Following a tip from a friend, our family made a slight detour through Pleasant Grove on Saturday en route to BYU’s final regular season home basketball game at the Marriott Center.

The decision turned out to be a slam dunk as Firebird Pizza and Pasta really rattled our imaginations and our taste buds with an intriguing menu, great service and an all-around enjoyable visit.

Firebird Pizza and Pasta is nestled right between Cocolitos and Cravings on historic Main Street in Pleasant Grove, and has been open for right around six months. The restaurant is semi-small, with a total of eight tables and seating for 36 patrons.

Our party had the place all to ourselves upon arrival — timed to beat the dinner crowd so that we could ensure an on-time arrival to the aforementioned basketball game — but the pace had picked up considerably by the time we left an hour later. The relative calm at the beginning was actually a good thing, as it took us several minutes to peruse the menu — written on two chalkboards near the front counter — and figure out what we wanted.

Our family group is actually split into two camps when it comes to menu diving, one which tends to pick the tried-and-true traditional items and one (read: me) who prefers to walk on the wild side. The menu at Firebird catered to both sides of the equation. So it was that our extremely picky teenage daughter could order spaghetti noodles with a marinara and meatball sauce while I sampled the Creamy Chicken Roasted Red Pepper and Artichoke Pasta — and we both came away delighted. I still think I got the better end of the bargain as the latter pasta was extremely robust and delicious. Both dishes came with an herb-crusted bread that was the perfect side.

Our divergent tastes could also be sated in our choices of pizza. We ordered one with a more traditional pepperoni, sausage and black olives combination, and a second — the BBQ Chicken — off the specialty menu. One of the workers, who appeared to be a manager, swayed us toward the BBQ Chicken pizza by saying that it was “by far the No. 1 choice” among restaurant patrons. And who are we to disagree as it was a sweet dreams masterpiece in both design and taste. It appeared to feature a combo of pizza and BBQ sauces topped off with chicken, onions, bacon and cheese, with a drizzled design of BBQ sauce on top for good measure. It was incredible.

As good as that was, however, we’ve also got to give it up for our more traditional pizza selection as well. It was equally delicious. If the excellence of the two pizzas we did sample did anything, it definitely whet our appetites to seek out even further combinations and specialties — there’s 11 of them after all — on future visits.

Firebird runs a Family Special that includes two 14-inch pizzas (one specialty, one two-topping) and a 12-inch Cheesy Bread pie for $26.99. This proved to be a good deal and would have easily fed our group of six on its own. The Cheesy Bread comes with a choice of three different dipping sauces: ranch, marinara and alfredo. At first we opted for the natural choice, marinara — but the manager said we really needed to try it with ranch. He was right. We loved the thick ranch sauce and how it went with the bread.

There’s a soda fountain for drinks, or you can go the 2-liter route.

The decor inside Firebird was simple — with a restaurant logo painted on a pallet, and a few other quaint wall hangings — but the food was simply delicious. Talk en route to the basketball game centered around how everyone hoped we could visit again in the future.

Firebird Pizza and Pasta

Where: 93 Main St., Pleasant Grove

Hours: 11:30 to 9 p.m. Monday to Thursday, 11:30 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday. Closed Sunday.

Prices: $2.99-$14.99

Info: (801) 785-8804, firebirdpizzaandpasta.com (website coming soon)