Reverse Engineering/Cloning Papa John's Pizza Sauce

[c0mpl3x]

pete

have you ever used stanislaus full red for cloning the sauce?

[Pete-zza]

I tried your sauce clone, but every one thought it came out much too sweet. Did I use the wrong type of pure? It actually seemed a little on the sweet side right out of the can.

Sonic98,

Thank you for your feedback.

As member November mentioned earlier in this thread, there are limitations to trying to reverse engineer and clone a pizza sauce using only one's tastebuds, which can vary from one person to another and even at different times for the same person. Unfortunately, at the time I conducted my PJ sauce experiments all I had was my tastebuds. But it is clear from the PJ sauce ingredients list I started with that sugar is added to the already sweet (naturally) Stanislaus tomatoes used in PJ's regular pizza sauce. For some people, that can mean a sauce that is cloyingly sweet and, from reports I have read, there are many people who will no longer buy PJ pizzas because the sauce is too sweet for them, not to mention the above average amount of sugar in the PJ dough/crust that will also contribute to the overall sweetness of the pizza. As one who is very sensitive to the presence of sugar in many different foods, I can understand that reaction. If it weren't for the fact that I was trying to reverse engineer and clone the basic PJ pizza sauce, I perhaps wouldn't personally choose a sauce as sweet as those I made.

In your case, I believe you have several options. You can 1) repeat the sauce formulation you used but reduce the amount of added sugar, 2) ask for a sample of the PJ pizza sauce the next time you buy a PJ pizza (but not the sauce in the little tubs) and conduct your own reverse engineering/cloning tests, or 3) use a different pizza sauce that contains little or no sugar. I suppose you could also use less sweet tomatoes than the Stanislaus and Escalon fresh-pack tomatoes, as I did with the Wal-Mart crushed tomatoes, and add whatever amount of sugar satisfies your tastebuds. If you decide to go with options 1) or 2), I hope you will return to the forum and report on your results, either on this thread or a new thread if you wish.

Peter

[Pete-zza]

pete

have you ever used stanislaus full red for cloning the sauce?

c0mpl3x,

No, I have not tried the Stanislaus Full Red tomatoes. In all of my PJ reverse engineering/cloning experiments, both for the dough/pizzas and sauce, I have tried to use ingredients that our members have a good chance of finding either in supermarkets or by mail order at reasonable prices, and in small can sizes (28 ounces) in the case of canned tomatoes. In the past, I have been able to locate the small cans of Stanislaus tomatoes, like Tomato Magic and I believe the Full Red, but it is a hit or miss proposition as to whether the store where I have located these tomatoes--an Italian food market in Dallas--will have them on its shelves at any given time. The 6-in-1s in small cans I purchase online from time to time as I need them. I am sure that I can obtain the Stanislaus and Escalon fresh-pack tomatoes from pennmac (http://www.pennmac.com/page/27) in the #10 cans but I have not gone that route thus far. Also, in my case, I am often able to get the large cans of some Stanislaus tomatoes at the Italian food market  in Dallas.

Peter

[c0mpl3x]

c0mpl3x,

No, I have not tried the Stanislaus Full Red tomatoes. In all of my PJ reverse engineering/cloning experiments, both for the dough/pizzas and sauce, I have tried to use ingredients that our members have a good chance of finding either in supermarkets or by mail order at reasonable prices, and in small can sizes (28 ounces) in the case of canned tomatoes. In the past, I have been able to locate the small cans of Stanislaus tomatoes, like Tomato Magic and I believe the Full Red, but it is a hit or miss proposition as to whether the store where I have located these tomatoes--an Italian food market in Dallas--will have them on its shelves at any given time. The 6-in-1s in small cans I purchase online from time to time as I need them. I am sure that I can obtain the Stanislaus and Escalon fresh-pack tomatoes from pennmac (http://www.pennmac.com/page/27) in the #10 cans but I have not gone that route thus far. Also, in my case, I am often able to get the large cans of some Stanislaus tomatoes at the Italian food market  in Dallas.

Peter

ill ship you a #10 can of full red if you are interested.  it's re-labeled to that of a local pizza distributor that used to be a multi-million dollar/year company that supplied sports venues and stadiums with pizza for the pittsburgh/tri-state (ohio/west virginia/pennsylvania)

[Pete-zza]

ill ship you a #10 can of full red if you are interested.  

c0mpl3x,

Thank you very much for the kind offer. However, the next time I go into Dallas I should be able to pick up a large can of the Full Red.

Peter

[c0mpl3x]

c0mpl3x,

Thank you very much for the kind offer. However, the next time I go into Dallas I should be able to pick up a large can of the Full Red.

Peter

$5 + shipping and the can is yours if you don't feel like spending the time/gas/etc to drive all the way out there 

also based on the info on the back of these cans they have changed since i last bought them and are no longer full-red

"concentrated crushed tomatoes, HF corn syrup, salt, olive oil, spice, dehydrated onion, garlic and citric acid"

[Sonic98]

Sonic98,

Thank you for your feedback.

