Pizza rolls

Cooked Totino's Pizza Rolls

Pizza rolls are a frozen food product consisting of bite-sized breaded pizza pockets with an interior of tomato sauce, cheese or cheese analogue, and various pizza toppings. They are sold in a variety of flavors including cheese, pepperoni, sausage, supreme, multiple imitation cheeses, and mixed meats. Other flavors include hamburger, cheeseburger, ham and cheese, and combination (pepperoni and sausage). Pizza snack rolls are designed to be quickly cooked in the oven or microwave. The name "pizza rolls" is a trademark of General Mills, current owner of the original product, currently sold under the Totino's brand.

Similar products are made by other brands and private labels. Since the original name is trademark protected, different names are used such as pizza bites, pizza snacks, or pizza poppers.

History

Pizza rolls were created in the mid-1960s in Duluth, Minnesota, United States, by product developer and cook Beatrice Ojakangas. She worked for food industry entrepreneur Jeno Paulucci, who specialized in canned and frozen Chinese food under the Chun King brand and was looking for new uses for his egg roll wrapping machine. According to Ojakangas, she started with over 50 filling ideas, including a number of sandwich flavors such as peanut butter and jelly. Several of her pizza-flavored concepts performed well on taste tests. Paulucci stated, "pizza rolls are nothing but egg rolls with pizza crust and filling." For the commercial production, Paulucci adopted a co-extrusion process using a Demaco extruder.[citation needed] Jeno's, Paulucci's frozen pizza brand, began using the Pizza Rolls trademark in 1967.

In 1985, Paulucci sold Jeno's to Pillsbury, which owned Totino's pizza. Jeno's Pizza Rolls were rebranded as Totino's Pizza Rolls in 1993. Pillsbury was sold to General Mills in 2001. After a series of commercial spoofs on Saturday Night Live, Totino's pizza rolls saw a boost in popularity and sales in 2016.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Pepperoni Pizza Rolls™". Totino's. General Mills. Archived from the original on January 31, 2024. Retrieved January 31, 2024.
  2. ↑ "Cheese Pizza Rolls™". Totino's. General Mills. Archived from the original on January 31, 2024. Retrieved January 31, 2024.
  3. ↑ "Triple Cheese Pizza Rolls™". Totino's. General Mills. Archived from the original on January 31, 2024. Retrieved January 31, 2024.
  4. ↑ "Totino's Products". Totino's. General Mills. Archived from the original on February 27, 2018. Retrieved February 16, 2018.
  5. ↑ "PIZZA ROLLS - Trademark Details". Justia. Archived from the original on May 1, 2021. Retrieved May 1, 2021.
  6. ↑ Johnston, Louis D. (April 29, 2021). "How Totino's secured Minnesota's slice of the frozen pizza market". MinnPost. Retrieved January 31, 2025.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  7. ↑ "Are Pizza Rolls Vegan? Can Vegans Eat Pizza Rolls?". Can Vegans Eat. February 18, 2022. Archived from the original on February 19, 2022. Retrieved February 19, 2022.
  8. 1 2 3 4 Johnston, Louis D.; Riley, Susan E. (May 19, 2021). "How (American) Chinese cuisine gave birth to the Minnesota-invented pizza roll". MinnPost. Retrieved March 1, 2024.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  9. ↑ Svitak Dean, Lee (October 9, 2016). "Adventure of a lifetime". Star Tribune. Minneapolis. pp. E7. Archived from the original on March 1, 2024. Retrieved March 1, 2024 – via Newspapers.com.
  10. ↑ Possis, Ann (December 5, 2016). Beatrice Ojakangas on her big Finnish family, pizza rolls (Radio broadcast). WTIP. Archived from the original on May 23, 2024. Retrieved March 1, 2024.
  11. ↑ Lovrien, Jimmy (October 7, 2023). "Northlandia: Area inventions include a cow on skates, nipple enhancers and Paulucci's golf glove". Duluth News Tribune. Retrieved March 1, 2024.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  12. ↑ Shapiro, T. Rees (November 30, 2011). "Jeno Paulucci, food visionary behind the pizza roll, dies at 93". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on December 20, 2016. Retrieved December 19, 2016.
  13. ↑ Jeno's v. Commissioner, 498 F. Supp. 472 (D. Minn. September 5, 1980).
  14. ↑ St. Anthony, Neal (March 10, 1986). "Doughboy is king of the pizza freezer". Star Tribune. Minneapolis. Archived from the original on January 31, 2021. Retrieved January 26, 2021 – via Newspapers.com.
  15. ↑ "Totino's History". Totino's. General Mills. Archived from the original on March 10, 2021. Retrieved February 16, 2018.
  16. ↑ Painter, Kristen Leigh (November 12, 2016). "General Mills has surprise growth star: Totino's frozen pizzas and rolls". The Minnesota Star Tribune. Archived from the original on March 27, 2019. Retrieved April 23, 2019.