Pizza's Days as 'Vegetable' Could Be Numbered

You may soon find it tougher to pack in a day's recommended number of vegetable servings. Rep. Jared Polis is on a quest to undo what some may consider to be the best thing Congress did in all of 2011: its declaration that pizza is still considered a vegetable—at least where school lunches are concerned. Pizza is currently granted that designation thanks to its two tablespoons of tomato sauce, and the Colorado Democrat hopes his SLICE Act (seriously) will change all that, reports the Los Angeles Times.

Polis' "School Lunch Improvements for Children’s Education" would adjust the math, so that pizza's 1/8 cup of tomato paste counted only as 1/8 cup of vegetables, rather than a full serving. "Pizza certainly has its place in school meals," says Polis, but he thinks we shouldn't equate it "with broccoli, carrots, and celery." The American Frozen Food Institute isn't too excited about the bill, noting it would "all but remove foods made with tomato paste from school cafeterias, in spite of the significant nutritional value offered by tomato paste." (More pizza stories.)