Dareo's Pizza Casino does something South Minnesota Avenue has no shortage of opinions about: it put a gaming lounge next to a pizza kitchen and made it work.
The pizza side is a legitimate operation — hand-built pies with the kind of crust-to-topping ratio that holds up whether you're eating at a table or grabbing a box to go. Delivery and takeout round out the options, so the casual dining angle isn't just dine-in theater. The gaming side gives you something to do while you wait, or a reason to stay longer than you planned, which in Sioux Falls is saying something given the competition for your Saturday night.
What keeps locals coming back to this pizza restaurant isn't the novelty — novelty wears off fast. It's that the two halves of the place actually coexist without one undermining the other. The food doesn't feel like an afterthought to the gaming lounge, and the gaming doesn't feel bolted on to justify a liquor license. That's a harder balance to pull off than it looks, and Dareo's lands it on the south side of town where the bar for this kind of spot is set pretty high.