The Other Place

Great atmosphere, good food plenty of TVs so never a bad seat. Very large beer selection, and the pizza is fantastic. Staff is friendly and knowlegable, of both food and beverages. Regular stop for friends when it is game day. Best sports bar in town!

I’m pretty familiar with the Other Place restaurant. Aside from having a name that confuses everyone I ever talk to, it’s usually a pretty-​decent pizza and grill place where I can expect to be able to find something that most people will enjoy. While I still would rather that Carlos O Kellys had stuck around, this isn’t a horrible replacement.
The OP has a pretty standard «sports bar and grill» type of atmosphere. There is lots of bar seating (two bars!) with bar stools. There are a couple tall tables throughout the place, and there are some booths for seating lined up against the wall. Unlike the OP in Cedar Falls, this one seems much more open and well-​lit, and the restaurant-​booths are placed right next to a bar. This led to much louder noise levels, and the booths are seated right underneath the restaurant speakers, so it made it pretty annoying to speak to other people in the group. On more than one occasion, I had to repeat what I was saying.
However, the service was pretty bad. There was a single woman running both the bar and the tables on an entire side of the restaurant during an evening at 7PM. As you can imagine, she was swamped and people were waiting. She was definitely trying her best, but I’m not entirely sure why she was on her own for the night. I hope she at least made some good tips from it, but we ended up having to wait quite a bit of food and drink refills because of the staffing issue.
The food itself was okay. The Other Place in Cedar Falls seems to have the food down better. This one seems a bit heavy on the oil. My pasta was literally pooled in butter and oil, and the noodles were a bit overcooked. It definitely was not the usual pasta that I expect from the OP. The chili, however, was pretty good. Mozerella Sticks were different. They used a very bland type of cheese and breading, but their marinara was super, duper tomato-​strong. I imagine that’s what they wanted to use for the primary flavor. Unfortunately, we don’t like marinara, so we were left with pretty bland appetizers.
We came on a Wednesday night expecting to watch a bit of college football that was on. None of the TVs were on basketball. Some were on ESPN while most were on various baseball things. We tried to get things switched, but the waitress seemed confused and forgot about our request as well. With as many TVs as they have, it was odd.
I mean, this wasn’t the worst visit in the whole world, but nothing about this made us want to come back. The food was pretty «meh» and expensive for what it was, the service wasn’t too amazing, and the ambiance was just… there.

The best place to watch Iowa play next to not actually being there. The food and help top notch. I wish they had this in Sioux City.

Good place to watch tv and drink. If your hungry try west towne pub or bdubs. Used to have very good drink specials. Hopefully service improves when students come back to town.

When Carlos O’Kelly’s closed and it was announced that the OP was opening a location in Ames, I was thrilled, having previously been to the Clive location. It does not disappoint. Service has been good, the food is great (the pizza is some of the best in Ames) and takeout is fresh and quick.

Loved my personal pizza. Friendly staff. Reasonably priced. Can be a bit noisy during dinner hour and game nights. But worth a visit.

Good pizza. Some of the best in town for sure. Honestly no complaints. It’s kind of sad that people are giving bad reviews for slow service. It just opened a few weeks ago and this town does not have enough restaurants for the amount of people. It’s very common in Ames to overwhelm new places for the first few months. It also takes time for managers and employees to get into the swing of things. Give it some time and this place will be a great place for Ames.

Went for the first time last night. Great food and great service! Prices were decent. Good happy hour prices.

Food is amazing! Some of the best I have had for a place like this. But they will NOT work on subbing and item on the menu for another. Example the combo platter comes with mushrooms which I dislike. I asked to not have those come and maybe get one cheese stick more than normal and that couldn’t happen. Didnt seem to care about my request and told me no very quickly. Good thing the food is great right?!

I went here for the first time. I think there used to be a Carlos O’Kellys here. I like that better.
We were meeting friends and it was early. So we ordered beer and an appetizer (an artichoke dip I could have easily store bought and warmed up at home!) And so the problems begin. My son ordered a beer off the menu, a Loganitas, they didn’t have it. So he order another beer from the menu, they didn’t have that either. So, order number 3! Yup! They didn’t have that either! So, beer order number FOUR seemed to be the magic number. So, THAT was frustrating!
Then, when friends arrived, we ordered pizza to share with hubby and son, our friends had something else. I rarely ever go out to eat pizza, but we did cuz after all, that’s what their main thing is.
I’m not sure where the other positive pizza reviews are about, but Kum n Go has better pizza than this place! The crust was SO hard that it was practically inedible. I had ONE slice. We took 3 slices home. My son also only had one slice. We had the Hawaiian pizza, the Canadian bacon smelled funky to us.
The reason for the 2 stars is cuz I felt sorry for our waitress who kept having to apologize. No beer, crappy pizza, and the the couple that was with us, she got her food WAY after us. More apologies from the poor waitress.
Seriously, don’t even bother with this place, buy a Digorno frozen pizza and a six pack and take it home. Not worth spending money here.
I didn’t care for the atmosphere. They are trying too look like a sports bar and grill, but was not happening for me. Their stools, which we had to sit on, were slippery and positioned so the guy sitting behind me punched me twice when he was taking his coat off and another time when he moved. I was very annoyed by the whole thing.
This is food you can get ANYWHERE else, in my opinion, you should do just that and forgo this place. Don’t waste your money.
Want good pizza, try Fong’s Pizza in Des Moines. Want a good sports bar with good food and all the drinks on the menu, go to ANY Jethro’s BBQ places. Way better food, way better sports bar.
Sorry for the long negative review. But I didn’t wanna review and run. I wanted to express that any other place is better for Pizza and drinks than the Other Place!

