The National (Athens, GA)

232 W Hancock, Athens, GA 30601

 

In many ways, The National is the antithesis of a pig out spot. It is one of the few fancier restaurants in the Southern college town of Athens, which is known and loved for its high-quality food. But it recently put some pig out foods on its lunch menu, including a burger and falafel, so I checked it out.

 

I get the Smash Burger ($15), which are two smashed patties (prepared on the griddle) with bacon jam, dill pickles, red onion, lettuce, and tomato on a soft bun (I eat it without cheddar cheese). The burger is juicy and has good flavor, but is a bit sweeter than I prefer – I am more a spicy than sweet kind of guy. The “home fries” are thick cubes of fried potato, which they also use for their delicious Patatas Bravas (dinner menu), which are perfectly prepared, although the potato is a bit light. My wife and I also get two scoops of the homemade Gelato ($4 a scoop). This week’s flavors include Peach, which is ok, and Chocolate-Hazelnut, which is creamy and tasty and covered with crushed hazelnuts (scrumptious).

 

VERDICT: 88/100

From a pig out spot point of view, this is a very nice, if somewhat gourmet, smash burger and fries.

Black Market & Grill (Birmingham, AL)

1035 20th Street S, Birmingham, AL

 

Black Market & Grill is a kind of mix between a metal/biker bar and a sports bar, which has two locations in Birmingham. The one I visit, in the popular Five Points district, attracts an alternative but fairly mixed crowd on a Wednesday night. The bar serves burgers and other types of bar food. It has a very cool vibe.

 

I get the Hulk Burger ($12.99), which comes with avocado, bacon, and Chipotle sauce. The patty is thick and juicy and has an excellent taste. The bacon and avocado are good and the Chipotle sauce gives the burger a great kick. The fries are thick, a bit soft, but very tasty.

 

VERDICT: 98/100

This was an excellent burger, one of the better ones I ever had, and the setting is great too. What an awesome place. Go there!

Slutty Vegan (Athens, GA)

700 Baxter Street, Suite 800, Athens, GA

 

Slutty Vegan is a new chain out of Atlanta that serves vegan burgers and sandwiches (fried chicken, hot dogs) and fries as well as some desserts. It is Black-owned and the story of founder and CEO Pinky Cole is inspirational! Slutty Vegan currently has five locations in and around Atlanta, with Athens being the furthest, but is opening new locations outside of Georgia soon. Inside, the music is extremely loud — to the extent that you can’t understand the people behind the register, and they can’t understand each other — and the personnel (has to) do an annoying loud routine when you come in and leave. All burgers have sex-themed names, are made with Beyond Meat, and come only in (pricey) combos. Weirdly, you cannot eat inside or outside, while there is no drive-thru.

 

I get the Sloppy Toppy ($15), which comes with lettuce, tomato, caramelized onions, fresh jalapeños, and “slut sauce” on a vegan Hawaiian bun. It looks messy and tastes mostly like a whopper, but one with a good kick because of the jalapeños and sauce. The fries are thick wrinkle-cut, but they lack a bit of flavor, despite the light seasoning.

 

VERDICT: 80/100

While I love everything about the story of Slutty Vegan, it is not for me. Then again, I am not the target audience. To be honest, there is no reason to go here if you are not vegan. It is crazy loud, you cannot eat inside or outside, and the food is expensive and not remarkable. However, if you are vegan, this place comes as close to the “real” experience as anything I have ever seen.

B & D Burgers (Pooler, GA)

238 Pooler Pkwy G, Pooler, GA 31322

 

B & D Burgers, which stands for Blake & Duncan, is a local chain of burger restaurants with currently four locations in and around Savannah. I visit the large new restaurant in a strip mall in Pooler, just outside Savannah. It serves mainly burgers, with a variety of options (beef, bison, chicken). In addition to about 10 options you can also create your own.

 

I get a Bison Burger, which comes with lettuce, onion, tomato, pickles, and I add fresh jalapeños, bacon, and B&D sauce ($23.27). I order it “pink”. The patty is well-done, not medium, but juicy. Overall, the burger is big and salty. The fresh jalapeños add the kick, the B&D sauce has little taste. The fries are softer than I like but tasty (if, also, too salty).

 

VERDICT: 85/100

Good but expensive burgers. A bit too salty too.

Zum Frischen Max (Zürich, Switzerland)

Max Frisch Platz 2A, 8050 Oerlikon, Switzerland

 

Zum Frischen Max is a relaxed cafe that looks like a beach club next to train station Oerlikon, in Zürich. It has a range of alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks (high hipster content) and a small selections of bar food done with a hipster twist (pulled pork burger, hot dogs, salads).

