Pizza Place in Small Indiana Town Drawing Crowds
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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowThe population of Mount Summit, Indiana is fewer than 400, but the number tends to swell ten-fold on weekends. What’s the draw to the tiny town in Henry County? A restaurant that is quickly becoming a can’t-miss-destination for pizza lovers because of its unique, Italian wood-fired grill.
“It’s crazy the people that come through here,” Tracy Draper, co-owner of 1000 Wood Fired Pizza, told Around INdiana reporter Mary-Rachel Redman. “We open the doors, and there’s a line that never stops on the weekends.”
The hidden gem located between New Castle and Muncie is said to serve some of the best pizza in the Midwest.
In an effort to create an authentic “taste of Italy,” co-owner Darrell Draper says he purchased the seven-foot Italian-built brick oven along the East Coast.
“I found an oven that was in Boston. A restaurant over there had ordered it and it’s shifted on this base like an inch, and they didn’t want so I picked it up and hauled all the way here,” said Draper.
Moving it to Indiana was no easy task either, as the center section weighs 8,500 pounds. Draper says it is one of only a handful of woodfire ovens like this in the state.
While the oven takes center stage at the restaurant, Draper says the ingredients are every bit a part of the success of the five-year-old pizza place.
“All of our food is from all over the world. The dough that we use in our pizzas is made in Italy and shipped here twice a week,” said Draper.
Draper says this year, sales are on track to surpass $2 million. Pretty impressive for a guy in retirement and with no prior restaurant experience.
“I just played with food all my life as a hobby,” said Draper. “The people have a good time coming here and we work really hard to please each and every one of them.”