The Iowan Pizza Chronicles: October 2022

Venue Outside

The Venue

4601 1^st Ave SE
Cedar Rapids, IA 52402
(317) 249-6001

At Spare Time, you can eat, bowl, and play arcade games, laser tag, escape rooms, and more. The restaurant caters to the adult crowd with a high-top bar. Gas lit fireplace, and several booth and individual 4-man dining tables. The video game arcade had the kids busy for as long as the credit card was loaded, the bowling alley in the back was pretty fancy, and the escape rooms/laser tag was nearby.

Menu

Overall the establishment was very clean, and new looking (despite being about a year old). Architecturally, it almost felt as if you were in a casino without the machines.

The Pizza

Chicago Style: No

Crust Thickness: Thin

Menu: https://www.sparetimeentertainment.com/cedar-rapids/wp-content/uploads/sites/33/2022/10/Iowa-Menu-July-2022-v2-SM.pdf

The Corleone, 16 inch, $20

Participants: 8 (7 children)

Pizza Ordered: 5

Sizes Offered/Ordered: 16”, 28”/ 5x 16”

Pieces Cut: Triangular

1. The Corleone - Sliced salami, pepperoni and Italian sausage with banana peppers, mozzarella & parmesan cheeses(16", $20).

2. Meatlovers – Pepperoni, crisp bacon strips, sweet Italian sausage and ground beef (16", $20).

3. Chicken Bacon Ranchero – A tempting creation of ranch dressing, crisp fried chicken, bacon, and cheddar jack cheese with a chipotle ranch dressing drizzle (16", $19).

Pepperoni, $17

4. BBQ Bacon Chicken – BBQ sauce base with cheddar jack cheese, bacon pieces, red onions, and tender crispy chicken pieces (16”, $19).

5. Pepperoni (16”, $16).

The Verdict

Sauce: This was the lowest scoring category at 3.86, which is of no shock to me. On some of the pizzas it was as if they forgot to put it on, and others, it was too little where it was dried up.

Cheese: The cheese was standard processed mozzarella which also lacked flavor.

Meatlovers, 16 inch, $20

Crust: This crust was too flimsy to be a fulfilling, bready style. It was not crisp, as some thin pizzas are made. It tasted a bit gritty in some cases. I am unsure what kind of flour they used, but I would suggest a different one.

Toppings: Sausage tasted way too sweet on the meatlovers. Overloaded with too much bacon on the CBR and BBQ pizzas. Other than that, the toppings were okay.

I will state that the pizzas above were way better than the pizzas that are included with the children’s birthday parties. I would almost classify those as uneatable. One bit, and you are left with an off-taste in your mouth! Thankfully, we didn’t try those today, I’ve had it back in July, and it had me nervous to simply come back to Spare Time. It reminded me of Chuckie cheese as a kid where even as a kid, you knew the pizza was bad, but it didn’t matter because you liked playing the games.

Chicken, Bacon, Ranchero, 16 inch, $19

Final thoughts: Spare time is a great place to lighten your wallet while your kids play some games. However, I would order the burger or maybe that $15 sundae bowl next time.