by Lisa H Warren

Created on: August 02, 2008

Pizza is not without nutritional value, so it doesn't belong in the " complete junk food" category, but along with any nutritional value of pizza comes a lot of fat and salt. In addition, pizza crust adds another serving of carbohydrates to the diet, and not everyone wants or needs that.

One slice of cheese pizza can offer protein, iron, Vitamin A, and calcium. Depending on the topping, on slice could offer substantially more nutrition. Depending on the size of the slice and any topping(s), one slice of pizza need not be extremely high in calories. In fact, one slice may well be under 300 calories.

Not all slices of pizza are equal, however, so it's easy for some "deluxe" pizzas to exceed 300 calories a slice. Also, many people don't eat just one slice. Many eat two. Some eat three or more. Teens and young men are known to eat whole pizzas themselves, even if not in one sitting. This means that the male college student, who orders a pizza for dinner and eats the rest for the breakfast the next day, will have eaten in the area of 2400 calories within 24 hours (and that isn't including any other calories he has taken in over that period.

The middle-aged individual who eats two 270-calorie slices of pizza for lunch will be taking in 540 calories for lunch with just the pizza. The same obviously applies to the eight-year-old child who has a couple of slices of pizza for lunch. 540 calories is a lot of calories for anyone's lunch. With pizza, the price for any nutrition offered is that high calorie count.

What about the person who has one slice of pizza? One slice, of course, is likely to be under 300 calories, which isn't bad. Still, with those calories comes a high fat and salt content. Foods high in fat and salt are not considered "healthy" foods.

Although some pizzas are made with thin crust or crust aimed at keeping carbohydrates low, ordinary pizza crust adds those carbohydrates that most people don't want or need.

There are unhealthy foods ("complete junk foods") that offer no nutritional value whatsoever. Pizza is not one of those, Protein, calcium, Vitamin A, and iron are valuable nutrients, the importance of which should not be underestimated. With those good nutrients, however, pizza also brings a higher percentage of fat calories, more salt, more cholesterol, and more starch than is generally considered "healthy" or ideal.

Healthier pizza can be made by using lower fat cheese or eliminating cheese completely, but some pizza-lovers would not view the resulting meal as "pizza", and would instead consider it a completely different type of food.

As for that familiar pizza that we get delivered to our door in those shallow, white, boxes tucked in thermal bags to keep the pizza hot; well, the cold reality is that is a not-so-healthy food that should be reserved for being an occasional treat.

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