Type Pizza Place of origin United States of America | Region or state Quad Cities | |
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Created by Frank's Pizzeria (1955) Main ingredients Pizza dough with malt, tomato sauce with red chili flakes and cayenne, sausage, cheese Similar Iranian pizza, Scaccia, St Louis‑style pizza, Sardenara, Pizza pugliese | ||
Quad City-style pizza is a unique pizza style that originates from the Quad Cities region of Iowa and Illinois in the United States. The crust has a nutty taste, the tomato sauce is spicy, the toppings are under the cheese, and the pizza is cut into strips.
Contents
Preparation
Quad City-style pizza dough contains a "spice jam", which is heavy on malt, which lends a toasted, nutty flavor. The pizzas are hand-tossed to be stretched into an even quarter-inch thin crust with a slight lip ringing the edge. The sauce contains both red chili flakes and ground cayenne, and the smooth, thin tomato spread is more spicy than sweet. The sausage is typically a thick blanket of lean, fennel-flecked Italian sausage sometimes ground twice and spread from edge to edge. The pizzas are cooked using a special gas oven with an average cooking time of about 12 minutes. The pizza is cut into strips, as opposed to being cut in slices. An average 16-inch pizza has about 14 strips, and a 10-inch pizza has about 10 strips.
By region
The dish originates in the Quad Cities region of the United States. Purveyors as of April 2015 include:
The dish has been prepared in other areas of the United States, including Mesa, Arizona and Chicago. The Arizona location has closed.
Comparisons between establishments
In 2016, a group of Quad City residents reviewed and compared two popular brands of Quad City-style pizza, Harris and Wise Guys. The review used a numerical rubric to take into account the key aspects of the style including the nutty crust, spiced sauce and double ground fennel-seasoned sausage. Harris Pizza scored an 81/92 while Wise Guys scored a 75/92, indicating Harris to be a better model for Quad City-style pizza.
