You know those hidden gems that don't look like much from the outside, you probably drive by every day, but locals know just how good they are? Yeah, Kinsey's is one of those places. Certified hidden gem status.
We ran into Trent in our local Walmart, he recognized us and said "hey, Indy Pizza Blog, right?" He's got the inside scoop on the northeast McCordsville to Lapel area and strongly recommended Kinsey's.
We vowed to make it our next date night and moved it to the top of the bucket list. We still have dozens of places to get to, and more open and close every week it seems. Kinsey's is in a small inconspicuous strip with a parking lot out front.
We started with the garlic knots (comes in 3, 6 or 12) and pepperoni breadsticks (comes in 3 or 6). The pepperoni breadsticks were hot from the oven and incredibly juicy. They are done right with cheese and pepperoni on the inside and sauce to dip so they are not soggy or sloppy, just right, dippable and they stay together in your hand.
The garlic knots were fresh and super soft, but just a heads up they are more like room temperature dinner rolls brushed with garlic butter as opposed to oven baked pizza crust garlic knots like at Bubba's. Not in a bad way, in fact I had three they were great.
I said we would go on date night but we actually took my parents and nephew with us as well. My mom got a 10 inch pizza with sausage and green pepper. She gave me some notes for the blog she said the green pepper was cooked but still crisp and had a little crunch as opposed to being soggy.
Chris and I split a 14 inch pizza with pepperoni and bacon, and I got a calzone called a Panzerotti with sausage, pepperoni, and mozzarella.
The crust is soft and foldable and somewhat spongy as opposed to chewy. A word that kept coming to mind with the crust was soft, and the Panzerotti calzone was surprisingly soft. If you look at the picture you can probably imagine what the texture is like, well I would say it's more pillowy soft than you think, stuffed with fluffy gooey cheese, small sausage crumbles, and pepperoni.
The toppings stay put and the crust holds up to all the cheese and toppings, so not just good but stays together.
The Panzerotti stole the show for me, and Chris said next time he would get a calzone as well. The pizza and the calzone were fantastic, would definitely make the drive to come again to show off this diamond in the rough.
Honestly, this is so fun, this is why we pizza blog to find places like this to share the love and help spread the word to folks downtown and folks visiting Indy looking to try something new. Thanks Trent and thanks to our followers for the tips.