Pizza Hut (Mattawan)
56280 City Center CircleFriday night’s on the road. Well, kind of. I’m still in Southwest Michigan. I’m just not at home for pizza night with the family.
I had an overtime shift on Friday night so I ordered delivery from Cottage Inn for the family but I didn’t want cold pizza when I got home around 10:30.
As I travel around the area on Friday night’s in the fall, I usually try to find a local pizza place somewhere to grab a pizza from. The problem with that is I’m running out of local pizza places. Just about every small town I go to has one local pizza place.
I had to start branching out.
That was fine though because there was a pizza from one of the national chains that I’ve really been wanting to try anyway.
I was in Mattawan and the pizza place I was looking for was Pizza Hut.
The Pizza Hut in Mattawan is in the McGillen’s Crossing development on the corner of McGillen Avenue and Main Street. The address for the restaurant is actually City Centre Circle which is a road that runs through the development. The restaurant is on the Main Street side in a building that has room for about a half dozen businesses.
Pizza Hut isn’t quite the same as it was when I was growing up. I grew up during the awesome area of Book-It pizzas, endless pizza buffets and the red roofed buildings. The modern Pizza Hut has sort of transitioned to a mostly carry-out business with most newer locations doing just carry-out and delivery.
This building in Mattawan is a mostly a carry-out/delivery location. I put my order in online before I left Kalamazoo. When I got to Mattawan, I found a counter right inside the building. I told them I had an online order and the person working the register turned around to find a box with my name on it. I had already paid online so it was just a grab and go situation.
I said this was “mostly” a carry-out/delivery location because that’s the bulk of the business but there are a couple of tables inside the restaurant that you can eat in at. There actually was a group of people eating at one of the tables when I stopped in to pick up my pizza.
The reason I stopped at this Pizza Hut was twofold. One, it’s a pizza place in Mattawan I haven’t been too and two, Pizza Hut just came out with a Tavern Style Crust.
I’ve talked about Tavern Style a few times over the years….mostly in blogs about Chicago pizza joints (like this one from Rosati’s or Vito & Nick’s or my favorite, Palermo’s 95th). The Tavern Style is more of a hallmark of the Southside of Chicago. Everyone associates the Deep Dish with the City but the best pizzas are actually this Tavern Style.
I say this is a “new type of pizza” but in reality, Pizza Hut introduced this a year ago. I just don’t eat at Pizza Hut often despite it being my favorite pizza place growing up. I feel like I just saw an ad for this recently which is really what put Pizza Hut back on my radar.
I ordered a 16″ Tavern crust with pepperoni, sausage, and jalapenos. If we were really doing the Chicago thing, they’d have Italian beef and giardiniera on the menu. They don’t so I went with the standard meats and the jalapenos to give it a little spiciness.
Tavern style pizza has a crispy cracker thin crust with cheese and toppings that go all the way to the edge. It’s cut in to squares instead of triangles so it’s easier to eat. This pizza from Pizza Hut was surprisingly good. Like, it’s probably going to become our new go-to when ordering delivery. The whole pizza was nice and crispy and the toppings were loaded on. It had a nice golden brown top with crispiness in the pepperoni’s and the jalapenos. I wasn’t planning on eating this whole pizza in one night but once I got to my job site and started to dig in, I just couldn’t stop.
The cost for this pizza was just under $14.
I think we have a new Friday pizza night pizza. It’s hard to find good Chicago style tavern pizza outside of Chicago. Hell, even the Uno’s I ate at in Boston had a hard time getting it right. This Pizza Hut got it right. Crispy, thin crust pizza loaded with toppings. I’m actually kind of excited to order one of these and see how J and the kids like it.
SW Michigan Dining 