For this outing into the Ames dining scene, we headed to the Pizza Kitchens, home of the Lasagna Factory. Or at least that’s what the sign out front advertised.

Tom, however, was skeptical.

Pizza Kitchens is a very nice restaurant, plain and simple. It’s clean and spacious, and it’s located below ground — a nice touch for any restaurant in these post-Cold War ’90s.

In order to get to the dining area, visitors must descend one story below ground into a retroesque seating area.

By retro, we mean we felt like we had wandered into a circa-’20s speakeasy, complete with a large zebra sculpture of some sort.

We felt like at any moment, some showgirl, not to be confused with Elizabeth Berkley in “Showgirls,” was going to walk out onto a hidden stage and serenade us with easy listening and cool jazz.

We were, needless to say, intrigued by the atmosphere.

Pizza Kitchens seems like a breath of culture in a city dominated by fast, cheap, delivered-to-your-dorm pizza places, and we liked that.

In addition to pizza and lasagna, the menu includes a few sandwiches and soups. And since they have more varieties of pizza and lasagna than I can count, the occasional club-style sandwich is a welcome change.

Tom: I had lasagna, which was actually quite good (I had eaten at the Brown Bottle in Cedar Falls the day before, so my standards were pretty high).

The variety of lasagna at Pizza Kitchens threw me. I like a traditional Italian lasagna, but I had trouble finding it on the menu. Instead I ordered a “make your own” lasagna, complete with Italian sausage and Canadian bacon.

I liked the mushrooms in the sauce at Pizza Kitchens. There weren’t too many of them, but they gave the sauce a great flavor. If Pizza Kitchens just adds some carrot shavings to its sauce, it will have a lasagna to compete with Brown Bottle’s.

All in all, I was expecting something about the quality of Fazoli’s lasagna but at a higher price. Instead, I got a very good, high-quality lasagna for what I thought was a reasonable price.

Pete: I ordered a crock pizza which had been recommended to me, so I decided to give it a try.

When it came to the table, I was a touch disturbed. All I saw was a little bowl with a big “muffin-top” of pizza crust.

Imagine my horror when our waitress flipped the bowl over onto a plate and the pizza toppings of sausage and pepperoni dropped unceremoniously onto the crust.

Despite the untraditional preparation process, the crock pizza tasted wonderful. The sausage and pepperoni was in abundance, and the crust was surprisingly soft and chewy — just the way I like it.

We also had some foccacia bread, which was quite good. An order of the bread came with the lasagna and was a pleasing appetizer.

We were told that on future trips we ought to try the sandwiches and some of the more bizarre varieties of lasagna and pizza.

---

Peter Gudlewski is a sophomore in English from Davenport. Tom Hanks is a sophomore in computer engineering, from Coal Valley, Ill. He is getting his wisdom teeth pulled over break, so wish him a speedy recovery if you see him on campus.