Behind a framed painting of tin-can men hanging near the pool table inside Latchkey Bar in Uptown Denver, there's a hole in the wall that leads straight into the neighboring Hearth bakery kitchen. Slide the painting aside, and you'll find After School Pizza, a pop-up window slinging New York-inspired sourdough slices and whole pies to bar patrons who've quickly made it a fixture of their Thursday-through-Saturday routine.
The pop-up is the product of a literal wall demolition. Latchkey owner Cade Cauley carved through the non-load-bearing wall separating his bar from Hearth's bakery space, as reported by Westword, creating a direct pass-through between the two independently operated businesses at 1300–1308 E. 17th Ave. Latchkey opened at the address in January 2025, bringing craft cocktails, pool tables, and retro Americana design to the corridor, according to WhatNow, which traced the bar's roots to an Austin, Texas concept founded by Cauley.
Cauley and Hearth culinary director Andrew Van Stee first discussed the pizza idea in January 2026, and After School Pizza served its first slices by spring, launching that April. It quickly became, in the seed story's telling, a near-instant favorite with Latchkey's clientele. “The last three months have been insane,” Cauley said, adding that “the community's support has been unbelievable” and that people now come in and stay at the bar because of the pizza.
A Chef With Two Decades in Colorado Kitchens
Running the window is Van Stee, who joined the Hearth team in summer 2025 and now handles After School Pizza's menu, ingredient orders, prep, and cooking. He brings more than two decades of professional kitchen experience across Colorado to the pop-up, including five years as executive chef at wood-fired pizzeria Cart-Driver — a shop Hoodline has previously highlighted as one of Denver's top pizza destinations, known for its wood-fired sourdough pies across its Five Points and LoHi outposts.
Van Stee's resume also includes stints in the kitchens at Bruto, Devil's Food, Potager and Il Posto, plus a year working in Spain, and he's a culinary arts alumnus of Denver's former Johnson & Wales University. Before spearheading After School Pizza, he created scratch breakfast and lunch menus for Hearth's Littleton location, where he still works 30 to 40 hours a week. On top of that, he puts in another 40 hours most weekends at the pizza window alone.
What's on the Menu, and What It Costs
The pizza uses the same sourdough starter as Hearth's bread loaves, tying the pop-up directly to the bakery's reputation for artisan, naturally leavened baking. Hearth was founded by Matt Quinlisk, who trained at a San Francisco baking school and worked as a pastry chef at Moxie Bread Co. before opening the brand's first brick-and-mortar in RiNo in 2022; it has since grown to four locations across RiNo, Uptown, Highlands and Littleton. The bakery's sourdough and pizza dough rely on grains sourced directly from Rocky Mountain regional farmers and milled locally, according to Visit Littleton.
Cheese slices are cut from 20-inch pies into six pieces and sold for $4 each, customizable with additional toppings. Whole 16-inch pizzas run less than $24. The menu includes a margherita with red sauce, basil and mozzarella; a white pie with ricotta, garlic confit, mushrooms, arugula and mozzarella; a supreme with red sauce, red onion, green peppers, oregano, mushrooms and mozzarella (Cauley himself orders his without onions); and a summer pizza topped with basil pesto, speck, zucchini, jalapeño, artichokes and parmesan. Van Stee has said he plans to keep experimenting with new offerings and to grow the pizza operation's own team.
Hours, Orders and What's Next
After School Pizza currently operates Thursdays through Saturdays starting at 5 p.m. until the kitchen sells out, and it's set to expand to include Wednesday evenings starting next week. At night, orders are taken by Lizzy Van Stee, who works as a full-time accountant by day. Latchkey itself keeps longer hours than the pizza window, open 2 p.m. to midnight Monday through Thursday, 2 p.m. to 2 a.m. on Friday, noon to 2 a.m. on Saturday, and noon to midnight on Sunday, with beer, $10 cocktails, and TVs for game day rounding out the bar menu.
The shared-wall arrangement fits a broader pattern along the East 17th Avenue corridor, where compact bar and pop-up concepts have been taking over former full-service restaurant spaces. Yoshi Cocktail Bar plots a 2027 corner takeover just down the street at 1740 E. 17th Ave., part of what real estate turnover on the strip has pushed operators toward: agile, shared-footprint models rather than standalone restaurants. The building housing Latchkey and Hearth has its own turnover history, having previously been home to the Denver Bicycle Cafe from 2011 to 2019 and Alpine Dog Brewing Company from February 2023 until its closure in March 2024.
