MOD Pizza Menu Items Ranked From Worst To Best
When it comes to a type of food that has a ton of different places making their own, pizza certainly tops that list. Even if you pass through towns that have little to nothing going on, there's almost always at least a pizza joint somewhere. Pizza is one of those things that doesn't take a whole lot of ingredients to make, which is likely why you often see new spots spring up frequently. But just because the three basic ingredients of pizza are dough, marinara sauce, and mozzarella cheese doesn't mean anyone combining them together does a pie justice. One place that is churning out some darn good 'za is MOD Pizza, and if you've never heard of them, now's a good time to start investigating.
Founded in 2008 by couple Scott and Ally Svenson, serving up great food was equally as important to MOD Pizza's mission as creating a positive social impact in communities and employing people who face real-life barriers, such as past incarceration and developmental disabilities. As the website states: "This is not a pizza place — we're a people place." MOD Pizza is all about bringing people together, and few things help gather crowds quite like food. But, before you run out to your nearest MOD Pizza for some grub, take a look at this countdown of their menu items so you know exactly what to order when you arrive. These are MOD Pizza's menu items ranked worst to first.
16. Garden salad
Sometimes when you know you're about to dive headfirst into a pizza, you're faced with that classic conundrum of wanting to eat something healthy before you take in a boatload of carbs and cheese. Getting some greens down your gullet makes you feel a bit better after all is said and done. Plus, your cardiologist would be so proud of you, and who doesn't strive to put a smile on their face as often as possible? One of MOD Pizza's menu options is the garden salad, but if you're looking for something with a bit of pizazz to it, look elsewhere.
Now, it's not that the salad is unappetizing, it's just that it's boring. The salad is comprised of mixed greens, romaine, diced tomatoes, and cucumbers tossed with a sherry Dijon vinaigrette. There's nothing fancy or unique happening here, but if that's what you're looking for, then by all means dig in.
15. Maddy
A pizza is great because it serves as a vessel for all sorts of ingredients. You can pile almost any topping on that hot disc of cheese and marinara to transform a ho-hum pie into a heck-yeah pie. But, just because you can dress a pizza in as many ingredients as there are letters in the alphabet doesn't necessarily mean you always want to. Sometimes a basic cheese pie is what the ol' stomach is craving. Well, that's exactly what the Maddy pie is at MOD Pizza. It's a crispy disc built with three ingredients: dough, cheese, and marinara sauce.
If plain is what you're venturing out to MOD Pizza to find, then plain is what you'll get with this pie. There are no bells and whistles when it comes to Maddy, and while that might prove satisfying for some, those in search of flavor profiles outside of just mozzarella cheese and red sauce will be disappointed. Order the Maddy if you're not feeling adventurous, but for those seeking a flavor journey, choose another path.
14. Caesar salad
Ah, the mighty Caesar salad. The salad must have been named after strong and powerful Roman Emperor Julius Caesar, right? Actually, nope. The name actually came from an Italian immigrant restaurateur named Caesar Cardini, who apparently invented the dish in the 1920s. But, just because your assumption might have been wrong doesn't make the salad any less tasty. At MOD Pizza, you can order up the Caesar salad if you're looking for some greens with a little more excitement than the basic garden option, but if you're already familiar with Caesar salads, then you won't find anything new here.
The base of the salad is romaine lettuce, and the bed of greens is tossed with diced tomatoes, croutons, shredded Parmesan and Asiago cheese, and Caesar dressing. The only thing that sets this salad apart from the kinds at other places is the addition of the Asiago cheese, which does work well alongside the Parmesan. The croutons are nicely seasoned and offer a welcome crunch among the romaine, and the dressing gives the whole thing a sharp salty bite. In the end, it's a Caesar salad, so you know exactly what you're getting.
13. Cheesy garlic bread
As much as we should try to avoid overloading on carbs, sometimes it's satisfying to shovel as much bread into your mouth as possible and scoff in the face of nutritionists everywhere. Take that, health experts! Obviously, pizza is a great way to scratch any kind of carb itch, but if you're not looking to tackle a topping-piled pie, there's one surefire option available: garlic bread. MOD Pizza offers customers cheesy garlic bread to satiate that carbohydrate fix, and it does a good job.
When you order the cheesy garlic bread, you're basically getting a pizza without the red sauce, but with the addition of garlic. The doughy disc is cut into rectangular strips so everyone at your table can enjoy several of them. The best part isn't the garlic or the cheese, it's the trio of dipping sauces that come with the order. You get a side of marinara, pesto, ranch, or sri-rancha (a sriracha-ranch combo). These sauces alone make the order worth your time and money.
12. Greek salad
"Hey, it's all Greek to me," is a classic expression that someone uses when they find it difficult to understand something. One thing that isn't difficult to understand is a salad. And, when it comes to Greek salads, there are a whole bunch of great ingredients that come together so you feel less like you're eating greens and more like you're enjoying a dazzling array of unique flavors. MOD Pizza has a Greek salad on their menu, and it's a whole lotta good happening in one bowl.
