Rotelli's

Originally, we set out to review non-chain restaurants for Penn State students and potentially some State College residents. I broke the form today when I went to Rotelli's for lunch. I decided that I'd review it since there is only a handful of locations total, and State College being the only one in Pennsylvania. Located on the corner of Calder and McAllister, this place hardly goes unnoticed. If you happen to be walking by during the lunch hour, it's hard to miss the enticing sign advertising their 1/2 sub, soup or salad and slice of pizza for $5.99. While I have had this special and it is a great deal, I had other plans today.

The whole process was fairly quick. My lunch today was from 11 to 12:30 and I had no problem getting there and back in time.

The lunch menu is great. The prices are very fair. I ordered a sub and a drink and I paid roughly $8.

The meal is definitely filling.

While they do not accept LionCash, they do deliver. They also offer a rewards card. You get a free entree on your birthday and half birthday. You also get a reward after you earn 100 points (generally, if you spend $12.51 you get 12.51 points, but some days are double points).

I knew going in that I was going to skip the special and get the chicken parm sub. For the same price, you get a full sub and a healthy side of fries. The inside contains fried chicken strips and ricotta cheese. On top of the heaping pile of chicken is a layer of marinara sauce and a layer of cheese that is melted over top of the delicious toasted bread. The presentation is simply beautiful.

The menu is also filled with other gourmet pizzas, pastas, and other delicious subs. I highly recommend this restaurant.

Gingerbread Man

What is there to say about the G-Man? The first thing we noticed upon entering was the conflicting sports jersey interests. You can see memorabilia hanging on the walls from the New Jersey Devils, Philadelphia Flyers, New York Rangers, Miami Dolphins, Philadelphia Phillies and other random teams and sports. This, however, was not about to deter our eating experience. The menu seems to be pretty vast, and after debating for several minutes on what to get, I decided to leave it up to the waitress. To no surprise, she suggested the infamous wedge. A pizza crust folded over an assortment of sandwich combinations and cooked to perfection.

If you get the wedge, don't expect it to come out fast. Pizza crust isn't an instant type of food, so a between class meal may be hard to pull off.

As for the price, everything seemed pretty fair, considering the burgers were about $6.50. The wedges kind of expensive at $8.99, but they were worth it.

We collectively felt full after this meal, but it didn't last for a very long time. I recommend upgrading the complimentary chips to an order of fries for full effect.

LionCash and delivery are accepted here making this another convenient location. The kitchen is open until 11 pm, but they have a late night menu from 11 to 1am that includes nachos, chips with salsa, chicken fingers, mac and cheese, cheese fries, wings, pizza slices, and egg rolls.

G-Man offers different daily dollar off days. Monday is wedge day, Tuesday is cheese steak day, Wednesday is burger day, Thursday is chicken day and Friday is salad day. For weekdays from 11:30 to 5, they offer two slices of pizza and a soda for $2.50.

So, there really isn't much to be said for the Gingerbread Man's chicken parm wedge. You get a personal sized pizza crust, folded over on itself containing a few chicken fingers, some mozzarella cheese and sauce. The wedge brings along a handful of chips to accompany the plate. Overall, the "sandwich" is great. The chicken fingers are very crispy and very moist. The sauce on top is an overall great sauce, and there is just the right amount of cheese on it. Let's not forget the delicious pizza crust, which just adds to the flavor.

The other wedge ordered was BBQ chicken. It came with lettuce, tomato and cheese on it. The chicken was chopped up and tender. The BBQ sauce really added to the flavor of the chicken. This wedge was a quality dinner; it tasted great and was satisfying.

The presentation is nice, and the service was great. The G-Man brings overall good food with a good atmosphere, despite conflicting sports team interests.