UPDATE: I am saddened to tell you right here right now, the round, calorie-ridden original pizza pocket as we knew and loved it is gone. In its place will sit a pale simulacra. An imposter of the highest order. People might try to tell you otherwise, “hey it’s the same we swear.” But where our beloved pocket was round, this “thing” is oval with some sort of faux-grill marks. There’s now some kind of “Harvest” version full of healthy shit. It now comes in a two pack not a four pack. So there you have it, the whole, sad truth. I am just a messenger folks, I mourn alongside you. Here is McCain’s statement to VICE, in full:
Despite false social media reports to the contrary, McCain has no intention of discontinuing Canadians’ beloved Pizza Pockets. We know how much Canadians love our Pizza Pockets. In fact, in the coming days consumers will see Pizza Pockets in a whole new way. With a new look but the same recipe and great flavours Pizza Pockets are now part of an exciting new snacking line up that we’re calling McCain Marché. Packed with wholesome ingredients and irresistible flavours, McCain Marché snacks are oven-baked, never fried, and come in a variety of choices to satisfy more tastes and cravings. In addition to Pizza Pockets, the McCain Marché line-up includes: Harvest Pockets—the perfect balance of mouth-watering flavours and wholesome ingredients in a delicious wholegrain or rosemary sourdough pocket, available in Roasted Chicken Club, Chicken and Broccoli and Three Cheese and Spinach recipes; and Protein Pop’ables—bite-sized snacks, delivering 14 to 23 grams of protein per serving, available in Chicken Parmesan, Jamaican Beef and Italian Sausage varieties.
We created the recipes for McCain Marché inspired by the flavours we know Canadians love. For nearly 60 years, McCain has proudly made some of Canadians’ favourite foods and we’re committed to continue introducing exciting new products, like McCain Marché, to meet changing needs and tastes.
There comes, in each of our lives, a time when the innocence of childhood is violently snatched away from us permanently, often inexplicably. Maybe you experience it while rewatching your favourite childhood movie as an adult and realize the giants of your imagination are now little more than ants. Perhaps it’s when you reconnect with your first crush and are bowled over by their sheer averageness no matter how hard you try to remember how magic they once were. For me that tragic day has finally arrived, as I, mere hours ago, learned that McCain Pizza Pockets are being discontinued in Canada. The news broke this afternoon on Twitter when a responsible business man named Gene Coleman of Coleman’s Grocery in Newfoundland tweeted the following:
Videos by VICE
As any journalist hot on one of the biggest stories of their career, I frantically started to dig deeper for more information. In a bid to get clarification from McCain Foods Canada I instead got a complicated run-around. Much like M. Night Shyamalan’s The Sixth Sense I began to wonder if I was seeing dead people or if I was myself the dead people. In the initial call to the Toronto corporate office I was told McCain’s hasn’t been in the pizza game since 2014. Huh. You and I both know this simply isn’t true. (They sold their pizza business to Dr. Oetker in 2014, but hung onto the Pizza Pockets for the time being.) Then I was directed to a corporate line that booted me to a generic voicemail service. Another call to corporate and I was told to call McCain’s UK. As though the British could help me on this, the most Canadian of stories. I believe I can say with great confidence that the person I spoke to has likely never heard of a pizza pocket. I will update this story as soon as I hear from the company on the future status of said pockets. McCain’s, I implore you, call me.
An imposter pocket.
Now, just what is a pizza pocket? Webster’s dictionary quite rudely has no official definition, but perhaps that’s for the best as a pizza pocket truly defies explanation. It’s both exactly what you imagine (pizza in a bread pocket) and like nothing you’ve ever experienced. It is cheese and meat and vegetables and sauce turned in on itself. It is the expanse of a child’s world both real and imagined. It is after-school cartoons. It is bike rides. It is everything, and yet, it is nothing.
It is the soundtrack of our youth. Pizza perfection in a crust that’s baked, not fried.
In closing, dear reader, I leave you with this: I honestly prefer Pilsbury’s Pizza Pops, and if they ever try to take those away from me you’ll have to do it over my dead, sodium-bloated body.
Follow Amil Niazi on Twitter.
