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Knoxville, Iowa —Rick Santorum tried to take a bite out of one his opponent’s slice of the action Friday evening in Iowa.

The former Pennsylvania senator’s seventh event of the day was a town hall at a Godfather’s Pizza, of Herman Cain fame.

He said it wasn’t to rub its former CEO the wrong way and instead his staff planned it, but he did admit to looking for the $9.99 special, which he found for a medium pizza.

“Every time we come into the town we work with people in the local communities…and we have them at Pizza Ranches and other types of establishments and they suggested Godfather’s Pizza and they (staff) said, ‘would you have a problem with it?’ and I said, ‘Heck no! If that’s the place where people in the community can be,” Santorum told reporters. “I thought it would be sort of a fun thing to have something at Godfather’s Pizza.”

He did try a sausage  slice after the town hall telling reporters and those gathered he enjoyed it, even adding a “good job, Herman!”

It wasn’t the first time he mentioned Cain Friday, a marathon day that included five town halls.

In Ottumwa, at a small town hall in a roundtable style at the local library with about 15 people, he was asked about his support for the NRA.

” Which NRA? The National Rifle Association or the National Restaurant Association?” Santorum joked. “I want to make sure I’m not getting a trick question here.”

Cain is the former CEO of the National Restaurant Association, and it’s from this employment where the sexual harassment allegations stem from.

At the same event, Santorum took a swipe at another rival: Mitt Romney for his health care plan in Massachusetts comparing it to President Obama’s health care plan.

“The problem with Obamacare is the same problem as Romneycare which is an acceptance that the government is the one who can best allocate resources and make decisions as to how the health care system should run. That’s fundamentally flawed,” Santorum said. “That’s why those who say well my plan is different, well it’s government run medicine and you either believe in top down government-run things whether it’s auto companies or financial services or student loans or health care.”

“This is the foundational problem I have with Gov. Romney and his defense of his own program,” Santorum added. “It is in essence the same thing.”

At an earlier town hall at a pizza shop in Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, Santorum was asked about Rick Perry’s new pledge that if he becomes president he will make the United States Congress a part time job.

Santorum said it won’t work and it gives the president too much power. He said an absentee Congress would mean there is “high potential for an executive to run amok.”

Throughout the day he implored the crowds to caucus for him on Jan. 3, but also to join up to be precinct campaigns.

This is a sign the campaign is not just hoping people will vote, but that they are organizing, a key element to winning the caucuses.

Despite low poll numbers, Santorum reminded the crowd in Knoxville that there is plenty of time before the caucus, pointing out that “as a father of seven children” he has learned patience.

“We still have six and a half weeks. That’s an eternity in politics,” Santorum said. “My goodness six and a half weeks ago no one was talking about Newt Gingrich, six and a half weeks before that no one was taking about Herman Cain. Six and a half weeks before that Rick Perry wasn’t even running so just remember the dynamism.”