East Idaho Eats: The Parlor at Mack’s Inn serves delicious pizza, creamy ice cream and more
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ISLAND PARK — Nestled near the Henrys Fork along U.S. Highway 20 in the heart of Island Park, you’ll find a bustling pizza and ice cream parlor serving delicious food and tasty treats.
The Parlor at Mack’s Inn opened two years ago in front of the SpringHill Suites by Marriott. Justin Hamilton owns the restaurant, along with Cafe Sabor across the river. He hired Freddy Berecartu to run both eateries and serve tourists all year long.
“I’ve traveled a lot in Europe and my parents are from Venezuela,” Berecartu tells EastIdahoNews.com. “They opened a pizzeria about 40 years ago and we met Justin about ten years ago. We brought together Idaho, Europe, South America and combined it all together for good food.”
The Parlor specializes in authentic pizzas using a dough recipe that’s been in Berecartu’s family for decades. His brother, also named Freddy, is the head pizza chef (interesting sidenote: Berecartu’s parents named all three boys in the family Freddy. And the dog’s name was Fred). Everything is cooked at 550 degrees in a stone oven.
There are traditional pizza favorites, like Meat Lovers, Hawaiian and Veggie Supreme, but there’s also the Chicken Cordon Bleu, Huckleberry Chicken and the Baked Potato (pictured above).
“Justin (the owner) is from Idaho and he’s very proud to be from Idaho so we created a pizza with him in mind. It has white sauce, roasted potatoes, bacon, cheese, and arugula,” Berecartu explains.
One end of The Parlor features the pizza while the other end has ice cream from the Aggie Creamery at Utah State University and Reeds Dairy. There are 16 flavors that come in a bowl, sugar cone or waffle cone made fresh from scratch on site.
The healthier eater can go for the BBQ chicken salad, also called “the volcano” because it’s stacked with lettuce, black beans, corn, tomatoes, fresh avocado, cheese, tortilla strips and a generous portion of BBQ chicken hot out of the oven.
The Parlor at Mack’s Inn is open all year round – not just in the summer. Hours vary depending on the season but right now you can grab a bite to eat and some treats between 11 a.m. – 9 p.m. Monday thru Thursday and 11 a.m. – 10 p.m. Friday thru Sunday.
“If you’ve never tried us before, you’re going to have an authentic pizza in the middle of nowhere. Pizza is all about art and everything we make here is fresh on that day. You’ll love it,” Berecartu says.
See The Parlor’s complete menu here and visit the restaurant’s Facebook page.
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