As member November mentioned earlier in this thread, there are limitations to trying to reverse engineer and clone a pizza sauce using only one's tastebuds, which can vary from one person to another and even at different times for the same person. Unfortunately, at the time I conducted my PJ sauce experiments all I had was my tastebuds. But it is clear from the PJ sauce ingredients list I started with that sugar is added to the already sweet (naturally) Stanislaus tomatoes used in PJ's regular pizza sauce. For some people, that can mean a sauce that is cloyingly sweet and, from reports I have read, there are many people who will no longer buy PJ pizzas because the sauce is too sweet for them, not to mention the above average amount of sugar in the PJ dough/crust that will also contribute to the overall sweetness of the pizza. As one who is very sensitive to the presence of sugar in many different foods, I can understand that reaction. If it weren't for the fact that I was trying to reverse engineer and clone the basic PJ pizza sauce, I perhaps wouldn't personally choose a sauce as sweet as those I made.

In your case, I believe you have several options. You can 1) repeat the sauce formulation you used but reduce the amount of added sugar, 2) ask for a sample of the PJ pizza sauce the next time you buy a PJ pizza (but not the sauce in the little tubs) and conduct your own reverse engineering/cloning tests, or 3) use a different pizza sauce that contains little or no sugar. I suppose you could also use less sweet tomatoes than the Stanislaus and Escalon fresh-pack tomatoes, as I did with the Wal-Mart crushed tomatoes, and add whatever amount of sugar satisfies your tastebuds. If you decide to go with options 1) or 2), I hope you will return to the forum and report on your results, either on this thread or a new thread if you wish.

Peter

I had actually used Hunts Tomatoe pureee. I will try something different next time. I will also go with the orignal amount of salt you listed the 7/8 t insead of the 3 t. I do plan on going to PJ and getting of their sauce so I can compare. I actually did not try toyr dough recipe as I alrrady had one in mind, but I will try yours. I want to try a different tomato product as the base, but I'm not sure if I can get the full red. I have no problem ordering something off the new if I have to though

[Sonic98]

Doskocil (which you can get from just about any vendor)...you can try others, but the flavors are obviously different.

(they use Doskocil for all their meats I think)

I wonder where I can get other toppings. It's kinda hard to find any pizza toppings other than pepperoni on grocery stores though I did recently find a nice brand of sausage crumbles that worked well on my attempts to make Pete's clone

[Stevorino]

I am making this sauce for my PJ Clone.  Just wanted to type up a couple of early impressions.

I made it with Kroger great value, I looked for the 6-in-1 product but didn't see it at two stores.  I'll keep an eye out for it.

I put all the ingredients listed into a blender and pulverized it with the 'margarita mode' (as my wife and I call it) and it turned out pretty decent at first taste.  I did NOT further crush the herbs.  That seemed a bit overkill at first...but after tasting the sauce, I can see the value for next time.

I plan on letting it sit in the fridge in an airtight container overnight so the flavors blend a bit.  I'll post my thoughts.

[c0mpl3x]

I am making this sauce for my PJ Clone.  Just wanted to type up a couple of early impressions.

I made it with Kroger great value, I looked for the 6-in-1 product but didn't see it at two stores.  I'll keep an eye out for it.

I put all the ingredients listed into a blender and pulverized it with the 'margarita mode' (as my wife and I call it) and it turned out pretty decent at first taste.  I did NOT further crush the herbs.  That seemed a bit overkill at first...but after tasting the sauce, I can see the value for next time.

I plan on letting it sit in the fridge in an airtight container overnight so the flavors blend a bit.  I'll post my thoughts.

at PJ, we are using sauce canned 9 months ago.    i've been there for almost a year, and their sauce is 7-10 months from canned date, to the date that we get it.   it sits for quite some time

[Pete-zza]

I made it with Kroger great value, I looked for the 6-in-1 product but didn't see it at two stores.  I'll keep an eye out for it.

Steve,

There have been reports in the past that some Krogers carry the 6-in-1s but I have never found them in any Krogers near me, even their Signature stores, but I have found them in a specialty Italian food market near me, sometimes in the small cans but more often in the #10 cans. There are many online sources for the 6-in-1s but many of our members order them directly from Escalon at http://www.escalon.net/products.aspx. I believe that PJs is still using a Stanislaus product, which, like the 6-in-1s, is a high quality fresh-pack tomato.

Peter

[Stevorino]

I'll have to look around at the other local grocery stores.  There's another 2-3 stores near my house that are a bit 'higher-end' than the nearby Kroger.

I'm taking the dough out of the fridge now - so I'll post my impressions later tonight/tomorrow.

[Lydia]

Papa John's Tomato Sauces

Quote from article; New York post:

Almost all sauces are reconstituted, from cooking tomatoes at a high temperature and evaporating them to create a concentrated paste that can be stored for two years without going bad and can be transported easily. If you’re going to make tomato sauce, you need to add water and cook it again. The sauce made from tomatoes grown in Stanislaus County in California is cooked only once, so they say it preserves volatiles, or flavor components. That’s probably true, but I don’t know anyone who has done a study about it. Stanislaus companies sued to try and distinguish their sauce from the ones that are common commercially.