This review is a summary of the past few times I have been to The Other Place’s new Ames location. Additionally, this reflects solely on the restaurant side of this location. I have no input nor opinion on the bar side. I also grant that it’s new, and have allowed it the opportunity to work out some it’s kinks. Now that’s been a few months, my wife and I went to see how far they’ve come. The result was slower than expected.
First, «slower than expected» can be taken quite literally. The service, every time, has been incredibly time consuming. This is excluding waiting for a pizza. They tell you on the menu to allot time for pizza since the make from scratch. Unless they make their water and drinks from scratch, or build new waitresses from spare parts for every table, there should be no reason that the service is that lacking. This also can rev one’s frustrating when they see 4 – 6 server conversing up front with nothing to do. On the plus side, every server we’ve had has been pleasant, courteous, and even apologetic when things do take long (or they forget).
The second issue would be their management. I have not had a positive (or more specifically, not awkward) interaction with the management staff here yet. Our last time here we didn’t speak with them, but I can give quite specific instances previously…
Our first time here was actually their opening night. Obviously, we expected glitches. Our waitress appeared young, nervous, and it was apparent this was one of her first jobs. Omitting all this, she was great. I honestly wish I remember her name because we’ve all been in that new experience and she did her best. An issue arose when my wife ordered a «meat supreme» pizza. The waitress accidentally put it in as a supreme. This was completely understandable. She apologized and promised my wife a new pizza. What was not understandable was her manager coming to «deescalate» a situation that wasn’t necessary. She talked down and mocked her waitress’s ability. This was quite rude and uncalled for. The worst part, the waitress was right behind her and heard everything. It was unspeakable uncomfortable.
The second time there we were with a group of friends. We all shared a bill. At the end of the evening it took over an hour and a half for them to figure out how to divide a check eight ways. When they promised to discount the bill their discount was taking off two drinking. This effect only two people and every one else was stuck with a full price and annoyed atmosphere. The management was zero help in this situation and was even more so annoyed with us for wanting our bill to be fair.
Lastly, our waitress on the our final stay did not ever ask us if we were ready. After twenty minutes not showing up to our table, she brought our bill. My wife and I wanted to order some more, and asked. She then got my addition, left the bill, but didn’t ever return for my wife to get hers. We decided at the point that it wasn’t worth the wait to change it again.
On the plus side, we’ve enjoyed the food. You do get a genuine feeling that the food is made fresh and the ingredient are as well. I gave this «OP» two-​stars based on the fact that there our literally dozens of options for pizza in Ames. In my opinion, the food is not worth the wait or risk of mistake at this one. Perhaps in a few months we’ll try again, but as of now, I cannot give more than 2 stars for our collective experiences.

As a UNI grad I spent many nights and dollars at the OP on the Hill in Cedar Falls.
The new Other Place is a nice addition to Ames. We sat at the bar and the bartender changed the television channel for us and made us feel welcome. Asked for a Miller and got a Miller Lite instead, no biggie. The California Quesadilla and Chicken Bacon Avocado, Quesadilla were very good. They are a meal, we could not finish either one.
This used to be Carlos O’Kelly’s before it closed. They really opened the place up and it is loaded with TV’s. It’s hard to judge the ambience on a Saturday afternoon but the bar area is nice.
Next time I will try the pizza.

It was okay. The atmosphere was a bit overwhelming. The seating was uncomfortable. Our food took over 30 minutes to make it to the table. My lasagna was odd, it was more mushrooms than noodles. My boyfriend got a pizza and said that was really good. I would probably get a takeout pizza from here but doubt that I will dine in again. I’d recommend it for going out with friends but not for a date or family dinner.

Very slow service. Nice staff but they clearly are not ready to be open. Food is good!

My girlfriend and I decided to check out this place, she really liked the house vinaigrette, but full leaves of lettuce not so much. I had build your own burger with cheddar and bacon it was big juicy and filling. Really looking forward to trying pizza next time!

Stopped by to get a pizza to go and had a beer while I waited. Remodel of the building looks great, but this location is smaller than many of their other locations. Pizza was excellent, seems they are sticking well to the recipes of the chain and not putting their own twist on it. Looking forward to having this place local. I hope they follow the trend of the rest of the locations and have UNI games on whenever possible, even if they need to be streamed.

The remodel job looks great! Service was excellent. She had the chicken quesadilla. I had the chicken alfredo. Both were very bland. The fettuccine noodles were way overcooked. Some friends were in there and said their pizza was really good. We will try that next time

Hand crafted pizza to die for, hand breaded tenderloins and chicken, great subs and sandwiches, great drink menu and awesome staff!