A Salt Lake City Date Night That Ends in Pizza
You don't need a reservation booked three weeks out to pull off a great Salt Lake date. You need a view, a good meal worth lingering over, and something sweet to end on. Here's the plan — and the best part is it costs almost nothing and ends with a pizza.
Start with the view
Salt Lake has a rare gift: you can be standing over the entire valley fifteen minutes after leaving downtown. The easiest win is Ensign Peak, a short climb behind the State Capitol — roughly a mile round trip with about 400 feet of gain, well-marked, and free to park. It's steep enough to feel like you did something but quick enough that you'll be at the top in under half an hour, looking out over the whole valley, the Great Salt Lake, and the Wasatch front. There's history baked in, too: Brigham Young and a handful of pioneers hiked up here in 1847, two days after arriving, to map out the city you're looking down on. Time it for sunset and stay a few extra minutes — the real show is when the streetlights flicker on and the valley turns to gold and glitter. (Bring a light layer; it's exposed up there.)
Want a little more of a walk and a better story to tell? Hike up to the Living Room Trail near the Natural History Museum, where the trail tops out at a cluster of flat rocks stacked into "furniture" — stone couches and armchairs with the best seat in the city for golden hour. It's a touch more of a climb than Ensign Peak, which means you'll have earned dinner.
Not in the mood to sweat before a date? Take a slow stroll through Memory Grove and into the mouth of City Creek Canyon instead — shaded, quiet, and minutes from downtown, with the creek doing all the romantic work for you.
Then dinner
Come down off the foothills hungry and point the car at Litzas. A hand-tossed pie and a basket of garlic bread is exactly the kind of meal you want after a hike — satisfying, unfussy, and built for two people who'd rather talk to each other than perform for a tasting menu. It's cozy and unpretentious, and it's been quietly hosting Salt Lake date nights since 1965, when Don Hale opened the place and named it for his daughter, Lisa. Sixty years of first dates, anniversaries, and "we should do this more often" — you'd be in good company.
End on something sweet
Now for the encore. You've got options depending on the vibe:
- Normal Ice Cream treats soft serve like a craft — a small, rotating menu where each flavor is dialed in, and the lineup wanders into territory you won't find anywhere else (think lavender honey or balsamic strawberry). Order one cone, two spoons.
- Rockwell Ice Cream is the local super-premium scoop shop, with a downtown spot on Regent Street. Founder Justin Williams started churning batches at home with his family and turned it into one of the richest ice creams in the state — around 16% butterfat. The award-winning "G.O.A.T." (a goat-cheese base with rosemary, almonds, and blackberry jam) sounds wild and tastes incredible, but the Rockwell Road — dark chocolate, marshmallow fluff, and almond brittle — is the date-night pick.
- For something cozier and a little more Old World, Dolcetti Gelato in 9th & 9th is the oldest gelato shop in Utah, with a rotating cabinet of around 40 from-scratch flavors and an eclectic, "I Spy"-book interior that practically dares you to linger. Split a Mezzo and people-watch.
View, pizza, dessert. No valet, no dress code, no three-week wait — just a genuinely good night out in the city you live in.