Papa John’s used it, too, but two years ago they switched to Heinz tomato sauce made from tomato paste. [UPDATE 5/5: Chris Sternberg, senior vice president for communications at Papa John's, contacted The Food section and says: Papa John's uses only fresh-packed tomato sauce and has never used tomato paste for its sauce. Sternberg says the company uses fresh-packed sauce from both Stanislaus and Heinz.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/all-we-can-eat/books/qa-ripe-author-arthur-allen.html

at the link below you can see the papa johns "fully prepared pizza sauce" being processed at Heinz-Escalon plant.

Heinz California Tomato Tour August '10

http://picasaweb.google.com/elliotpope/HeinzCaliforniaTomatoTourAugust10#

For the Heinz product I would look into the Bell'orto line of tomatoes first for a best match. They are very flavorful high quality tomatoes.

[Pete-zza]

Lydia,

Thank you very much for your post.

I know that big companies can't let themselves be dependent on a single supplier for critical items and therefore try to avoid sole source contracts. Hence, they have backup suppliers to the main supplier or spread the business around to multiple suppliers. I tried both the Escalon 6-in-1s and the Stanislaus Tomato Magic tomatoes in my tests, mainly because I was able to find them in small cans. For those who cannot find the small cans, I recommended the Wal-Mart crushed tomatoes.

Peter

[CDNpielover]

I just made this sauce and it's AWESOME.  Can't wait to see what it wil taste like after 24 hours in the fridge!  Thanks for sharing this, Peter!   

[Pete-zza]

I just made this sauce and it's AWESOME.  Can't wait to see what it wil taste like after 24 hours in the fridge!  Thanks for sharing this, Peter!   

I'm glad you liked it. It seems to work pretty well on a Papa John's type of pizza although I have used it on other types of pizzas also.

Peter

[CDNpielover]

yea I don't get Papa John's often since it's not too close to my house.  I have to agree with the others that the sauce is really sweet - i've never noticed that at PJ's before.  however, i REALLY like it.  this might be my new go-to sauce.  thanks again Mr. Pete!

[johnamus]

Peter,

In your opinion is lemon juice a viable addition in order to match the citric acid level in PJ's sauce?

-John

[Pete-zza]

In your opinion is lemon juice a viable addition in order to match the citric acid level in PJ's sauce?

John,

I have never done it, but I understand that some members do use lemon juice as a substitute for citric acid. As an alternative approach, one can use actual citric acid, which is readily available in powdered form. I have a small packet of citric acid that I purchased some time ago from an Indian food store to try to replicate a Pizza Hut pizza sauce, but I couldn't detect a big difference so I did not pursue the matter further.

As you know, Papa John's uses a Stanislaus tomato product, which does include citric acid. By contrast, Escalon, which makes the 6-in-1 products, says that it does not add citric acid to its products, as it notes at http://www.escalon.net/about_us.aspx where it says:

Unlike competitive tomato products, citric acid (a sour tasting preservative) is never added to any Escalon branded product. As a result, the final products are tantalizing in color, and so true to the sweet taste of fresh tomatoes that you will think they were just plucked from the vine.

But, the above quote should not be interpreted to mean that the Escalon tomato products do not have any citric acid. I once spoke with a food broker in the Dallas area who deals with several suppliers of canned tomato products and when I mentioned that Escalon tomato products had no citric acid, he corrected me and said that all tomatoes have some citric acid and that producers of canned tomatoes regularly adjust levels of citric acid in their products. In Escalon's case, it just does not add any more citric acid to its tomatoes. But it is there naturally and, in that vein, you will often see that a tomato can label says that there is naturally occurring citric acid in their product. It's possible that if the amounts of citric acid are below a certain level the producer/canner does not have to list the citric acid on its labels. I would imagine that there is an FDA regulation on the matter.

Peter

[Pete-zza]

Today, at Reply 8 at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,16096.msg162383.html#msg162383, I reported on a phone call that I made to the company that makes a new line of tomato products that are sold at Wal-Mart under the name of Classico, a company that, like Escalon, is owned by Heinz. The specific product that I called about is the Classico crushed tomatoes. As noted in Reply 8, I was told that the Classico crushed tomatoes are very similar to the Escalon 6-in-1s that I have used to make a Papa John's clone pizza sauce for use with PJ clone pizzas. In fact, the Classico crushed tomatoes are produced by Escalon. I can't see any reason why the Classico crushed tomatoes can't be used in lieu of the 6-in-1s to make a credible PJ clone pizza sauce. I suspect the same is also true of the Classico ground peeled and unpeeled tomatoes that are also sold at Wal-Mart's. They are all of the fresh-pack variety, as is the case with the Stanislaus tomatoes used by Papa John's for its pizza sauce in its stores.

Peter