The crisp brown crust remains a draw regardless of the toppings you might prefer. On the prime rib pizza, the toppings provide an interesting and unique set of rich demi, sweet onion, succulent beef and stringy, salty cheese.
 

Prime Rib Pizza
 

Well Done From Crust To Cheese
 

Unfortunate "Chile" Tacos
 

Well Prepared Ribs Needed Some Wow
 

Fries Still Good But Not Special
 

Too Sweet For Me But Fine
 

Every Element Excels
 

And Makes Me Popular
 

Kozmo's Grille
 Massillon, Ohio       Date of Visit  01/16/13       http://www.kozmosgrille.com

Not entirely sure how we ended up here. There is an ongoing list of restaurant possibilities and this Kosmo’s Grille has never been on it. Steph spent the day in front of the computer at home and put me in charge of some sort of respite for lunch. I checked the list and nothing seemed right so I tooled the web and found Kosmo’s. Just off of 21 in Massillon Kosmo’s takes up what seems like an entire block of 1st street.
 

Inside, the place is actually a mix of relaxed and refined with soft woods and exposed brick giving it the feel of a club where lawyers might smoke cigars and sip fine bourbon. Thankfully the place is packed with people and not lawyers. The hostess was ebullient and had a ringing laugh that nearly surpassed the contestant Josie on the Top Chef series on bravo. Our server was much more subdued but professionally friendly on top of being a hustler. We decided we would, as usual, order entirely too much, but would plan on taking a great deal of it home with us instead of waddling out the door groaning. We walked out with four take out containers, which was harder than expected…simply due to our lunch being much better than we had hoped.
 

We started with Toasted Goat Cheese Cakes, two panko coated (fried) disks which were served with toasted flatbread and set atop a Mediterranean-style marinara sauce. Fried and breaded goat cheese with any vehicle for delivery makes me happy. These were done to a suspiciously dark brown which ended up working very well with the pungent olives, acidic tomatoes and aromatics of the wildly flavorful marinara. The only detraction was the hit or miss texture of the flatbread pieces several of which fared poorly by comparison on the plate. Didn’t matter much, there were good pieces and even if there weren’t you could put everything else in a blender and I would drink it through a straw.
 

Delicious "Toasted" Goat Cheese Cakes...
 

We also tried a slice each of the daily special BBQ chicken pizza before sending it to the box. I might not have shown much interest in the pizza but we were sat close to the large stone hearth pizza oven and had a chance to see what was going on there. Ours consisted of a crispy flavorful crust featuring a variety of textures from the quick bake in the hot oven, topped with slow roasted chicken, BBQ sauce, sweet onions, cilantro and a five cheese blend plus smoked Gouda. Loads of cheese, tender chicken, layers of other flavors and a sweet sauce with a kick makes for a delicious pizza for lunch, and dinner, and maybe breakfast.

There was a special on the burgers on Wednesdays so I went with shrooms and bleu cheese from the list of options and was delivered a half-pound angus patty on a Kaiser bun with a full garden set. Excellent  burger, good toppings, half price? A half pound burger, half of which is also sitting in the fridge for 3.89? Can’t beat it. The fries looked gorgeous and very much would have been had they been done through which would take some doing since the fries are cut wonderfully thick. It seemed as though someone had forgotten to drop mine as they lagged behind everything else on the table and were pulled long before perfection, probably a good thing…already eating too much, but easily the only real disappointment of our meal.
 

Steph ordered something from the seasonal special menu, the made from scratch chicken pot pie topped with “Tiff’s famous pie crust”. This stuff was molten chicken crack topped with a biscuity feeling crust which reeked of butter and all things wonderful and homey and glorious. Maybe that’s what hope smells like. The steaming sauce was studded with peas, corn, carrots, lima beans and chicken which soaked into the crust to resulting in sort of a chicken porridge from heaven, if ever there could be such a thing.  It came with a great looking and fresh salad as well.
 

With a good bit of everything except for the goat cheese packed away for later consumption we ordered dessert. The seasonal fruit cobbler for the day was blackberry and it was on. We added a slice of Otis’ key lime pie which is made in house. The pie wasn’t quite as sharp as those I have had in Florida but did feature a light sting of citrus in a sweeter custard. The crust containing the citrus pudding had cashews ground in with the graham cracker and the whole slice was topped with a berry sauce and a couple of whipped cream rosettes. Really pretty good for up North. The cobbler shared more than just a layer with the pot pie, it shared the magic. The biscuit pie dough had been sprinkled with sugar and baked atop fresh blackberry goodness. The crust also served as a raft for the slowly melting vanilla ice cream. Kosmo’s Grille isn’t just a place we would return to, it’s a place we would take other folks to share. Try it.