Pizza Hut Spring Fling - Blogger's Meet-up

A few weeks ago I received an invite for a Blogger's meetup at Pizza Hut. The meet-up was at their Clifton Branch (the one opposite Boat Basin) and the meeting agenda was to share the details of their Spring Fling campaign.

To be honest, its been a while since I have had Pizza Hut. With so many new pizza delivery outlets opening up it's easy to forget about the chain that started off the pizza trend in Pakistan. More importantly, Pizza Hut is a brand that I have always associated with dining out  - delivery is convenient but no matter how quickly the order comes, it just can't beat a pizza fresh out of the oven. The fact that there is no need to clean up afterwards is well icing on the cake! So while there might be new chains opening left, right & centre, when you need to go out for a traditional & comforting thick crust pizza, Pizza Hut is almost always the place of choice. Let's also not forget Pizza Hut for office farewells! .. 

Moving on from where I sidetracked the conversation to the actual meetup. 

Out of all the blogger's invited, my habit of being punctual resulted in me being the first person there (obviously). Blogger Meet-up Lesson for next time - come at least 30 minutes after the stated time. The host (the ABM) was there and we had a good chat regarding well Pizza Hut, the campaign & what exactly was the point of the meetup (it was my first one so well duh). After a few minutes, more people started coming in one by one & introductions were made. Once the entire group was there, we had a detailed & very lively discussion on Pizza Hut and their on-going campaign - the positives & the negatives; to what they are doing well, to where they can improve with ideas & suggestions for improvement. Details of the deal and my comments follow: 

Spring Fling Deal: 
Currently Pizza Hut has an ongoing campaign titled 'Spring Fling' which you might have seen on billboards here and there. Aptly titled Spring Fling to signal the end of Winter in Karachi, it offers limited edition/seasonal meal deals by Pizza Hut. The outdoor & store campaigns (billboard & promo material inside the outlets) features the deals itself, using a flower themed background to indicate the spring element. However, on the social media front, the Spring Fling campaign utilizes two brand mascots titled Sherry & Veeni to generate a buzz and interact with fans on both Twitter & Facebook. 

The Spring Fling deal itself is simply a deal for 4 people with an appetizer (garlic bread), pizzas (of course) and dessert (one serving of their chocolate brownie). 

For people who like to share Pizza's there's Fling 1 - 2 regular pizzas, 4 garlic bread & 1 serving of chocolicious brownie for Rs. 999 (excluding tax)

For people who like to have an individual pizza of their own there's Fling 2 - 4 personal pan pizzas, 4 garlic bread & 1 serving of chocolicious brownie for Rs. 999 (excluding tax)

Toppings available include: Chicken Tikka, Chicken Fajita, Fajita Sicilian, Hot & Spicy and Euro

Pizza Hut Spring Fling Details (Image taken from Pizza Hut's Facebook page) 

So basically if you order this deal, and you eat like a normal person (not like 4 large & hungry guys) it will cost you Rs. 292/head (inc tax) and if you add a pitcher to it, then it's around Rs. 350/head which is pretty good value for money! If you do eat like 4 hungry guys, then you need to pay extra and order more. 

They did serve the deal to us with all four flavors with a pitcher on the side. I am not going to review the food in detail because this was an invited event where I did not pay for the food. Secondly, its Pizza Hut and I am sure that almost everyone has had Pizzas & Garlic Bread from them at some time. If someone hasn't, then they need to! Everyone has to have Pizza Hut at least once in their lives, especially our Desified Chicken Tikka. However, in short, the garlic bread was hot & crispy, the Pizza was hot, loaded with cheese and had that traditional thick crust which is a Pizza Hut trademark. I will give some additional comments on the brownie since I was wondering if it was going to be enough and it was. It is NOT one brownie, its actually one serving of chocolicious brownie (picture attached below) so two large pieces of chocolate brownie with chocolate sauce which is enough for 3-4 people. 



Overall, I really enjoyed the meet-up - the food, the company as well as the experience. There are people who say that these meetups are only a promotional gimmick and of course they are. However, it is also a good way for a company to get constructive feedback from relevant people on their campaign. I had started following Pizza Hut both on Facebook & Twitter once I got this invite, I noticed that there was a positive shift in the way that they were conducting their social media campaign. I can't be 100% sure whether it was a result of the discussion, but if it is then kudos to the team for listening to both the positive & the negative and improving on it. 

