MOD Pizza, Ladue Crossing - Visited November 2017

Today it was my selection to pick lunch, so I decided to visit the MOD Pizza at Ladue Crossing. We had heard it was better than Doughocracy or the recently closed Maplewood Pie Five, so I thought we should try them out. Their website said they opened at 10:30 which is pretty early for a pizza place and we showed up there around 11:00 am and they were just about empty as expected. The dining area was pretty large and open, and we were greeted by the manager, who seemed very cordial and friendly. He helped us select and order our pizzas. My mother-in-law just wanted a small (mini 6") plain pizza with mushrooms and green peppers, my wife ordered the Mod (11") sized Maddy, my son ordered the 11" Calexico, and I ordered a 11" Mad Dog, but with spicy sausage, green peppers, black olives and jalapenos added.

The drinks were at a central station where you could serve yourself. They had numerous selections including plain black tea and an assortment of sweeteners which is a plus to my wife. We selected a booth to sit in and observed the large wall with a billion photos on it which kept distracting my very easily distractable mother-in-law. She thought she recognized one of the generic clip art patrons on the wall. It did not take long for the manager to appear with our four pizzas which arrived straight out of the oven. Mine was the last to arrive and I noticed right off the bat that it was not correctly made.

My first pizza - the Mad Dog pizza without my desired extra toppings

He had brought me a standard Mad Dog instead of my modified one with extra toppings. He apologized profusely and said we could keep that one and he would bring me another one with the correct toppings. Since the pizza oven was so fast he came back in about 6-7 minutes with the new pizza.

My second pizza - modified Mad Dog with extra stuff!

So I checked the new pizza and it seemed to have the extra toppings I ordered and even mushrooms which I did not order (but which actually were just fine!) The pizza definitely tasted better with the extra toppings since in reality the pizzas tasted okay but were not that special. I thought their crust was better then Doughocracy (which is not saying much of anything) or Pie Five (which was better than Doughocracy but still pretty bland). As one of those fast baked pizzas it was neither a crispy thin crust nor a chewy thicker crust, and lacked much character. What made up for the crust was selection of toppings and my modified Mad Dog seemed a good balance. I had eaten a couple slices of my "free" original Mad Dog and adding the peppers, olives and, yes, the mushrooms help add some flavor and texture to the basic cheese, sauce and crust.

We must also comment on the service at the restaurant. At first the manager seemed to be very attentive and friendly and gave us plenty of service. But as the meal progressed and as one of only a few patrons there (and also probably because they messed up my order), he kept coming back and checking on us time and time again asking if he could do anything. A reasonable amount of attention and service is a good thing, but there is definitely such a thing as too much attention. He did take off the price of one of the MOD pizzas, and he gave us the mistake pizza for free, so we definitely ended up getting a good deal, but we would have been happier if he were not quite as attentive as he was, acting like he was our new best friend.

With the bottom line being about the pizza, I would say the MOD pizzas are actually above average for that niche of fast baked, chain produced personalized pizzas, but when compared to a real hand tossed New York style pizza, (yes, we mean La Pizza) or even a chain thick Detroit style pizza (Jet's!) they are no comparison. The general consensus among the four of us was it was not too bad for that style of pizza restaurant, but we would probably not come back.

Pizza compared to other fast baked, personalized casual pizza chains, Value, Speed

Pizza quality compared to actual high quality pizza

Service (first 5 minutes)

Service (after 5 minutes)

 JUST STOP IT,  IT'S TOO MUCH !!