Pizza Crust

Pizza crust is made from wheat, which grows to about 24 inches high. Wheat kernels are harvested off the plant, taken to a grain elevator, and then sold for processing where they are often milled into flour. Most pizza crusts are made from red spring wheat or hard red winter wheat grown in the central region of the United States. Here in Illinois, we mostly grow soft red winter wheat. Illinois wheat has less protein than other types of wheat used to make pizza crusts. However, Illinois wheat flour can be blended with higher protein wheat flour for use in thin crust pizza.

No Gluten? No Problem!

Some people are not able to digest gluten, the protein found in wheat flour. Luckily, there are creative ways for these people to still enjoy pizza! Alternative pizza crusts can be made from vegetables like cauliflower, broccoli, and squash, or from different types of flour made from almonds or corn!

Tomatoes

Pizza Sauce is made from tomatoes. Tomato plants take 75-85 days to produce ripe fruit. The seeds are often started indoors while it is still cold outside and then transplanted outdoors after the seedlings are four to six weeks old. The plants are supported with stakes to keep them from falling to the moist ground. The tomatoes used for pizza sauce are harvested with a machine that allows for maximum efficiency since the tomatoes will be blended into sauce anyway. Herbs, such as oregano, dill, and garlic are added to tomatoes used in pizza sauce to give the sauce a special taste.

Cheese

Cheese is made out of milk from dairy cows. Illinois companies produce more than 77 million pounds of cheese each year. Kraft Foods, a major cheese producer, is in Northfield, Illinois. Cheddar is the most popular cheese, followed by mozzarella, which is commonly used on pizza. We all have our favorite toppings, but chances are, almost everyone likes cheese.

In fact, 37% of all pizza orders include a plain cheese pizza!

Green Pepper

There are many varieties of garden peppers, but the large fruited sweet pepper is the favorite of most Americans and a popular pizza topping. Peppers grow on small bushy plants. They are commonly eaten on pizza in their immature green stage, but they are also delicious after they have fully ripened and turned red or yellow.

Pepperoni and Sausage

Pepperoni and sausage are meats made from pigs. Illinois ranks 4th in the nation for pork production. The animals are fed a special blend of ground corn, soybeans, vitamins, and minerals. The pigs go to the market in five to six months when they weigh 240-250 pounds. The meat from the pigs is called pork. It is ground up and special seasonings are added to make sausage, salami, hot dogs, bacon, and pepperoni.

Onions

U.S. farmers plant approximately 125,000 acres of onions each year. Three hundred of those acres can be found in Illinois on approximately 70 farms. Onion bulbs are raised either from seed or "sets". Onion bulbs grow underground and have long green tops. After they are picked and cleaned, they are either sold at grocery stores or sent to processing plants. At processing plants, they are diced or processed to be put into food such as spaghetti, barbecue sauce, and pizza. Each of us eats about 22 pounds of onions per year.

Mushrooms

There are over 10,000 mushroom types throughout the world, and scientists are discovering more all the time. Only about 60 different mushroom types are grown commercially for food. There are over 300 commercial mushroom growers in the United States. Mushrooms grow in cool, dark places. They lack chlorophyll, the green substance used by plants to make food, so they survive by soaking up nutrients from organic matter in the soil.