Restaurants in Kalamazoo

Though it's been a family secret since 1936, Mangia Mangia owners Emilio and Maria Dacoba award ample clues to guests who come dine at their tables topped with red-and-white checkered cloths. The secret's in the sauce—specifically, Nonna Rosa's spaghetti sauce, a family favorite that flavors many of Mangia Mangia's dishes. Along with creating Italian feasts the traditional way using family recipes, the duo caters to dietary restrictions with gluten-free pasta options and gluten-free crusts on some of their pizzas. For parties too large for the normal dining room or too devoted to wearing hoop skirts, Mangia Mangia also offers a 70-seat banquet room, an ideal locale for family reunions and rehearsal dinners.

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Although the Gull Road location of Cottage Inn Pizza has yet to be reviewed, Southwest Michigan Dining featured the Portage Street location and 90% of Urbanspooners recommend the KL Avenue location.

The Corner, which is housed in a former 19th-century homestead, has been delighting patrons for more than a century with a time-tested menu of ribs, burgers, and beer. Plunge a tusk into a solo rack of ribs ($11.95) or pair an edible xylophone with a portion of steak ($14.95), shrimp ($13.95), or chicken ($12.95). Diners can take on the Great burger ($4.25) or enter the C3 burger contest ($16.95), in which gorging gladiators are given half an hour to thwart a two-pound burger, a one-pound basket of fries, and a welterweight game hen trained in jujitsu. A variety of beers, from the hoppy Arcadia IPA ($3) to the dark and bittersweet Edmund Fitzgerald porter ($4), are available to ferry vanquished burgers to the underworld. Night hours bring melodious pageantry to The Corner in the form of concerts and karaoke.

Blackhawk boasts a history as flavorful as its food, starting in 1830 when Colonel Isaac Barnes built a crude cabin that would later develop into a multilevel trading post, then into an event hall, and finally into the current bar and grill. The historic restaurant, which was rebuilt in the 1970s after a devastating fire, continues to draw crowds with heaps of old-fashioned hospitality, as well as a monumental menu of fire-grilled pizzas ($9.95–$13.95), pastas ($6.95–$9.95), burgers ($6.95–$9.95), steaks ($12.95-$17.95), salads ($6.95–$8.95), and more. The Wet Burrito ($8.95) forms the saucy spine of Blackhawk's Latin American menu with mounds of meat smothered in colby jack cheese, lettuce, tomato, onions, and black olives. The pan-fried walleye ($14.95) is a house specialty, pairing perfectly with frosty suds from the bar.

Couched in newly expanded quarters, People’s Food Co-op's cooks draw on a community-minded business model and sate customers’ hunger with a toothsome array of nutritionally sound fare. Locally grown and organic foods shine in a cornucopia of house-made deli concoctions, including a fresh bulk-food bar heavily laden with hot stews, cold salads, and just-right porridges ($7.99/lb). Slabs of corn-polenta torta ($2.16 each) swaddle herb-kissed bundles of kale, red pepper, and feta cheese. A gallery of pre-wrapped options showcases stratified edibles such as breakfast burritos, vegan tempeh Reubens, and reams of roasted veggies sandwiched in Zingerman’s bread ($4.68–$12.99). Tubs of roasted-red-pepper and garlicky raw hummus lend creamy aplomb to al fresco outings on the shop's patio (up to $9.99 each), and nut-studded muffins ($3–$5) and diminutive rounds of raw cashew cheesecake ($3.99) fuel mobile-eating competitions.

Generations of treasured family recipes make up the foundation of Mi Ranchito's menu of south-of-the-border specialties, made fresh every day from authentic imported ingredients. The house special birria estilo "Mi Ranchito" ($12.95) tempts tongues with tender chunks of pork smothered in a deluge of spicy homemade barbecue sauce and is served with tortillas rice, beans, and guacamole. The golden, deep-fried chimi ($8.25) comes stuffed with a choice of beef, chicken, veggies, or beans and is topped with red or green sauce, and a "dear john" letter pre-addressed to your personal trainer. Patrons will be thankful the giant wet burrito ($10.50) forgot its umbrella at home as they are swept away in a torrent of homemade enchilada sauce, beans, cheese, and a choice of beef or chicken. Families looking to augment their tableside fiestas with appetizers can lasso in an order of four nachitos ($4.25), a specialty appetizer dish of taco-shell halves spread with refried beans and topped with cheese, jalapenos, and onions, or brush up on their division skills by sharing an order of three homemade hot tamales ($6.25) four ways.