Hovey’s Pizza & Grinders
226 Enterprise DriveI wish I could spend every weekend on the lake. As a Michigander, I feel a little left out when all of my friends go to their family’s lake house for a quick weekend. My family is not from around here…and we don’t have a lake house anywhere, so trips to the lake only happen about once a year.
When I say “my family” I mean my immediate family. My dad’s cousin actually does have a lake house near Three Rivers on Pleasant Lake. For the last two years, we’ve been able to get my whole immediate family and my dad’s cousin and her husband to meet up for a day of jet skiing and boating…as well as drinking and eating.
We grilled burgers and brats for lunch after a couple hours of swimming and attempting to ski. When dinner time rolled around, I asked what the plan was and was told we were thinking pizza. My dad’s cousin only had a couple of menus to places in the area and one of them she said took forever..the other was Little Ceasears. I knew we could do better than that, so with the last ounce of battery life, I quickly searched for pizza places in Three Rivers.
The best hit I got was for a little place on the north end of town. I got the name before my phone died and told J to look it up. She found the Facebook page and they posted a pretty good deal just an hour earlier, so we all decided that Hovey’s Pizza & Grinders was going to be our place.
Hovey’s Pizza & Grinders is in a strip mall just off of Main Street near where Main meets up with US-131 on the north side of town. The strip mall is anchored by a Goodrich movie theater and the address is actually on Enterprise Drive which intersects with Main.
J had called in an order for two 16″ pizzas. The deal came with two toppings, but we only got one on each. One was a sausage pizza and one was a bacon pizza. With that special, we also got breadsticks with cheese and a 2 liter of pop. There was also one more special we took advantage of since we had twelve people to feed. We ordered a large Detroit style pizza with pepperoni.
I got to the store about 20 minutes after we called in the order. The pizzas were all stacked up and waiting for me. I didn’t realize I was supposed to get a 2 liter of pop though and one was never offered, so I left without that. All said and done, the three pizzas and breadsticks were right around $45.
I popped open the boxes when I got back to the cabin on a picnic table outside then went to find everyone. Some of them were fishing. Others were playing in the house. My dad and his cousin’s husband were sitting on the deck b.s.ing.
The first thing I noticed was the Detroit style pizza. When I hear Detroit style, I think of a square pizza that has a buttery crust…like Buddy’s in Detroit. This pizza was not that. This pizzas was what seemed to me as a typical round, large pizza with pepperoni’s on it then topped with dollops of a sweet, hand crushed tomato sauce. It was good. In fact it was delicious. The sauce on top really made this pizza stand out. I was just confused as to why it was called Detroit style.
The other two pizzas went pretty fast. The bacon pizza was topped with whole slices of crispy, fatty bacon while the sausage pizza had a pretty large surface area covered with meat. Both pizzas were somewhat of a thin crust with a chewy that was just crispy enough to hold up to the large amount of toppings is was tasked with holding.
The bread sticks were kind of an afterthought for everyone except the kids. The pizzas were satisfying enough that no one really thought, “hey, I need some bread sticks.” I think we all eventually did try them and they were good. They had a thick layer of cheese and came with a marinara sauce for dipping.
I always like it when I can go to an unfamiliar town and find a good pizza. I think I did pretty well with Hovey’s. We all seemed to like it and I didn’t hear any complaints from anyone. I’m still confused about the “Detroit Style” but other than that, I really like the small pizza place.
Large Detroit Style Pepperoni Pizza
16″ Bacon Pizza
16″ Cheese and Sausage Pizza
Bread sticks
SW Michigan Dining 