Here's the list of ingredients in the Greek salad (you're gonna want to run through these a few times until you memorize them all): romaine lettuce, feta cheese, diced red onions, black olives, Mama Lil's sweet hot peppers, diced tomatoes, chickpeas, and cucumbers all tossed in a Greek herb and tahini dressing. Yeah, there are a whole lotta flavors happening here, and they all taste like they belong together. If you're looking for a salad with some zing, this is a solid option.
11. Dillon James
Let's say you're heading to MOD Pizza with the intention of getting something that isn't too bedazzled with unique toppings but also isn't a plain cheese pizza either. You're slightly nervous they won't have anything that fits into that category, but you're keeping your fingers crossed nonetheless. You eventually walk through the front doors, look at the menu, and suddenly rejoice in the fact they do, in fact, have exactly the kind of pie you want. It's the Dillon James pie, and it checks off all the boxes you want it to.
The Dillon James pie is a step above a basic pie, but not quite intricate enough to fall into the "super inventive" category, and that's perfectly okay. This 'za comes topped with marinara sauce, both mozzarella and Asiago cheese, fresh chopped basil, garlic, and whole slices of tomato. The two-cheese combo is a nice change from basic mozzarella, and the discs of tomatoes add a sweet punch that complements the red sauce. It's not basic, and it's not complicated. It's simply the Dillon James.
10. Italian chop salad
When it comes to interior decorating, a rug helps tie the room together. If you apply that same logic to salad, then it's the dressing that ties a bowl of ingredients together. An unpalatable dressing renders an entire salad inedible. Luckily, when it comes to the Italian chop salad at MOD Pizza, the dressing is the reason you want to order it. The rest of the ingredients are great as well, but the dressing uses its zesty lasso to rope in everything at once and create an amazing concoction of flavors.
The salad dressing used is a zesty Roma full of herbs and spices with a kick of vinegar that performs a ballet on your palate that you don't want to end. The dressing is drizzled on a mixture of romaine lettuce, arugula, mozzarella and Parmesan cheeses, salami, diced red onions, black olives, chickpeas, and green bell peppers. All of the dry ingredients alone are tasty, but with the help of the Roma dressing, they're elevated to a vibrant level.
9. Pizza salad
So, you arrive at MOD Pizza very much looking forward to enjoying a pie, but you also want to make sure you get a bit of roughage in your diet as well. Sure, you could opt to order a salad and a pizza. That makes total sense. But, you could also place one single order and go with the pizza salad. What exactly is a pizza salad? Well, it's pretty much exactly what you think, and it's worth your time if you're looking to combine the flavor of pizza dough and the eclectic ingredients in a salad.
When you order a pizza salad, you'll create your own salad using any of the ingredients MOD Pizza has available, and then those ingredients are piled onto a freshly baked Asiago pizza crust. The Asiago cheese baked into the crust does a great job of enhancing whatever kind of salad you pile on the dough, so if you're looking for both salad and pizza, this is a unique option you'll enjoy.
8. No Name Cake
While investing much of your appetite into pizza is usually a great option, your palate often begins to crave something not so rich and savory after a while. It's always good to change flavor profiles up to keep your mouth engaged to the fullest, and that's where dessert comes into play. Sweet always pairs well with savory, and at MOD Pizza, the menu has that post-meal craving for sugar available in the form of the No Name Cake. What this pastry lacks in a name it certainly makes up for in moist, chocolaty flavor.
No Name Cakes are similar to Ring Dings in design, but they're worlds better than the packaged stuff Hostess boxes up and ships to supermarkets and bodegas. The outside of the cake is a hardened chocolate shell that houses an astoundingly moist chocolate cake underneath. And, that chocolate cake houses a wonderfully rich vanilla buttercream center for a delightful surprise once you bite in. The dessert coats your whole mouth in sweetened goodness, and it's the perfect way to round out a meal of pizza.
7. Lucy Sunshine
The name "Lucy Sunshine" kinda puts a smile on your face, right? It conjures up the image of a bright, carefree summer day sitting on the beach and eating ... well, pizza. The Lucy Sunshine at MOD Pizza will almost certainly put a smile on your face if you order it. Although the pie has no meat on it, the ingredients it does come with are satisfying enough. Obviously, you can always add a protein if you want, but even without it, you should give this one a go.
This pizza has a unique design to it. It comes topped with mozzarella and Parmesan cheese, artichokes, garlic, and dollops of marinara sauce. That's right, the marinara sauce is plopped onto the pie in four evenly spaced round spoonfuls, so each slice has one. It sounds odd at first, but all the ingredients come together quite well. The cheese is salty and delicious, the artichokes are fresh, and when you spread the marinara sauce out on top of everything instead of under it, there's a unique texture to the whole slice that absolutely works.
