Burger & Beer Joint

     John's relentless quest for blue-chip burgers seems hopeless to me at times, but his determination pays off occasionally. Today he was successful. Even I got excited looking at the menu- the witty names for their signature burgers, the inspired combinations, the extensive selection of ingredients to help you design your own creation. The Joint shows serious reverence for burger worshipping.
 
     I decided I would try one of their signatures, but I couldn't decide if I wanted the Sympathy for the Devil, the Freebird, or the Wild Thing. Are you getting the theme? I finally chose to "rock 'n roll" with the Wild Thing, half a pound of bison meat on a brioche bun with blue cheese, garlic aioli, and my new friend, tomato jam. The burger was cooked to my specified medium, and the combination of the strong blue cheese with the subtle, sweet tomato jam made every bite a celebration of flavor. For the duration of the meal, I wanted to put tomato jam on everything. My burger came with a side of rich and savory duck fat fries.
    John put on his hard hat and built his own. He chose his classic beef, cooked medium, bacon, red onion, and American cheese, accompanied by onion rings. A wide smile appeared on his face, and his eyes lit up after just the first bite. When Hubby is this pleased with his food, the meal takes on a whole new hue. The side element consisted of four enormous onion rings barely touched by batter and gently fried, which made them a light complement to the headlining burger.
     And I would be remiss not to make a parenthetical note about The Motherburger, a manhole-sized ten pounds of premium Angus beef with lettuce, tomato, onion, and pickle. If that's not a complete burger for you, there is the option of adding cheese, toppings, and sauce. The price is $125, but if you can finish it within two hours, it's free, and you can save the money for cholesterol medication. May the Force be with you.
   
     Dessert presented us with two options- The King, Fried Twinkies, or Maroon, Fried Oreos, both accompanied by vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce. We chose the Twinkies and were not impressed. It seems the creamy center melted into the cake when fried because I couldn't find it. In fact, I didn't even taste the cake. It was more like chunks of fried dough. A hot/cold/sweet combination always provides some satisfaction at the end of a meal, but this dessert didn't match the quality of the burgers. That's okay, though. The burgers are so good, its forgivable.
     B&B has made an undeniable commitment to offering quality burgers. They want you to love your burger experience, and they want you to come back. Done and done.

BB Free ©2017

Doc's Beach House

Every good beach has a joint where sand dwellers can walk up in their dusty bare feet, get a cold brew, a burger and fries and continue their ocean worship virtually uninterrupted. This is such a place. Rent a parasail or a jetski, walk up to get your grub, and return to the warm embrace of the Gulf of Mexico with a simple about-face.
     Doc's was the first stop on our anniversary weekend getaway to Naples in Florida's west coast, our favorite place to hangout these days.We had a sunset dinner cruise booked, so we wanted a no-frills lunch. I ordered the fried Mahi fingers basket with fries and coleslaw, and John ended up with a ham and cheese sandwich because the steak sandwich on their menu was not available. We throw little tantrums when something on the menu is not available.

     My fish fingers were actually quite satisfying, the fries were like hundreds of others I've had, and the coleslaw did not offend. That's the best I can do. John's sandwich, on the other hand, shocked me. It could've easily been a prank. Two slices of white bread, not toasted. The ham kept slipping out because there was no condiment to glue it to the bread. The cheese slices came fresh out of plastic wrappers.
     Listen, I know this is beach food, but if you're going to charge $9 for a ham and cheese sandwich, little details like toasting the bread, adding a little garlic mayo or better even, cheese that does not come individually wrapped is not too much to ask, right?
     I wasn't discouraged, though. I knew better adventures would follow on our mini vacation. This road stop would soon be forgotten.

    BB Free ©2015

Red Robin

Yes, I must be the last person in the free world that had never tried Red Robin, but burger snobs like me often overlook the obvious, plus until recently, there wasn't one conveniently located. John said it would be like Fuddruckers, and that was a good enough endorsement for me.

     The mood is that of a happy '50s diner with a bar- lots of kiddie birthday parties going on, cheerful servers, neon signs, cooks hustling in the open kitchen.
Hubby ordered the Smoke & Pepper, which   they call their finest. The black pepper bacon was cooked the way he likes it- not too limp, not too crispy. This burger promised a smoky flavor but failed to deliver. "I ordered the best, but I wasn't impressed." From the poet laureate of the meat world.
     I ordered the Guacamole Burger but switched the Swiss cheese for blue cheese. This burger really tried hard to be good and it had potential, but it was missing the pink interior of a medium-cooked patty, and even more noticeably, the guacamole.  There was a schmear of it on one side of the bun, but I looked through the burger several times to make sure I hadn't somehow misplaced it. I shouldn't have to do that, right?  If the name includes the word 'guacamole', then the avocado flavor and texture should rise to meet me. We both ordered the steak fries and found them stale and disappointing.
     I won't say it was the worst burger I ever had, but this snob needs more.

BB Free ©2014
     
     

Shake Shack

Hamburger questing is getting harder and harder. John and I believe we have already found the Holy Grail of burgers, at least here in Miami, so the bar has been set very high. We didn't, however, expect to be so thoroughly disappointed on this day.
   

   The Shack doesn't have a lot of choices for hamburger assembly. They are small and do not constitute a full meal for anyone over the age of seven. We shared an order of their "hand-cut" cheese fries which were soggy with a mixture of melted American and cheddar cheeses that resulted in a slightly antiseptic aftertaste.

