Place: Blaze Pizza
Lunch: Create-Your-Own (Pepperoni, Italian sausage, Italian meatball, mushrooms, black olives, mozzarella, feta, creamy white sauce), blood orange lemonade
Blaze opened recently in Wichita and I found it favorable so when I found myself wandering the older upscale mall in town wishing to myself we had one here while WALKING RIGHT BY ONE RIGHT THERE IN THE FREAKING MALL, it was sort of magical. Why can't I have this power with Steak n Shake?
So it's now in the regular lunch rotation.
Blaze is basically Pie Five with pizzas that are on fire, as they're baked in an "artisan" pizza oven with visible flames. I like Blaze's earthy thin crust, but I prefer Pie Five's red sauce.
I get in line. And stand there. And stand there. Seemingly a dozen people are working, but they're busy with other pizzas. One guy is training another guy. One guess who will end up making my pizza.
Yep. Trainee.
"What kind of sauce do you want?"
"Creamy white." I haven't had this before. I usually get their Spicy Red. Their regular red sauce isn't very good. But hey, new things...
Training Guy very specifically instructs him how to specifically fill exactly the amount of sauce into the ladle, and how to correctly spread it on the crust. Then Training Guy ceases paying attention completely.
"What kind of cheese do you want?"
"Mozzarella, and a little feta," I reply before realizing I actually wanted Parmesan. Oops. Oh well.
One of the failings of Blaze is they don't have cheddar or provolone cheese. All the best pizza places use a mixture of mozzarella, cheddar, and provolone. ALL of them.
While I'm drifting off thinking about cheese, Training Guy re-appears, mumbles something about my pie, and THROWS IT IN THE TRASH. WHAT THE HELL, MAN. I've already been here longer than it takes to actually be handed a cooked pizza. Now we're starting over? My lunch hour isn't that long. It's an HOUR.
He produces another crust and makes Trainee start over, with more specialized instructions. Sauce. Mozzarella. "Oh, he wanted some feta too."
Me: "Uh, actually..."
Too late.
He asks for my meats and proceeds to put on the fewest pepperonis on a pizza I've ever seen. Then I get my other toppings. Then I get oregano and sea salt. The pizza goes into the oven of FIRE. I go to pay the cashier. Except there isn't one.
Still isn't one.
Helloooooo?
Oh...there she is.
Blaze has a Coke fountain and some other specialty drinks that includes a blood orange lemonade, which is my drink of preference. On an earlier visit, an elderly customer questioned me on what exactly it was, but decided he was too chicken (his words) to try it.
My pizza is ready. It's very white. And very salty. Like REALLY SUPER SALTY. Like the trainee put on way too much salt, as I've had the salt added before and it wasn't this bad. Unless the creamy sauce is also salty. I might try this pizza again without the sea salt.
Still delicious.
We were supposed to get a Pie Five near the office, but it was canceled. I'd prefer that to Blaze, but this is a fine consolation.