P.s. When ordering the deal, DO NOT leave the end crust! 
Being a Muslim, it is obligatory on us to finish whatever is on our plates. Additionally, think about all those less fortunate than you who don't have anything to eat. 
Anas said: “The Prophet ordered us not to leave anything in the plate and he said: “You do not know in which portion of your food Allāh has put the Barakah.”(Muslim)

Home Made Pizza

I love Sundays. Not only is the day ultra relaxing, but by having a late breakfast, there's more time to prepare an elaborate lunch. This week I made Pizza, and home-made Pizza is so much better and reasonable than Pizza purchased from outside. Not only is it fresh & hot out of the oven, but it can be completely customized.

Pizza Dough
Quantity ..Makes 3 Large Pizza's; We had two for lunch and froze the third one for dinner time.

Ingredients:

• 1 kg flour (maida)
• One packet of instant yeast
• 2 eggs
• Oil  - 2 tbsp
• Salt - 2 tsp
• Sugar - 2 tsp
• Warm Milk 1 1/2 cup
• Luke -warm water - 1/2 cup

Method: 
Mix yeast with flour and then mix the salt and sugar. Make a well in the center of the flour and add eggs and oil. Start by mixing the dough by adding 1 cup of milk and then add half a cup more. Mix and knead the dough lightly.Add 1/2 cup of water little by little till the dough comes together and can be shaped in the form of a ball. Make sure that you don't knead the dough too much. Form the dough into a round and apply oil around the entire dough and then put it into a warm place to rise for at least 1 1/2 hour. After one hour, just flatten or knead the dough once and leave to rest again for about 1/2 hour to 1 hour.

In the meanwhile, prepare the fillings as follows:

Filling - Ingredients
Onions - 2 (chopped into small pieces)
Capsicum - 2 (chopped into small pieces)
Tomatoes - 2 (chopped) (Alternatively, the tomatoes can be sliced thinly and put on top of the pizza at the end after which they become dried, however, i don't like dried tomatoes hence I prefer to put chopped tomatoes)
Garlic Mushrooms - Instead of using plain mushrooms, I prefer making garlic mushrooms. For garlic mushrooms just take one can of buttom mushrooms, slice them thinly. Then heat about 2 tbsp oil in a pan, add 2 tsp of garlic paste, saute the garlic paste for a minute then add the mushrooms. Season with a tsp of salt and 2 tsp of crushed red chilli flakes. Saute for about 5 minutes.
Olives (Green and Black) - 3 tbsp of each type of olives
Chicken - I used K&N's chicken chunks (about 100 grams) cut into small pieces
Cheese - 225 gms Mozzarella (Sliced) and 225 grams Cheddar Cheese (Grated) 

Assembling & Baking the Pizza:
Pre-heat oven to 200 Degree's Centigrade.The dough should have risen up and be quite soft. Knead it for like half a minute. Then put about a table spoon of oil on my tray, take a ball of dough and start sort of pushing it into the trays with my fingers. The dough is quite elastic so it will stretch a bit back into place. When it does that, i just let it rest for a minute while i start on the next tray and then come back and start pushing it into the corners.Once the dough has been placed in the trays, then let it rest for about 15 minutes before starting to top with the fillings.

My way of doing it is to first start with the sauce. Depending on the amount of time available, I either make my own sauce; use a combo of ketchup and chilli garlic ketchup; or use store-bought pizza. In order to make my own sauce, I take about about 2 tsp of garlic, saute 1 tsp of garlic in it, add 1 cup of tomato puree, then season with salt, chilli powder/red chilli flakes, Italian herbs, worchestire sauce & Italian herbs.

This time I had a bottle of store - bought pizza sauce which I needed to finish so I mixed about 2 tbsp of pizza sauce with 1 tbsp of Hot & Spicy ketchup for the base. Then I added 1/2 tsp of salt, 1 tsp of white pepper and 1 tsp of basil.

Then add a little bit of cheese, then add onions, capsicum, tomatoes, mushrooms and chicken. Then add grated cheddar cheese and slices of mozzarella cheese. After that finally top with the green and black olives so that they add a bit of color.

Then bake in the oven for about 35-45 minutes till the dough is light golden and the cheese is also melted and slightly brown on top. I prefer a crisper crust and top hence i bake it for a few minutes longer.