     The only tolerable part of the meal were the shakes, the key word being "tolerable". I ordered the peanut butter malted and John the chocolate. He found his no better than the ones at Steak & Shake. Mine couldn't decide whether to be peanut butter or malted. I expected distinct peanut butter with a hint of malt. All I got was lazy peanut butter, hidden malt and a sudden craving for the Summer peach shake at Chik-Fil-A.

     I'm a little worried that this place came so highly recommended because usually my sources are reliable. But eatery-hopping is always a "hit or miss" proposition. Shake Shack was definitely a "miss". 

BB Free ©2014
   

Pincho Factory

     I confess... I am a burger snob. Over the years, I have outgrown the fast food versions. For a while, Wendy's could satisfy the craving, but then Five Guys dethroned Wendy's. That reign lasted a very short time when Shula Burger appeared. Now, my burgers only come from Bar & Grill eateries, Fuddruckers (because they serve bison burgers), or specialty restaurants.

     A while back, on the Today show, I saw a cooking segment with a guest chef who dared to replace the hamburger bun with 'tostones', latin-style plaintain fritters. I was intrigued. This would be my new quest for the upcoming weekend.

    Pincho Factory is a minuscule place in a strip mall with predominantly black and white décor and a lot of traffic. Their specialty is skewers, or 'pinchos'. You can have single pinchos, you can make them into a full entree with a rice bowl, a salad bowl, or swaddled in a thick pita wrap. You can make them into a vegetable dish, you can have them Buffalo-style, a la Caesar, or go Greek. They know their pinchos, no question.

     John teetered on the verge of ordering a pincho, but in the end his love of burgers won out. He ordered the classic 'Pincho Burger', served on potato bread and with all the traditional embellishments plus potato sticks (missing from John's) and their "secret pink sauce".

     I customized my 'Toston Burger' by adding bacon and switching the Jack cheese with my beloved blue cheese, which probably nullified any flavor their cilantro sauce may have offered.

     Both items were flavorful but neither was exceptional. The tostones didn't add or subtract from the total burger experience. One thing we found really disappointing was the size. They were just a smidgen bigger than a slider.

     As I often do, I've left the best for last. We shared a small but very generous order of sweet potato puffs, an ethereal delight so sublime that they melted in your mouth like cotton candy. And, in case you had any doubt that they were made in heaven, they're served with apple butter on the side for that extra burst of sweetness. It's the kind of thing that puts a smile on your face whether you like it or not.

     I don't know that I would go back for the burgers, but I'm captivated by the pincho craze so, if I'm in the area, I will investigate... and have more sweet potato puffs.

    BB Free ©2014

Bobby's Burger Palace

     I've done it again! I have a rule: Do not try a new restaurant until it's been in business for at least three months. I confess that I have broken that rule from time to time with disappointing consequences, and today I succumbed to weakness again. I convinced myself that it wouldn't be too bad if Bobby Flay's name was behind it. It made no difference.

     Bobby's Burger Palace opened in December in my neighborhood after much anticipation. The look of the place is clever. The overhead lighting and the seating match in their ribbon-like shape, and the fact that customers sit at one long, uninterrupted curving counter gives the space the appearance of a futuristic soda shop.

   It was 3:00 pm on a Friday, not a particularly busy time, but there was still a 20-minute wait in line (I heard it was 45 minutes during the Christmas rush). There are only two cash registers and only one was manned. In general, the place was understaffed, and the employees that were there, seemed confused and clumsy. One girl dropped an entire tray of dirty dishes on a customer's feet.

     The weather was cool and comfortable so we decided to sit outside. There were no utensils anywhere on the terrace tables nor did any of the employees provide or even offer utensils. After another 15-minute wait for my burger, and after my friend Jackie had been forced to eat her grilled cheese sandwich before it went completely cold, she kindly walked into the restaurant and grabbed some tools for me straight from the counter.

     When you place your order at the register, you are issued a number to display on your table.  My number was 20.  Orders 21 (Jackie's) through 26 were delivered before mine. My burger arrived after we inquired about it.

     Despite the inconveniences, these are small issues that I expect to encounter even in the fanciest of eateries in the early days. Management can easily make these tweaks as the place finds its rhythm.

     But let's talk about the food. The menu promised that Jackie's sandwich would be a rich blend of four cheeses: American, Swiss, Cheddar and Monterey Jack. I took a taste and found it bland. She said it was the best grilled cheese sandwich she'd ever had. Different palates- it's what makes the culinary world go round.

     The sweet potato fries were fresh and crisp and salted just right. They came with a Honey Mustard Horseradish sauce, but neither one of us likes spicy food, and frankly, the fries alone were delicious. The pistachio milkshake tasted more like vanilla infused with pistachio. It wasn't bad, but the pistachio flavor didn't jump up to greet your taste buds as it should. I did love the super-wide straw. Perfect tool to enjoy a thick shake.

     I ordered the Bobby Blue Burger. The name had me at the mere hint of blue cheese, only there was no real blue cheese. It was a blue cheese dressing- a good dressing, but there were no small crumbles to bite into for the taste explosion that blue cheese is intended to provide. I wanted the meat cooked medium and I got a stunning, healthy-sized patty, glistening brown on the outside and gloriously pink on the inside. This burger had great potential, but also a fatal flaw: For some reason, they felt showering it in salty potato chips would be a beneficial addition to the already salt-heavy flavor of the dressing. The crunch in every bite was more than well accomplished with the superbly crispy bacon strips. It was overkill.

     If there weren't other places around of comparable price and menu, I would probably like BBP more, but Shula Burger has an amazing variety of burgers and to-die-for sides for about the same price. And for a few more dollars, Fuddruckers is always a sure thing.

     I think I probably will give BBP another chance sometime down the road, but first I'll give them time to get their act together.

BB Free ©2014