Domino’s Pizza (Arcadia)
2706 W. Michigan AvenueFriday night pizza night is usually the same thing every week. Cottage Inn.
Don’t get me wrong, I really like Cottage Inn. There’s a reason it’s become our go to Friday night pizza delivery place.
I’m not a guy that likes eating the same thing over and over though. I like variety…especially with pizza. My kids, however, don’t like change. Whenever we order something other than Cottage Inn, they complain and barely eat.
I decided I didn’t really care last Friday. I wanted something different.
A lot of times when I order pizza that isn’t Cottage Inn, I order from Kazoopy’s. That’s always great pizza but Friday night’s are busy and there can usually be quite a wait…even for pick up.
We do this thing called RaiseRight for the kids’ figure skating. We buy gift cards through them and it benefits us and the skating club. We essentially get money back from each gift card we buy that goes in to our skating account.
I searched RaiseRight to see what pizza places had gift cards available. Domino’s was one of them and actually sounded good to me.
I ordered from the Domino’s on the corner of Howard Street and West Michigan Avenue in Kalamazoo’s Arcadia Neighborhood. The restaurant is in the outer building of the Campus Pointe Mall across the street from Western Michigan University. The carry-out pizza chain has been in this spot since about 2017. Before that, it was a Panda Express followed by Buddha’s Belly.
The easiest access to the restaurant is from the parking lot behind the building. There is a door on the Michigan Avenue side if a person would walk there but the only parking is behind the building in the shared parking lot.
I put in my order online for two pizzas, Garlic bread twists, and a Marbled cookie brownie. Each of the items was $6.99. With a two liter of Coke, my bill came to a little over $30…which is about half of what we usually pay for Cottage Inn. `
I elected to go in the store to pick it up because I actually wanted to check this place out. This was one of the locations where they put in the “Pizza Theater” where you can watch the pizzas being made. There are chairs alongside the window and enough room to sit an eat if you choose. The whole “Pizza Theater” thing gets a little messed up by the boxes they have stacked in the way. There’s even a set of stairs so kids can get up to see but again, there are boxes stacked in the way and there’s nothing a kid could see if they were standing on those stairs.
I was a little surprised to see an actual dining room. Most delivery pizza places are just carry-out/delivery places anymore but there are a number of tables where a person could actually sit and eat. There’s a mural on the wall with local pictures and shots from the WMU and K-College campus which is served by this Domino’s location.
One of the things I like about ordering from Domino’s is the tracker they give you so you know what stage the pizza making process is in. I had about a 15 minute drive to the store and the ETA was about 20 minutes. The tracker said my pizza was done about the time I was pulling in to the parking lot so I headed in to pick it up. This location also offer curbside pick up and even a drive thru pick up window.
My kids didn’t throw a fit when I walked in with Domino’s boxes instead of Cottage Inn so I didn’t make the horrible decision I thought I was. That’s a plus.
The first pizza I ordered was a medium thin crust cheese pizza. J and B like to keep things simple. I stopped ordering Domino’s because I really wasn’t a fan of the thin crust. It felt to…I don’t know…pappery to me. The bottom layers always seemed to peel off and it really wasn’t all that crispy. This pizza was not like that. I didn’t ask for a well done pizza but that’s what we got. That’s not a complaint. I think all of us prefer a crispier crust and golden brown cheese. I got this pizza for J and B but I ended up eating a few slices and it was better than the pizzas we’ve gotten from them in the past.
The other pizza I got was their new New York Style crust. I got a medium with just pepperoni’s in case anyone else wanted to eat it with me. The New York Style crust will be my go-to in the future. It’s a thinner crust that’s a little floppier than the thin crust but it works when it’s cut in to triangles and able to be folded over like a true New York slice. It’s doesn’t have the “snap” or crispiness that NY slices get when they come out of the oven but it’s still a pretty tasty pizza and much better than their other crust options.
I got the Garlic Bread Twist mostly for L but we all grabbed a couple. L likes to just eat bread. She had a slice or two of pizza but she really liked the garlic bread. The bread twists are pretty standard garlic bread sticks but they’re twisted in to knots instead of just being flat pieces. There’s a pretty heavy layer of garlic on top and they come with a side of marinara for dipping.
The big reason we order Cottage Inn on Friday night’s is for their Cinnamon Bread. We end up eating it for breakfast all weekend.
Domino’s has Cinnamon Twists but it’s not the same. We still need dessert so I ordered the Marbled Cookie Brownie instead. This is just a combination of a cookie and a brownie all in one dessert. It’s better if you eat it warm right out of the box but B ended up eating some for breakfast the next day because we left the box out and forgot to hide it from him.
Domino’s Pizza has always been pretty hit or miss for us. The rest of my family doesn’t really like the typical delivery style pizza. J grew up in the Chicago area and had literally the best pizza in the world every Friday night. I, on the other hand, begged my parents to eat at Pizza Hut every week when they still had the dine in service restaurants…then I went to college and damn near lived on delivery pizza…so, we have very different pizza tastes. Domino’s has some good options though and it’s always a nice break from “the usual.”
SW Michigan Dining 