Comfort-food favorite French bread pizza is back — and you can make it

SEATTLE — Mention French bread pizza, and people have feelings. The reason is right there on the Stouffer’s French Bread Pizza box, below the cozy logo of the name inside the outline of a pot: “Celebrating 40 Years,” it says in a cursive flourish, and, elsewhere, “Back to the Taste You Love,” with “Love” inside the shape of a heart. (Somewhat unnervingly, the box also feels the need to specify, “Made with 100% real cheese” and that the pepperoni contains “pork, chicken & beef.” Chicken seems weird for pepperoni-making, but then chicken is cheap, and so is Stouffer’s French Bread Pizza — a box of two for $3.99.)

French bread pizza is a classic American come-home-from-school-and-eat-it-in-front-of-the-TV snack — Stouffer’s if you were lucky, but also easy enough for you to make yourself (sometimes, sigh, substituting English muffins). Hot gooeyness atop a pleasingly shaped, light-and-crispy bread-torpedo — many happy latchkey moments were made of this; just add a glass of cold milk and some reruns.