Pinstripes

Website: Pinstripes.com

Location: 100 W. Higgins Road, South Barrington
Pinstripes also has locations in Northbrook (1150 Willow Road, Northbrook), and Oak Brook (7 Oak Brook Center Mall, Oak Brook).

Phone: 847-844-9300

Hours: 
Monday- Thursday – 11:30 am-11:00 pm
Friday – 11:30 am-12:30 am
Saturday – 10:00 am-12:30 am
Sunday – 10:00 am-10:00 pm

Admission: None.
Bowling is $5 per person, per game Sun-Thur, and Fri-Sat until 5:00 pm; $7 per person, per game Fri-Sat after 5:00 pm; $3 kids 12 & under Mon-Thur. Rental shoes are $4/pair, and complimentary socks are available.
Bocce is $5 per person, per hour Sun-Thus, and Fri-Sat until 5:00 pm.

Parking: Free parking in attached lot.

Bathrooms: The bathrooms were very nice, but did not have changing tables.

Nursing area: There is no designated nursing area, but plenty of seating.

Handicapped/stroller accessibility: Pinstripes is accessible for the handicapped or strollers.

Other amenities: Pinstripes offers party packages that suit any event you can imagine, from children’s birthday parties to weddings. They have party rooms, a patio, and you can even have a private bowling room for your event. Here are some party choices:

• Kids or teen party
• Pizza party
• School field trip
• Bar/Bat Mitzvah
• Wedding

Pinstripes also offers catering.

Food: Pinstripes has an Italian-American bistro and wine cellar. They have a menu that you can view online, and they offer party packages and catering options. Pinstripes has gluten free options and a children’s menu.

Special events: 

• Sunday – Pintastic Brunch: from 10 am to 2 pm
• Sunday – Family Day – kids eat free after 5 pm from the kids menu (limit 2 children eat free per adult entree)
• Sunday-Thursday night after 8 pm is $3 for a game and $4 an hour of bocce
• Monday through Friday – Kids & Parents: 10:00 am until noon, bowling is $5 for kids and free for parents (limit 4 kids per adult, 12 & under)
• Tuesday – Burgers & Games: $5  burgers while bowling or playing bocce
• Live music on Friday and Saturday nights

Activities: 

• Bowling
• Bocce
• Outdoor patio with fireplace

We paid: We were invited for a complimentary pizza party event for bloggers and members of the media. This event is $25 per person and includes make-your-own pizzas, dessert, beverages, and 2 hours of bowling (including shoe rental and socks) or bocce.

Our experience:

Pinstripes is a dining and entertainment venue offering bowling, bocce, food and drinks, and more. We visited Pinstripes for a family event.

To start off our evening, we made personal pizzas with help from Pinstripes staff and a chef. The boys love to be involved in preparing food so they were pretty excited about it.

Once our pizzas were labeled and taken to the kitchen for baking, we were ready to check out the rest of Pinstripes.

I got a tour of Pinstripes and we saw the bocce area, party rooms, and the Bistro.

Next it was off to the bowling alley. It was not like most bowling alleys I’ve been too. It looked more like a giant living room than a bowling alley, with beautiful furniture and lots of comfortable seating.

For the kids, they offer bumper bowling and a ball ramp for the kids to roll the ball off of. The bumper bowling is great because you set the players who will be using bumpers at the beginning of the game and then the bumpers pop up only during their turns. It made it much more fun for us to play as a family when John and I could play a regular game (gutters and all), and the kids could have the advantage of the bumpers.

 

Even Campbell was able to bowl and he loved it.

There was no need to head to the bar or snack bar – servers came in to take orders and bring us the pizzas we made earlier.

During our evening we had the chance to try out several of the Pinstripes dishes, including the tenderloin sliders and the shrimp, spinach, and tomato flatbread, as well as some amazing desserts – s’mores and crème brulee dip. I was really impressed with the food. It was all delicious. Much better than your typical bowling alley fare!

We got some really nifty red rubber Pinstripes bracelets. They’re pretty cute, but the best part is that any time we bring them in to Pinstripes we get a free glass of wine, or a free sundae, or a free root beer float. YUM. We had to test them out so we each got a sundae to top off the evening (which we enjoyed on a comfy couch).

 

Pinstripes was a lot of fun. It’s a lot more sophisticated than the bowling alleys I’ve always gone to, but definitely still a family-friendly place. Their party packages would be a lot of fun for a kid’s party (or any party really).