Mellow Mushroom

With travel arrangements firmly in place for a trip to Savannah, the obvious next priority was to figure out eating plans. Cooking facilities in our apartment were limited to a microwave so it meant our hand was forced and we had to explore the eating out possibilities in the city – what a hardship. The focus during the countdown to actually travelling was to book the places that sounded worth visiting for evening meals. Daytime plans were left open so we could be flexible between food and other less important activities.

Fast forward to the actual trip and as we drove in from Savannah airport to our apartment on the eastern edge of the historic district the SatNav directed us down Liberty Street. As we worked to get our bearings it was impossible to miss the green and yellow canopies hanging over the table outside The Mellow Mushroom. The name meant I dismissed it as a vegetarian place that we were unlikely to visit due to the two committed carnivores travelling with me. However, something about the name struck a chord and their subsequent nagging meant that I ended up checking the on-line menu to see if it was worth a visit. As soon as word got out that pizza was Mellow Mushroom’s main focus there was no way that I would be able to avoid going there.

Mellow Mushroom was founded in Atlanta in 1974 with expansion around that area during the 80s. Further franchising means that the chain has expanded throughout the Southeast United States, with an emphasis on college towns. Further afield branches have opened in Arizona, Oregon and Texas. The menu has 15 speciality pizzas and the option to build your own with three additional calzone choices. If pizza is not your thing then there are 11 appetisers, 14 hoagy sandwiches or 5 salads to go for. The ambience is very much college town bar. The walls are dominated by murals by Allyson Burke and huge fibreglass mushrooms provide an opportunity for kids to test their climbing skills. We sat by a vast field of mushrooms populated by Alice in Wonderland characters with a good view of a mushroom-focused take on The Simpsons. Elsewhere in the restaurant you could see Dali’s Persistence of Memory with melting pizzas or sit at a booth surrounded by musical and pop culture legends. 

There simply was no choice but to go with wings to start things off. From a list that also mild, bbq, jerk sauces or naked double-baked wings we opted for the hot and somewhat inexplicably the sweet Thai chilli. The meat on the plump wings was satisfyingly juicy with plenty of flavour so the success of each choice was dependent on the sauce. There was a continual battle over who could get the next hot wing but no such furore over Thai sweet chilli wings where the lack of spicy heat worked against them. The hot wings were pitched at a level that catered to the wide range of spicy heat tolerance between us so thumbs up all round.

Next up was the Holy Shiitake pie, a pizza building from n olive oil and garlic base with shiitake, button and Portobello mushrooms, caramelised onions, mozzarella and Montamore cheeses. This was topped with a garlic aioli and black truffle oil and garnished with chives and shaved Parmesan. Punning title name aside this was a really good pizza. I’ve never considered having mushroom on a garlic pizza but, given that it is a classic combination, it makes perfect sense. The whole pizza was an intense blast of complimentary ingredients and worked really well for me. One caveat though, it failed the cold pizza test the morning after because the aioli just did not sit well.

As a casual dining option, Mellow Mushroom worked really well and if we’d spent longer in Savannah we may have had a return visit. It’s never going to serve as a destination restaurant but if they chose to open a branch nearby I’d be happy to treat it as a fairly regular place to stop at.

Overall Rating - 3/5