 

I get one of the daily specials, the Veal Burger (CHF 19.50 or ~$20). It doesn’t look like much; regular bun, big pieces of lettuce, thick slice of tomato, thick patty, and a bit of sauce. However, the meat is really juicy and very tasty, while the spicy sauce gives it a good kick. With a more subtle bun and less lettuce this would have been killer. The fries are thick and quite crusty.

 

VERDICT: 87/100

Remarkably good burger, mostly because of the excellent patty.

Smash Burger (Berlin, Germany)

Wittenbergplatz, 10789 Berlin, Germany

 

Smash Burger (or Smash) is a stand at the Wittenbergplatz just off the famous KaDeWe, which is part of the Hauptburger chain. It serves three types of smash burgers, one type of fried chicken burger, and fries. I get the Double Fried Onion Chili Burger (€8), which is two extremely juicy smashed beef patties, thin sliced onions, jalapenos, homemade pickles and chipotle sauce on a brioche bun. Not sure where the chili comes in. But this is a very juicy and tasty burger, despite the rather minor kick.

 

VERDICT: 89/100

Excellent smash burgers and not too expensive given the location.

El Toro (Most, Czech Republic)

Chomutovská 2230/18, 434 01 Most, Czechia

 

(not my pic)

El Toro is a cute, medium-sized wooden restaurant with covered outside patio in downtown Most. It has an Argentinian logo and a kind of American menu, centered around steaks and burgers, but with various foodie dishes and sides too. In fact, friends consider it the best restaurant in town.

 

I get the Chipotle Burger, which comes standard with fries. The fries are shoestring but perfectly prepared (nice and crispy). The burger is a beast, including the patty, which is grilled perfectly (truly medium, without asking). The meat is exceptional, the burger overall one of the best upscale burgers I’ve ever eaten!

 

VERDICT: 92/100

If you are in Most, eat at El Toro!

Farm Burger (Athens, GA)

 100 Prince Ave Suite 102, Athens, GA 30601

 

Farm Burger is a chain of "grassfed" burger joints in the South East. It originated in Atlanta and now has 13 locations in 4 different states. The Athens location opened recently so I went with the family to check it out. The menu consists of several different burgers (and build-your-own) and sandwiches, sides, salads, and shakes and floats (as well as some alcoholic drinks).

 

We order a whole lot of different stuff. First, to keep the kids busy, we got a Basket of Fries & Rings ($5.75). The fries were pretty good, the onion rings were mainly fairly flavorless crust.

 

 

 

Then, my wife had The Chicken ($9.25), ground chicken burger, smoked gouda, kale coleslaw, crispy onions, and sherry-date bbq. She liked it. I had the DBL Bacon Burger ($10.99), which included "two 50% beef/50% bacon patties, Tillamook yellow cheddar, grilled onions, pasture-raised bacon, house pickles, and dijon mustard" -- I replaced the mustard with "fb sauce" and skipped on the cheese. Overall, it mostly tasted enormously salty.

 

After all of that, we also got a Seasonal Shake ($6.25), which was strawberry. I had expected it to have fresh strawberries in it, but it was a thick syrup. I was also a bit dismayed by the fact that they made it and poured the relatively small glass full and kept the rest (roughly one-third of what they made). At that price, a bit more would have been appropriate. Then again, it was mostly sweet and not particularly flavorful.

 

VERDICT: 80/100

Farm Burger is an upscale burger chain but the prices rather than the quality are upscale. Most of the dishes were underwhelming and too expensive. I ate at the Decatur location a long time ago and had a pretty similar experience.

Ghostburger (Washington, DC)

1250 9th St NW, Washington, DC

Ghostburger is a kind of pop-up inside an upscale Latin restaurant, Espita, in downtown DC. It was created during the pandemic and still mainly operates as take-away and delivery, but you can also get it inside the restaurant (but you have to ask for the menu). They serve a couple of different burgers, some sandwiches, and sides and desserts.

 

I get the Guacamole ($12) from the Espita menu, which is amazing, and the original Ghostburger ($9) with a single patty and no cheese. The patty is thin but perfectly grilled and goes well with the red onion and dill pickles and the somewhat citrusy “Spooky sauce”. Together with the potato bun, flattened by the grill, it is a very tasty burger.

 

VERDICT: 86/100

While Ghostburgers serves very nice burgers, they are (far) too expensive for what it is, which is essentially the size of a Shake Shack burger.

The Collegiate Grill (Gainesville, GA)

 220 Main St SW, Gainesville, GA 30501

 

The Collegiate Grill is an institution in Gainesville, Georgia. It is an old-school diner that serve American classics the same way they were made half a century ago. The menu is mostly hamburgers, hot dogs, fries, sandwiches, and shakes. The inside is also classic, although well-maintained.

 

I get a Small Hamburger ($3.59) and a Chili Dog ($3.19) and share a side of Fresh Cut Fries ($4.79). The place is packed and the wait is substantial, but it is worth it. The burger is old-school, i.e. lettuce, tomato, onion, ketchup, and mayonnaise (I hold te mustard), but very tasty. Similarly, the Chili Dog is old-school but tasty, mostly because of the a bit smokey chili on top. The fries are not overly crispy, but real potato and well-prepared.

