Ian’s Pizza
3462 North Clark Street
Chicago, IL 60657
So, last Sunday the pizza club hit up Ian’s Pizza in Wrigleyville. Ian’s sells pizza by the slice and whole pizzas. It was similar to Art of Pizza in regard to its order-at-the-counter style. I will stop the comparisons there. Now, Ian’s definitely fits the bill of its Wrigleyville location -- it’s the perfect stop after a Cubs game (and hours at the bars in the area). It’s not really an ideal dine-in setting, but the atmosphere is perfect to give you a true taste of Chicago (post Cubs, Blackhawks or any other Chicago sporting event). And you know Chicago sports fans: win or lose, they’re out for a good time. We’re good sports, the belligerent drunk people coming in and out while we were there did not phase us; however, the atmosphere rating at Ian’s was hurt by the fact that there were multiple solicitors in and out of the restaurant while we were there, and not one employee asked them to leave. All in all, you could say that we enjoyed our experience at Ian’s -- the “service” rating was boosted by the fact that employees happily put our beer in their cooler for us!
Service: 3.67
Atmosphere: 2.25
Value: 3.83
We’ll give Ian’s props for their creative pizza combos -- they managed to put pretty much every drunk food you can think of on a pizza (it doesn’t get much better than that when you’re drunk!). I will say, that it is unlikely I would go near any of these combinations sober (taco pizza, burrito pizza, tortellini pizza, etc.), but I can definitely see that many of
them would be a drunk person’s dream come true. And as I mentioned, they pour in and out of this place by the dozen. We actually witnessed people eating some of these very combinations. Ian’s is known for it’s Mac & Cheese Pizza, and we were starving when we arrived, so I’ll admit it, we ordered a slice for the table to try while we waited for our pizzas. “Carbs+Carbs. How can you go wrong?” Mary says; and honestly, it wasn’t bad. Being the health nut among this group, I will not let my opinion over power the rest of the group -- everyone really thought this Mac&Cheese combination was pretty good.
Ian’s pizza was, as Dan put it, “good, but not great.” I, personally, really liked the crust -- kind of blend between a Neapolitan-style pizza, but HUGE, fold ‘em in half New York-style slices.
“Although most of the patrons could not, the thin crust stood up well!”
-- Kevin Smith
Our order: Barbecue Chicken Pizza w/pineapple
Pesto Tomato w/spinach and portabello mushrooms
Sausage, green peppers and onion (with pepperoni on half)
I’ll get the bad news over with. Although I complimented Ian’s on their creative pizza combos, their pesto tomato pizza was not so good -- stick to what you’re good at people (read: junk food). The pesto sauce was not very flavorful, and the pizza itself was just kind of bland. I’m not really sure what we were thinking ordering that after the girl in the Cubs t-shirt stumbled into our table mumbling expletive after expletive about how good her tortellini pizza and ordering her friend to try a bite as she shoved it down her throat. Well that’s enough of that -- we recommend that you stick to good ‘ol originals or junk food on pizza when you go to Ian’s.
We also ordered a bbq chicken pizza with pineapple. Now this was a delicious salty-sweet combination. My disappointment here was the fact that they used canned pineapple on the pizza. In the dead of a Chicago winter, I may have given it a pass, but pineapple is in season and fresh pineapple would have given this slice that something extra. Overall, pretty good.
Finally, the traditional sausage, green pepper and onion (w/pepperoni on half) was good , but nothing to write home about. We’ve obviously had better, but it was still pretty good. These sentiments were echoed around the table.
Here are the scores for Ian’s:
Crust: 3.67
Sauce: 3.00
Toppings: 3.25
Cheese: 3.42
Overall Quality: 3.33
Overall Taste: 3.42
Average: 3.31/5
Ian’s pizza is good, but know what you’re getting yourself into. This is a great place to come after an afternoon at Wrigley. It’s also probably a great place to stop in during the off-season. If you head up there on a Cubs game day, you’ve been warned. I’m not saying it’s not fun -- I’m just sayin’.
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