6. Dominic
If you're looking for a pie that contains both meat and veggies but doesn't go overboard on either one, MOD Pizza's Dominic is certainly that. The pie has a white sauce base as opposed to the traditional marinara, and it's topped with Asiago cheese, fresh chopped basil, rings of red onion, full tomato slices, and juicy chunks of mild sausage. It's a great way to get some meat and veggies in one pie without feeling like you're overloading your stomach with both.
The star of the show here is the mild sausage. The flavorful chunks burst with savoriness in your mouth, and it hits all the right notes when you're craving protein on your pie. The tomato and red onion both add a sweetness that helps to balance out the savory sausage, and the saltiness of the Asiago cheese then comes in with the third flavor profile to round the whole thing out extremely well.
5. Jasper
Those who can't stand the heat naturally want to stay far away from anything that's gonna singe their tongue. But, for those who welcome a fiery experience, spice is quite nice. However, just because you like your food to have a kick of heat doesn't mean you want to plunge your palate into the infernos of hell. This is where the Jasper at MOD Pizza works like a charm. It has heat to it, but it's not enough to send you on a quest for milk after one bite.
The spice in the Jasper comes from super juicy chunks of spicy chicken sausage. These plump little morsels of heat are paired with mushrooms and rest on a glistening layer of marinara sauce and mozzarella cheese. The spice is present, but not overwhelming, and the earthiness of the sliced mushrooms complements the heat quite well. This is a pizza that doesn't have a lot of ingredients, but it has the right ingredients.
4. Mad Dog
Meat, meat, and more meat. That's sometimes the only thing paired with pizza that leaves the grumbling ghoul in your belly with a smile on its face. Well, that nameless ghoul lurking in your stomach will be more than happy to know that MOD Pizza serves up a pie called the Mad Dog. If you're living that carnivore lifestyle and looking for a pizza that's gonna fit into it perfectly, then this pie is for you.
Three savory meats come piled on top of a mozzarella and red sauce-covered disc of dough: pepperoni, mild sausage, and ground beef. It's a trio of friends who want nothing more than to coat your mouth with hearty flavors and leave juice running down your chin after every bite. There's nothing quite like a three-meat battalion staring you in the eyes as you pick up a slice, and this battalion is ready to wage a delicious war on your taste buds.
3. Tristan
More often than not, all it takes is one simple ingredient to transform something fairly average into something incredible. A single flavor can weasel its way into the jumble of other profiles going on, and it ends up screaming out the loudest. This is exactly what happens when you order the Tristan. A brief look at the ingredients might leave you thinking, "This is a pretty normal pizza." But, there's one ingredient that finagles its way in to carry this pie to great heights.
Before we get into that special ingredient, let's look at the others first. The pizza has both mozzarella and Asiago cheese, roasted red peppers, and sliced mushrooms. Let's face it, there's nothing in that list that jumps out at you. But, the ingredient that takes off like Superman is a drizzle of pesto on top. The pesto flavor is vibrant and garlicky, with a huge kick of herbs and spices. It erupts with every bite, and this otherwise basic pie becomes something you absolutely have to try.
2. Caspian
Barbecue is a flavor that has crept into the pizza scene over the last several years. Whoever was the first person to pour a bit of barbecue sauce on pizza must have immediately realized they were onto something. The zestiness of the sauce goes perfectly with the saltiness of the cheese, which is why when the hankering for some pizza and BBQ hits, MOD Pizza rushes in with the Caspian to help.
This pie has mozzarella and gorgonzola cheese, savory chunks of marinated barbecue chicken, large rings of sweet red onion, and a hefty amount of rich barbecue sauce. The chicken is super juicy, and the barbecue sauce is a little sweet and a little savory, so you get two perfect flavors in one ingredient. The fact that gorgonzola cheese is used here is what brings this barbecue pie off the charts. That sharp wake-you-up flavor of the gorgonzola slices through every other flavor like a Ginsu knife, so nothing feels overwhelming, and every bite is extremely well-balanced.
1. Calexico
When it's time to start a full-blown pizza fiesta in your mouth, it's essential you seek out something with an array of explosive ingredients that all work wonders together. Sometimes it can prove difficult to find that exact mixture of excellence, but when you're at MOD Pizza, they make it super easy by offering the Calexico. This thing screams "party time," so pop on that celebration cap and get ready to rock 'n' roll with some seriously awesome flavors that are eagerly awaiting your arrival.
The Calexico is designed for people who like to keep things spicy, so those without a heat tolerance should stay far away. This pie is loaded up with mozzarella and gorgonzola cheese, juicy white-meat chicken chunks, and jalapeños all drizzled with a hot buffalo sauce. The jalapeños and buffalo sauce make the sizzle happen, but it's the gorgonzola cheese that lends a bitingly salty burst of flavor to offset some of the heat and tantalize the taste buds. You don't realize how much you love gorgonzola cheese paired with heat until you take a bite into this amazing creation.