Whether your pizza is fresh or frozen, you must read the composition and not find additives and other technological ingredients revealing ultra-processed foods.

Regarding the dough, to avoid spraying the daily carbohydrate counter, the percentage of filling should ideally be higher than that of the dough. Not like at Marie with 59% dough and 41% filling. The composition is simple, so it remains satisfactory.

This is not the case with the Fresh’Up Buitoni which nevertheless sports a Nutriscore B but in which you find:

• Gluten.
• Glucose syrup.
• Artificial flavors.
• Carrageenans.
• A synthetic antioxidant.
• Modified starches, phosphates …

Beware of the words “the dough that rises” or “soft”, rather prefer fine pasta to ultra-generous pasta.

Prefer a tomato sauce

Tomatoes contain a specific antioxidant, lycopene, which protects skin cells and the prostate. To choose your tomato well, avoid tomato paste diluted with water, which gives a rather orange color and is necessarily a little less flavorful. So give preference to tomato puree.

Pizzas containing several cheeses

Track down the denominations “cheese specialty” or “processed cheese” which are clever mixtures of:

• Cheeses, reconstituted skimmed milk, butter, milk proteins.
• Cast iron salts (E331, E452).
• Preservatives (E202, E234).
• Artificial flavors and flavor enhancers (E635).

Opt instead for real cheeses, emmental, mozzarella, goat cheese …

What ham pizzas?

Go hunting for low-quality hams, known as standard ham, as at Sodebo or Buitoni gorged with phosphates (E450 – E451 – E452). They are likely to increase the risk of kidney and cardiovascular disease.

Manufacturers are particularly fond of them because they retain water in the ham, which, according to them, prevents the ham from drying out, but above all which artificially increases the weight of the ham.

Instead, look for the name “superior ham”, which guarantees an absence of phosphates, as is the case with Picard in its royal pizzas or in the organic versions since these additives are prohibited in organic regulations.

Otherwise, prefer pizzas with raw hams, which in addition do not contain nitrites (E249, E250) or “beef-bolognese”.

Rely on the words “cooked over a wood fire”

Prefer this mention to the use of artificial flavors including the smoke aroma used at Dr Oetker Ristorante “special” … Certainly very special but artificially flavored, phosphatic, nitritated and salty.

Very high salt content

The salt content in pizzas can vary from single to double depending on the topping. Be careful with those that combine cheeses, chorizo, bacon, merguez, salami … which in addition to salt also provide saturated animal fats.

A 200 g portion of pizza covers 60% of the daily intake recommended by the WHO (set at 5 g maximum per day). As a benchmark, in the nutritional table, opt for pizzas with a salt content not exceeding 1-1.3 g of salt per 100 g.

Consumption per week

These pizzas should be eaten once a week at most because they are small bombs of carbohydrates, especially when everyone consumes their own pizza.

Between bread, pasta, potatoes, rice… (all starchy foods), carbohydrates are already omnipresent. It is imperative to burn them, that is to say “spend”, otherwise they will turn into fat.

A 200 g serving of pizza represents about 50 g of carbohydrates, while a buckwheat pancake (ham-gruyère-egg) represents only 17 g. The ideal is not to consume other starchy foods at the same meal, nor ultra-sweet desserts.

Above all, remember to systematically accompany your pizza with vegetables, cooked or raw (an endive salad for example at the moment) to at least provide:

• Fibers.
• Protective antioxidants.
• Potassium which partially counterbalances the excess salt.

The ideal is to make your “homemade” pizza

If you make your own pizza, you have complete control over the ingredients (fresh, seasonal) and each member of the family can put what they want: olives, mushrooms, salmon, vegetables …

You can even take a pizza dough already ready like the one from BioBleud family square, to make small portions as an aperitif, based on:

• Whole flours (wheat, spelled, rye) richer in nutrients, in soluble fibers perfect for lowering the glycemic index.
• Sourdough instead of baker’s yeast, which destroys part of the phytic acid in cereals and therefore increases the bioavailability of minerals.