 

VERDICT: 90/100

Great quality classic American staples in a beautiful old-school setting. 

 

 

Park Stone (Portland, OR)

9921 NE Cascades Pkwy, Portland, OR 97220

 

 

Park Stone Wood Kitchen & Taps is a “new American cuisine” type restaurant. It serves pretty much the usuals, burgers, sandwiches, steaks, etcetera.

 

I get the Parkstone BBQ Burger ($17) with a side of Sea Salt Steak Fries ($4). The burger is perfectly prepared, medium and juicy, but is not very spicy. The steak fries are big and well prepared. Tasty.

 

VERDICT: 88/100

Not exceptional, and a bit pricey, but overall good and in a nice atmosphere.

Fuller's Burger Shack (Portland, OR)

10131 NE Cascades Pkwy, Portland, OR 97220

 

Fuller's Burger Shack is a pretty large, upscale burger joint in the Cascades Mall on the outskirts of Portland. It serves a four different burgers, including one beyond meat, as well as tator tots, crinkle cut fries, and shakes. They also have a monthly special burger. I get the October Special Burger ($10,50), the Spicy Maple & Cheddar Bacon Burger, which oddly they still sold in December. It looks a bit like a whopper, in size and in massive amount of lettuce on it. It is their classic burger with a spicy maple & Apple compote atop a spicy, honey and Cayenne aioli (I hold off on the cheddar). The organic patty is tasty but the burger is overall much more sweet than spicy and overpowered by lettuce etc.

VERDICT: 83/100

Good and big burger but expensive.

Jack Brown’s Beer & Burger (Birmingham, AL)

2811 7th Ave S., Birmingham, AL

Jack Brown's Beer & Burger is a chain with about 15 locations, mostly in the Southeast. The Birmingham location is quite small and in every top-10 "Best Burgers in Birmingham" list, so I’m not surprised that it is full when I arrive — even though it’s before 6 PM. I can sit outside at the bar though, where they have heaters. They only serve burgers and a few sides, offering various types of the former.

 

I get the Shocker ($8.99) and a side of Fries ($3). The Shocker is a thin patty with fresh jalapeños, fresh habaneros, and house-made Shocker sauce (it usually comes also with paper Jack cheese). The bun and patty are underwhelming but the peppers and sauce are really hot, saving it somewhat. The fries are standard crinkle cut but served lukewarm and a bit chewy.

 

VERDICT: 82/100

I would only come back for the heat.

Fightingtown Tavern (Blue Ridge, GA)

511 E Main Street, Blue Ridge, GA

 

Fightingtown Tavern is a hardrock “tavern” in the heart of the touristic town of Blue Ridge, GA, at the foot of the Appalachian mountains. It comes highly recommended online. Although it is the atmosphere that sets it apart, it is also known for its food, a slightly different take at staple US classics: burgers, wings, etc.

 

 

I get the Wings ($13) tossed in honey-siracha sauce. The wings are meaty and well prepared. The sauce is good but a bit weak in flavors.

My wife and I both get a burger. She builds her own -- bacon, grilled jalapeños, smoked Gouda ($14.50) -- while I get the Incubus ($13.50) and add bacon ($1). We both choose fries as the side. The burgers are almost charcoaled, despite me asking for medium and they making fun of people ordering well done. The burger was overall fairly pathetic — the Serrano rub and grilled jalapeños had little flavor or heat and the little bacon was as dry as the patty. The fries are enormous, very thick, and taste more baked than fried. We also got a side of Chipotle Slaw ($4.50), which was tiny and tasteless.

VERDICT: 78/100

Given the reviews, I’m willing to believe this was an off day, but how can anyone mess up their staple item, a burger (!), like this? I doubt the fries ever taste better. Very overrated.

Arnold’s Homemade Famous Burgers (Greenwood, SC)

 1601-1611 Woodlawn Rd, Greenwood, SC

 

Arnold’s Homemade Famous Burgers is an old-school diner/snackbar attached to a gas station outside of Greenwood, SC. It has the regulars: burgers, hot dogs, fries, sandwiches. It also has a location in Anderson, SC.

I get a Bacon Hamburger plate ($7.50) and a Hot Dog ($1.99). The burgers comes with lettuce, tomato, onion, ketchup and mayo. It’s pretty good for an old-school burger. The patty is fresh and the bacon crispy. The fries are potato-y but get saggy too fast. The Hot Dog comes with onions, mustard, and chili, which is more a tasty heap of ground meat. Still decent. The coleslaw is a bit tasteless.

VERDICT: 83/100

Arnold's is a good place if you fancy an old-school burger joint.