Mangia Pizza

This was a great place — very tasty pizza at a good price, usually very large slices, friendly staff. Sadly, they seem to have closed up…

Mangia is definitely one of the best pizza joints I’ve ever been to. Friendly, inviting, and cozy space with a front and back patio. From my experience, there are usually only a few people in the restaurant at a time.
But more importantly the pizza is AMAZING. Fresh, wide selection of toppings and an excellent, light, crispy crust (perhaps the most important part?). The selection of specialty pizzas is great. My favorites are the White and the Greek.
Plus it’s called Mangia! Feel free to use your pronunciation of choice. Lord knows I do.

After a bike race, my crowd of about 12 wondered upon Mangia and decided to give it a shot. Great pizza with a very secluded, cozy, very cool patio to hang out on. Not sure, but it almost seemed to be more of a carry out place (or a place you can go if you are not in a hurry) because there was only one waitress (who ended up doing a fine job after the initial shock of us walking onto the patio) working there and they only had one beer on tap.

I love the idea of this place… it is a small, quaint pizza place a bit of the beaten path with homey indoor seating and a great outdoor area for the summer. However, the pizza was just mediocre. We ordered the chop salad for starters, which was delicious. The freshest veggies topped with huge chunks of mozzarella and salami, with a great Italian vinaigrette. We ordered the Greek pizza, and added chicken. The chicken had no flavor whatsoever, which is what I think killed the whole deal. Crust was nothing special either though, and I was totally underwhelmed.
Service was great though, we had a sweet waitress who talked to us about the Oregon Pinot Noir we chose. Maybe we just ordered wrong? Not sure, but unfortunately with all of the pizza competition in Portland, I can’t say I’ll purposely choose to go back here.

My love of Mangia Pizza is equal to my hatred of the series Twilight.
The crust is neither thick nor thin and cooked to perfection, not burnt. The cheese is gooey and not rubbery chuck-​e-​cheese mass, and the toppings are high quality. The service is friendly. As surely as Twilight promotes backward, misogynistic ideals of the virgin sex-​object, Mangia Pizza offers a quality pie which is sure to please the whole family.

Ate here a couple times during a recent visit to Portland. I thought the pizza was very good, the service great as well. They used kalamata (?) olives on the pizza as well as some high quality sausage. Crust not thick, rather on the thin side as I prefer it. Olive appetizer was a big hit as well!
Not much of a beer selection, but what the hey, this is Portland and there is no shortage of places to grab a quality brew before and after. Some good wine to be had to make up for it.
Only lost one star from a to-​go experience. Got a large pizza, and asked for some napkins and peppers, and parmesan. I was given exactly one napkin, and one packet of peppers. No big deal, but rather strange. Didn’t stop me from dropping in again the following week!

I finally got the chance to visit Mangia in person; they were gracious enough to grant me a $ 5 off coupon — how nice!
Ambience: warm and glowing. The copper stamped ceiling was gorgeous, the lighting romantic and inviting. Since childhood, I’ve been hypnotized by gleaming copper kitchen ware; I have Christmas-​like memories of the spotlit copper kettles in The Cellar at Macy’s (The Cellar was my father’s creation.) We opted not to check out the patio this visit.
Service: friendly, efficient, very helpful. Megan (forgive me; I *think* it was Megan — what I get for delaying my review this long… Alzheimer’s sets in) even discussed wine and beer options knowledgeably, which says a lot for a pizza restaurant. Even given that the selection was small. Even given that this is a pizza joint in the Alphabet district.
Drink: enjoyed a delightful Pinot Noir from Big Fire — it went superbly with the pizza. The other selections were foreign (in that they were from overseas as well as in that I was unfamiliar with them). His Goatness had Mirror Pond on tap, and was happy as a clam. I also noticed bottles of Thomas Kemper root beer in the fridge — I love pizza with root beer.
And finally (drumroll)… the pizza! As I had suspected, the crust was SUPERB when out-​of-​the-​oven fresh. Light, thin, crisp, and flavorful, I would happily eat it with a little extra-​virgin olive oil, solely. Or heck, with PBJ. But I didn’t have to! Joy! Instead, we got a half and half: beef with caramelized onion and Gorgonzola, and Italian chicken (with artichoke hearts and sun-​dried tomatoes). Yum! It was delicious; I ate too much of it (again). And then they gave us these gorgeous little hazelnut cookies, gratis…
Given the quality of the crust, I asked; apparently, the pizza oven is a slate oven that was shipped here from the East Coast. (And apparently the first one was broken, and had to be returned for an exchange — !)
I honestly have not had better pizza in Portland, and I’ve tried most of the high-​end gourmet joints (I don’t do chains for pizza). Given that, plus the superiority of the rest of the experience: this is it, for me! Never more shall I roam.
Thanks, Mangia!

I have to give this place an A-​OK. Its close by work so I will be visiting it a lot. Its better than pizzacato but not as good as ken’s pizzaria. The cheese is greasy on a really hot baked pizza dough. The crust is really good. I really like it. Though the topping can be better. I will have to try the calzone later. Slices costs from $ 3+ and each pie costs about $ 12+ Calzones are about $ 8+ The pizzeria is very small but very nice and comfortable. I like it. I will definitely come back for more.

I was really hoping to have an exceptional pizza place a couple of blocks from my house. I agree with the previous reviewer about the space and the service. I have to confess that all I’ve had is pizza (one slice pepperoni and one Margahrita pie) so the touted salads and desserts are going unreviewed by me. One approach would be to wait until I’ve sampled more, but I’m not sure I’ll be back soon. That said, I heartily suggest that all area pizza lovers visit Mangia and sample their wares. Here’s why.
I don’t think I’m a good representative judge to go by where pizza is concerned. I go to places where folks have raved about the pies and I generally come away about 3-​star impressed. I like thin, crispy crusts with sparse, flavorful toppings. That’s not your hugely popular pizza these days — maybe never was. I’ve had 4-​star examples of the type of pizza I like at a couple of places in Portland. It’s been years since I’ve had a 5-​star version (but I’m still looking).
The Mangia pizza? The pepperoni slice was 3.5 stars. The crust wasn’t as thin as I ‘d like, but would definitely be categorized as thin crust by most. It was crispy. It had very good flavor. The sauce, cheese and meat were pretty run-​of-​the-​mill, but the overall effect was good. I imagine that the Margahrita pie was the same dough recipe, but it ended up more chewy than crisp. I suspect that was in the cooking. The sauce was tomato paste heavy and missed the mark for me. The large circles of fresh mozzarella were distributed rather randomly, such that some slices went unpopulated. There needed to be much more fresh basil.
If you like popular pies such as Hot Lips, I urge you to go try Mangia. You may find just what you are looking for. I like the idea of the place and I hope they succeed.