1395 US-31All I wanted for dinner was a pizza.
I thought that would be pretty easy. There are two pizza places in Mackinaw City, Mama Mia and BC Pizza.
My plan was to put in an order while I was on the ferry heading back across the Straits of Mackinac but as I sat down and did a Google search, both places were closed.
Well, crap. It’s not like there are a lot of places around Mackinaw City and there really aren’t a lot of places that are open past 9:00. It was already 7:30 and I knew I was going to have to drive somewhere.
I quickly did a Google search on my way back and found Hoppie’s Landing in Pellston. They do online ordering and it was only about 20 minutes so if I left as soon as I got back to my hotel, I would make it with plenty of time to spare.
Hoppie’s has locations in Cheboygan (Hoppie’s Tavern) and Pellston (Hoppie’s Landing). I picked the Pellston location which is actually at the Pellston Regional Airport on US-31 just north of Pellston.
The Pellston airport isn’t that big. The terminal building only has one commercial airline flying in and out of it. The whole building has kind of a lodge like feel to it more than an airport.
The restaurant is upstairs once you come in the main entrance. There’s sign pointing you in the right direction and signs throughout the parking lot making sure you get to the right place.
Once upstairs, the signage kind of disappears. I walked around a little bit guessing where the restaurant may be. I assumed it overlooked the runway so I went towards the big glass windows on the other side of the landing. Sure enough, I found an entrance.
The restaurant has an interesting feel to it. As I mentioned early, the décor of the terminal is more Northern Michigan Cabin than industrial airport.
Right inside the door is a large rectangular bar. There are jersey’s hanging above the bar from local high schools and TV’s all around it.
The dining room area is divided into a couple of different areas. One near the bar…
..and one kind of overlooking the runway. There are TV’s with Tigers games visible from just about anywhere in the place.
I put in my order online so I just had to pick it up but when I walked in, there was no one in the bar area. I walked around a little bit until someone in the kitchen noticed me. A guy came out with my two boxes and rung up the order. I had ordered a 14″ (only option) Hot Wing Pizza and an order of Cheese bread. The meal set me back just under $30.
I headed straight back to the hotel to eat but I had to dig in to the Cheese Bread in the parking lot of the airport. I stuck with the 10″ since it was just me and I had a pizza too. The cheese bread is pretty simple. It’s a thinner crust than the pizza and it’s covered with golden brown cheese.. It came with marinara to dip but fresh out of the oven, it didn’t need the sauce. It was cheesy delicious on it’s own.
The pizza was far better than I was expecting. This pizza is bleu cheese dressing, Buffalo Chicken, mozzarella, and bleu cheese crumbles. This type of pizza is always so hit or miss for me but this one was a big hit. The crust had very little chance holding up to this gooey, spicy pizza. The Buffalo chicken gave it some good heat but the bleu cheese had that perfect calming affect. The whole pizza just had that really good golden brown crust all the way around.
I was really bummed when all the pizza places in Mackinaw City were closed but this worked out for the best. Hoppie’s Landing was so much better than I could have asked for at this point. I would have eaten just about any pizza but I was lucky to find this place that has really good pizza.