Some say that if you want a great dinner in the city, the only place to go is Fire + Ice. But, they are wrong.
Fire + Ice is focused on providing hip food experiences, but my experience was far from a good one. From the disgusting food to the unprofessional staff and obnoxious atmosphere, Fire + Ice is sure to make you an even poorer college student with a distain for Mongolian grills.
Fire + Ice is equivalent to Chuck E. Cheese’s for people in their 20s and it’s the perfect place for people who have imaginations larger than their stomachs. Fire + Ice takes pride in letting you create your own food combinations and then taking no responsibility for the unpleasant taste that every bowl provides. They boast that there are 192,743 possible combinations, and though I don’t plan to try any more of them, I can say from the experience I had that every one of them tastes just as bad. Even the simple combinations that they recommend—such as Chicken Alfredo—leave much to be desired.
The grill at Fire + Ice is dirty. Their salad bar has a wide variety of options, but be aware that the dressing sometimes separate, meaning they have sat out too long. The ranch dressing that I tried tasted like it was out for weeks.
There were some serious issues with the food preparation and sanitation. Some of the chicken in one of my dishes was pink inside. That should be reason enough to never go there. In the same bowl, I had steak that had the texture of bubblegum. I figured that they couldn’t screw up a simple hamburger, but I was proved wrong; it was as dry as beef jerky.
While I was at Fire + Ice I caught a little boy sticking his hands in raw calamari. None of the grill cooks were wearing gloves when making my food. If they spent as much time worrying about the food as they did hitting on the female customers, the world would be a better place. The wait staff is great, but the cooks are pretty inappropriate.
Overall, the food was bland, dry, and undercooked. Fire + Ice disrespects the ingredients they work with. If you attend restaurants to eat—rather than for the environment—there is no reason to go to Fire + Ice.
The décor is very cool and fun, but the overall atmosphere is a mess. It is as cramped—if not more so—than the Cheesecake Factory. While I was there I saw a couple seated in a corner of the building that was not accessible. Just to seat these people the wait staff had to ask a whole table to get up. Additionally, Fire + Ice is not recommended for anyone that wants to have a conversation with other people in their party; it is extremely loud.
I was depressed just from eating there. When I got the check and saw that it was $18.85, I was physically sick. The only redeemable thing I see in Fire + Ice is that they are doing a make your own pizza night every Tuesday and Thursday.
College students are too strapped for cash to waste money on an experience like Fire + Ice. When your friends ask you to go next time, play the gluttony card and say Fire + Ice is a sin.
Zack’s Restaurant Report: Fire + Ice
Food– 2 stars
Atmosphere– 3 stars
Service– 2 stars