Two revelations from recent visits to Extreme Pizza:

Played loudly enough at mealtime, certain Alice in Chains tunes can make you seriously consider base-jumping.

And toasted walnuts are extremely good on pizza.

More on both later. First, what's Extreme Pizza?

Opened in December in a narrow strip mall bay near Clancy's Pub in Miracle Hills, it's the first Omaha location of a San Francisco-based gourmet pizza chain with an extreme sports theme.

A surfboard dangles from the ceiling. Skateboards and snowboards hug the walls above the red-topped tables in the long hallway that constitutes most of the dining room. Snowboarding competitions, BMX bike races and other sporting events play on mounted TVs.

The offerings, most of them listed on big boards above the register, are focused: A few sandwiches, salads and calzones. Limited wine, beer and cocktails. Bar-type add-ons such as Buffalo wings, garlic twists and vendor-supplied cheesecake. And the main event: dine-in, delivery and take-and-bake pizzas with some interesting toppings (black beans and salsa, Portuguese sausage, mandarin oranges, nuts), clever names (the hummus-topped Peace in the Middle East, say, or the cheeseless White Out) and near-equal selections for meat-lovers and vegetarians.

The pizzas are available in 8-, 12-, 14- and 18-inch rounds ranging from about $5 to $24, depending on your options (more than 40 toppings, not including four house-made sauces). Each day, two of the signature pizzas (one meat and one vegetarian) are also available by the slice. White and whole-wheat crusts are made on-site and served medium-thick unless you ask for something thinner or thicker. There's also a gluten-free version, made on 12-inch crusts provided by an outside outfit called Still Riding.

Now about those walnuts: The clear standout of all the pizzas I tried was the Holy Cow, a meatless number topped with fontina, Swiss, Gorgonzola, mozzarella, toasted walnuts and sage. On our server's recommendation, I had it with tomato sauce and a wheat crust. The flavorful crust had a crisp bottom, a chewy top and a puffed edge freckled with cornmeal. The sage was restrained, the quartet of cheeses was harmonious, and the oven-toasted walnuts were as meaty and resounding as sausage.

When I raved about that satisfying pizza later, co-owner Lisa Gordon agreed. “A lot of these pizzas, you don't even realize they don't have meat.”

For die-hard carnivores, there was the Everest: pepperoni, meatball slices, Canadian bacon, mozzarella and cheddar with a fresh-tasting tomato sauce on a white crust that was every bit as chewy and cornmeal-crisped as the wheat. Happily, despite all the good stuff on top, it was rich without being overly greasy.

Another I'd have again is the Aveiro, named for a city in Portugal and topped with mozzarella, pepperoncini, roasted red pepper, bacon and slices of linguica, a garlic-laced Portuguese sausage. One quibble: It lacked the intended fresh cilantro.

From the Monster Sub section, a sandwich dubbed the Crux was tasty: tender shredded pork, sweet barbecue sauce, red onions and melted cheddar on a long, toasted ciabatta bun, pressed flat and cut diagonally. It, too, was missing its cilantro, and it looked more like a pressed panini than the giant U-boat of a sandwich the menu suggested.

Gordon said they've been working on making sure the right herbs are included with the right dishes and that she is still searching for a local version of the bread the chain uses elsewhere for its sandwiches: a roughly 8-inch by 3.5-inch hoagie roll that better lives up to the “monster sub” name.

Boneless (think chicken nugget) and standard chicken wings were tossed in our choice of a sweet barbecue, a spicy Buffalo or a seriously scorching Thai pepper sauce. Available by the half or whole dozen, they came with ranch or blue cheese dressing and a few sticks of celery and carrot to help put out the fire. If wings are your thing, you'd do well to get them during happy hour (5 p.m. to 7 p.m. nightly), when they go for half price.

A few duds: A Caesar side salad had a thick dressing, gritty and chalky with ground cheese; rock-hard croutons; and Romaine of varying freshness (some crisp and lovely, some browning at the edges). A fun-to-say Mr. Pestato Head pizza had a flavorful pesto sauce, melted mozzarella and red onion, but it stumbled with undercooked slices of red-skinned potato and crashed with the omission of three promised ingredients: fresh basil, dried oregano and feta cheese. And the Extremely Twisted Sticks were timid cradles of pizza dough with Fontina and Swiss cheese but none of the garlic punch the menu led me to expect. Gordon said the eatery may have erred on the cautious side when seasoning those because the garlic it uses is so potent.

One minor bummer: I missed out on dessert. They were out of the New York cheesecake, and the only other sweet (a large house-made chocolate chip cookie) didn't make it into a to-go order.

Gordon said diners generally order and pay at the counter, take a number and a seat and get their own drink, even if they're dining in. But it was pretty slow when we were there, and a friendly gal behind the counter handed us a menu, took our order at the table and even brought us our drinks.

Though she and other staffers were pleasant and inviting, the music was not. A loud, fast-tempo mix of whiny pop and grating grunge (including the aforementioned Alice in Chains) had me contemplating jumping off a building (with parachute, of course, in keeping with the extreme theme). It's why I opted for takeout on a return visit.

Asked about the music later, Gordon said she, too, found it annoying: “Every time I walk in in the morning, I say: ‘Why is it so loud?'”

She assured me that she and her staff are dialing down the tunes, dialing up the flavor and fine-tuning order accuracy as they settle in to their second month in business and their first Super Bowl weekend in Omaha.

I say: Better stock up on walnuts.

Contact the writer:

444-1069, nichole.aksamit@owh.com