Next time you have a longing for a pizza and you reckon you know which type is the healthiest, put down the takeaway menu and think again. According to the consumer watchdogs from Which?, who carried out a survey of cheese, tomato and pepperoni pizzas available at both takeaway chains and supermarkets, if you really want the healthiest option - that is, the pizza with the least calories, salt and saturated fat - you should go for one of the supermarket deep pan or even stuffed crust frozen varieties.
Are you eating the healthiest type of pizza? Photo: Getty
Surprised? We were too. All these years so many of us have fooled ourselves into thinking thin crust pizzas were the lowest in fat and calories. And we were wrong all along.
Altogether the experts from Which? investigated 162 pizzas available at major supermarkets as well as Domino's and Pizza Hut takeaway pizzas, and compared them for calorie, fat, saturated fat and salt levels.
The thin crust pizzas, says the report, were often higher in fat and saturated fat than the deep pan and stuffed crust pizzas. Tesco's Italian Romana Margherita, with its 'ultra thin' base, for example, contained twice as much fat and saturated fat as the supermarket's Trattoria Verdi Deep Pan Cheese pizza.
And frozen supermarket pizzas were, on average, healthier than fresh supermarket pizzas (Morrison's frozen Thin and Crispy Pepperoni pizza had less fat, calories and salt than the fresh Thin and Crispy Pepperoni pizza).
The Which? report also criticised the food labels found on pizza packaging, claiming that the difference in nutrition labelling is too confusing.
So it's frozen stuffed crusts all round then?
What's your favourite pizza, and will you switch to deep pan now?