Ordering from a pizza vending machine - how to do it and how does it taste?
Our reporter Joe Buncle tried one of the city's pizza vending machines
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00:00 [Multiple people talking]
00:19 So it's February the 9th, which is International Pizza Day.
00:23 Pizza is in demand. We're here to try pizza that's on demand
00:27 from a vending machine in Portsmouth City Centre. Now like lots of people I
00:31 absolutely love pizza. I've never had it from a vending machine
00:33 before. Now almost exactly a year ago I tried the Portsmouth Special Pizza
00:38 which contained banana, madras sauce and pineapple.
00:42 Now we're not going to go for anything that wacky today but let's see how pizza
00:45 tastes from a vending machine rather than a kitchen.
00:49 Right so here we are at the vending machine. Now I can't claim to understand
00:52 how this is going to work but let's give it a go. The instructions we've got here
00:56 'touch me I'll feed you 24/7' okay. Margherita mutiny.
01:02 It's all veg. Hot pizza okay.
01:07 Confirm.
01:10 Every 10 pizzas you buy next one is free. We'll see how the first one goes.
01:24 Okay so I've just ordered the pizza we've got for the Margherita mutiny.
01:28 Something quite simple so that we can compare it to
01:31 I suppose a normal pizza that doesn't come from a machine. So
01:34 it doesn't really tell us how long it's going to wait but we've got this bar
01:37 here coming along.
01:40 I'm guessing two, three minutes. Well I can't smell any pizza
01:47 but I'm guessing all the magic is happening in here. I can't even begin to
01:53 imagine how a machine could make a pizza to be
01:56 honest. I can't see anything going on but I can only assume there's a
02:03 Italian guy in there somewhere.
02:06 Okay so pizza's here let's have a look.
02:12 Okay I wouldn't say it looks like it's come from a machine although
02:18 I'm sure a proper pizza chef would have delicately placed these
02:22 around the pizza a bit more. But anyway it looks great. It's not sliced I don't
02:26 know how I was expecting that. We've got a little wooden knife though
02:28 so let's see if I can cut it. First impressions I mean it looks like a
02:34 normal pizza which is good. Definitely doesn't look like it was
02:38 made in a machine. It smells pretty good too.
02:42 And you know bonus points for not being a plastic knife.
02:51 Yeah yeah it just came from the machine. We were trying it out.
02:55 Yeah I mean it doesn't look like it's made from a machine.
02:58 Well let's find out. Enjoy it.
03:10 Is it nice? Yeah I mean I would never know that was from a machine. I'd never known
03:13 for a vending machine to be a pizza. I have heard bad reviews
03:18 about food in this but I was either in Portsmouth so it's
03:22 gonna be the best. Yeah definitely. It's a nice part. I'm not actually a
03:26 Pumby girl. I'm a new part I saw but I thought I was in Pumby.
03:33 What would you give that? 8 out of 10. 8 out of 10? Yeah very nice.
03:39 Cool I will definitely have to try that sometime then.
03:43 Yeah I mean I don't really know what I was expecting.
03:46 But yeah I mean it looks handmade. It tastes
03:51 it's nice and hot. It doesn't taste any more artificial than a normal
03:55 pizza. So I enjoyed it but I've got to be honest
03:59 I'm not a fussy eater. So more so than saying it was the best
04:02 pizza I ever had I would say I wouldn't be able to tell it came from a machine.
04:06 There is an argument to be made that maybe
04:09 now it's too easy to get some pizza when I suddenly fancy it.
04:13 But you know you've got delivery and stuff like that anyway.
04:17 So I would say I recommend it if you're interested.
04:20 If you're waiting for a train you've probably got that 10 minute window where
04:22 you can run across the road and have a pizza in your hands. So that's
04:26 a good thing in my books.
04:29 [BLANK_AUDIO]