Mannie’s Pizza, Subs, and More
110 S. Farmer Street Suite BWe haven’t gotten any snow yet but that hasn’t stopped the ski slopes from opening in November.
Last week, my assignment took me out to Bittersweet Ski Area just outside of Otsego. My co-worker called in sick, so this became a solo assignment that I quickly knocked out and moved on to the next task.
I was working an evening shift so it was dinner time as I was getting back in the car to head towards Kalamazoo. I knew there was a pizza place just off the main drag in Otsego so I did a little research to see if I could find a menu. It didn’t take long before I pulled up a Facebook page and found what I was looking for.
Mannies Pizza, Subs, & More is a small pizzeria on Farmer Street just south of M-89 in downtown Otsego. It’s in a small building that is shared with Amish Oak Treasures. It became Mannies pretty recently after being Joe’s Way Pizza for several years.
When you’re sitting at the Farmer Street and M-89 intersection heading east, you can see the sign lit up, but it’s hard to tell exactly what it is. Luckily, they have a simple sidewalk sign easily readable from M-89 that lets you know exactly what you’re looking at.
The menu at Mannies is pretty self explanatory. They have pizza. They have subs. They have more. The more is salads, pasta, and appetizers. They also have the option to get all of their pizzas as Stromboli instead of the typical pizza for the same price.
I had called in my order for a 14″ pepperoni pizza. They told me it would take about 25 minutes so I stopped for gas a couple bottles of Pepsi before making my way downtown.
I actually walked in to the shop just under 20 minutes after I called. It’s a small place with an order counter that greets you as you walk in the door. The small dining room looks like it’s gotten a fresh coat of paint recently. The red and dark yellow color scheme keep things a little on the darker side more along the lines of fancy Italian restaurants.
There’s a small dine in area with less than a half dozen tables. Most are two tops, but there’s a bigger circular four top near the door. This is the kind of place that does the majority of their business as carry-out but if you don’t want the mess at home, there is an area for you to comfortably sit and eat with friends.
I didn’t realize it when I ordered but Monday is a carry-out deal night. My 14″ one topping pizza should have been $11.50 before tax but I paid about $7.50 pre-tax. I paid with a credit card then grabbed my pizza which was being boxed up when I walked in and headed back to the office in Kalamazoo to eat.
I was pretty surprised by the pizza when I got back to Kalamazoo. Their website makes it look like a thicker, puffy crust but the pizza is actually on a pretty thin crust that’s cooked with a slight crunch all the way through to the middle.
The cheese had a nice bubbled, golden hue to it and the grease from the slightly charred pepperoni’s was running over the top of the pizza. The sauce was layered on pretty thinly, but it had a robust, sweet flavor.
I like my pizza’s on the golden side of done so even though you see what appears to be burned spots along the crust, I had no complaints. I will take those over a doughy under cooked crust any day.
Mannies was another small town pizzeria surprise. I really had pretty low expectations based on their Facebook photos but I’m guessing a lot of those were either double crust pizzas (which is an option) or they were stock photos. I really enjoyed this pizza so much that I didn’t go home with any leftovers like I had originally planned.
SW Michigan Dining 