Review: Cheeburger Cheeburger
The Choose Your Own Adventure menu: it’s a fabulous concept, and one that I’ve yet to see executed successfully. So I was excited to discover that a new place had opened in town, called Cheeburger Cheeburger. Yet another place promising the exact same thing, as far as a fully customizable menu that would undoubtedly delight my tastebuds. Served to me, of course, in a kitschy atmosphere that would make me cheerfully nostalgic for the 1950′s.
Well, being a) a so-called millennial and b) having sent Mr. PJ for takeout, none of that last part applied to me. An oversight on their part, as nothing about the burger I (eventually) received screamed I Like Ike. Nor does the menu feature any of the foods that were actually popular in the 1950′s, like Swedish meatballs or pineapple SPAM kabobs. The hamburger wasn’t yet the national icon it is today; the first McDonald’s, opened by Richard and Maurice McDonald, didn’t appear on the scene (in San Bernadino) until 1955. But this isn’t an article about how we get roadside stands (good), car hops (sketchtastic) and poodle skirts (now hipster) confused. But, rather, about my sadly lackluster dinner.
First, Mr. PJ waited about 30 minutes after phoning in the order to pick it up, and another 30 minutes at the actual place. How do I know this? Duh, I’m the parent of a toddler; I time my life in half-hour segments. Tiny Satan and I were able to watch (and re-watch) a number of Mickey Mouse Club House episodes in the time that he cried for dinner and Daddy was gone. So part of the problem I suppose, at the outset, would be that we were all feeling pretty wretched by the time we sat down for dinner. And very, very hungry, which should have made our food taste delicious.
I ordered the “semi-serious burger,” described on the menu as “everybody’s favorite,” which claimed to be 7 oz but which certainly didn’t appear to be. I’d been initially really excited to see that provolone and marinara sauce were two of the possible toppings, instantly transported back to my college days where such a glorious combination featured prominently on the menu at our local burger joint. I was disappointed, therefore, to see that my actual burger–which set us back about eight bucks–was competently if uninspiringly cooked and almost devoid of toppings. There was a (thin) slice of provolone but only the merest smidgeon of marinara. So little, in fact, that I really wasn’t able to detect it on my burger. Certainly not taste-wise and barely only visually. The bun was okay, if floppy and too easily squished. To me, it had the consistency of Wonder Bread.
I also ordered the “best of both” basket, a combination of fries and onion rings, and several of their so-called signature sauces. The “creamy cheese” sauce can only fairly be described as a “cheese lover’s delight” if your cheese love is extruded from a can. Or if you’re especially fond of the cheese “sauce” you sometimes find at particularly sketchy ballparks. You know, the ones that attract flies and that my sister’s mother in law says “reminds her of Mexico, but not in a good way?” Likewise, there was no sense of freshness here.
The “zesty horseradish” left me similarly nonplussed. Now, maybe it’s because I’m from a part of the world where food has flavor, but I expect cheese sauce to taste like cheese and something described as “zesty” to have some zest to it. If you think Hidden Valley Ranch has “zest,” then this is zesty. Otherwise, all of their various sauces tasted vaguely like interchangeable flavors of book binding glue.
The fries and rings themselves were abysmal. Even my toddler wasn’t too sure of them, and ultimately gave them a miss. As did Mr. PJ. Now, in all fairness to the restaurant, their fry cook clearly doesn’t know what he’s doing. Fried food only gets that greasy when the oil isn’t hot enough. A fast, hot fry leads to that bizarrely delicious oxymoron known as “dry” greasy food and a nice crispy crust. These offerings…the only hint to the onion rings having been near a fryer was the coat of batter on them. A dubious-tasting batter at best. So we have a situation here where either a) the chain as a whole has horrendously low standards or b) the manager of this particular location has a fairly limited grasp of the term quality control. Neither is really, you know, considering that this is the only location near my house, a good thing.
The one redeeming feature to our dinner was our shakes. I got a peanut butter banana shake and Mr. PJ got a chocolate banana shake. But, as the menu advertises the shakes as being made with a well-known local premium ice cream, of course they were good. And for what they cost, they should have endowed us with magic powers.
Yes, folks, this entire meal–for two adults and a toddler, adults who shared a “best of both” basket–cost FIFTY-ODD DOLLARS.
All in all, this particular dining experience left a lot to be desired. Especially given that, for the same price, we could have taken Tiny Satan to a reasonably priced chain restaurant like Chili’s where that fifty dollars would have included dessert. From start to finish, this whole experience reminded me of our trips to Sonic in that, strangely and disappointingly, all this wealth of choice managed to not create anything worth eating. I was left feeling both underwhelmed and inexplicably cheated; probably because I couldn’t stop thinking about how awesome this menu could have been. And how awesome that fifty bucks would have been still sitting in my wallet.
Final score: 3.5 out of 10.
Would we eat there again: no.
