Monday, October 6, 2014

BurgerFi

I rued the absence in my food desert (pdf) of a national hamburger spot nearby the whole time I lived here. The Arby's at the corner doesn't count because their curly fires are the worst. What a bummer. The bbq sandwiches are almost there compared to what other nearby bbq places put out. So close and yet so far in all things and you cannot get out of there for under $10.00, I don't think, I am always disappointed. I've been there three times. The last time this year the panhandler who veritably accosted me at my table doubled the cost. Dirtiest hands I ever saw, and I mean it. Top panhandling there, world class filth. And they are always laying about the place. The best thing Arby's has that I've seen is a French dip and their au jus is salty.

Now suddenly two hamburger restaurants opened in the immediate area of 1/2 block, one right next door, and they are both very good. They both make better hamburgers than I do.

First, there is the Rendezvous, a hamburger and sandwich restaurant that opened in the Colorado History Center's new building a half block away on Broadway.

And now there is BurgerFi taken up in part of the space vacated by the bottle shop that moved in the space directly below. BurgerFi is a bustling space right off. They've taken over half the sidewalk with tables, fenced it off, just a bus stop has been shifted directly in front parallel to that fencing off, to accommodate construction taking the entire next block, another Art Center hotel, most likely with its own street level shops. That displaced a lot of people taking any number of southbound buses on Broadway out of the city. With no new seating provided the bus riders all line up standing waiting and mingling disorganized on half a sidewalk width, the other half reserved with tables and chairs. Restaurant and bus stop are competing for the same sidewalk real estate. People actually sitting outside casually eating hamburgers with all the bus activity right there next to them. It is an odd situation to pass through, and you must to go to the library, museums, capitol, civic center, people seated and eating on one side of a sturdy divider and people standing, mingling, anxious for their transportation on the other side.

They must part for me to pass as the Red Sea did for Moses.

The conceit is all natural beef burgers, never frozen never microwaved. It shows. It really does. I've had three hamburgers so far. They are adorable. Photogenic little hamburgers. Each one is a piece of burger art tucked in its little envelope-wrapper. They look exactly like their photographs. No fake out photography. Everything there looks exactly like these photographs, the interior looks like that, the sandwiches look like that, the fries do, the frozen concoctions custard like sundaes with all kind of variations and additions they call 'concretes' look like that, onion rings do. Honest photography all around. Their buns are logo branded and a plain single hamburger with no thrills is disappointingly small although larger than a slider. They are the cutest little things.

"I'll have a plain single hamburger with cheese, no double, no frills."

"Don't you want no tomato, lettuce or mayonnaise on that?"

"What? Oh, yeah. Those things sound great. Well, you're just full of good ideas, aren't you?"


I guess most people get doubles. Mine was cuter than this.

I brought mine home. The fries were limp. I heated a pot of oil and revived the fries. But I still did not like them. I thought, next time get two single hamburgers instead. So I did.

Turns out, on their menu they offer "limp fries" and extra crispy fries. What are soggy fries? The opposite of extra crispy fries. So that was me ordering the wrong thing.

The next day I wanted the same thing except two hamburgers and no lousy soggy fries but I made a mistake and said "bacon lettuce and tomato" and that's what they did, and they were both wonderful little hamburgers.

My experience is with limp fries and wonderful small single hamburgers.  I recommend them.

Menu with alternatives. Prices not listed. They seemed a bit expensive. I don't know. It isn't cheap.  I think I got out of there for $12.00 and $16.00, but I'm not sure.

13 comments:

Rabel said...

Speaking of food, I have an appliance repairman coming by soon to look at the fridge which is cooling inconsistently. I cleaned the fan and the coils are sealed so airflow is not the problem.

$83 for the visit and diagnostic. It's 11 years old and is a nice, large unit. I think I paid around $1300 for it.

How much should I be willing to pay for repair versus replacement? I'm thinking $300 total. I'm hoping to be out of this house in a couple of years so I hate to but a nice, new fridge for the next guy.

Rabel said...

but = buy

Eric the Fruit Bat said...

We all have our things.

One of mine is when big money corporations are calculatedly uncorporate. Fake folksy. Fake familiar. Fake.

The secret menu? Housemade? Eat comfort foodie? It's okay, you can stare?

Bite me.

Hmmmm. That might have bumped me out of the purple quadrant had that political orientation quiz bothered to ask.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

You cant order burgers via our Amazon portal, but you can a bunch of other things.

A reminder. And a thank you to those of you who already do.

Rabel said...

Defrost heater failure. $223 total quote. Going for it tomorrow after I unfreeze the coils overnight. Much ice melt expected per repairman. The penguins should be ok. I do worry for the walruses. I'll have to cook the polar bears tonight. Tough for them.

Trooper York said...

Fixing it is a good alternative to buying a new one. But it will never work the same. You just have to be resigned to continuing to baby it until you move.

Trooper York said...

We have the same problems with our fridge and our washing machine. Every year a different thing goes wrong.

The don't make appliances the way they used to back in the day.

ampersand said...

I rented an apartment (1985 -2000), that had a Hot Point refrigerator that would not die. It was built in 1960.
It had an open freezer section in the fridge that would frost on the inside and outside and needed to be defrosted weekly. I only defrosted when I would run out of free space in the freezer.
For all I know it's still running.

ndspinelli said...

Trooper is teaching Advanced Curmudgeon @ Brooklyn College.

Michael Haz said...

I love a good hamburger. I go out for a hamburger for lunch every Saturday. Finding a really, really good burger is a happy thing. It doesn't happen often enough, though.

My go-to chain is Culver's. They are okay in an emergency.

This past Saturday we stopped at a biker bar called Hogs & Honeez, not expecting much. We were the only customers; it was just us, the waitress/bartender and Tony the cook. So we started talking.

Tony grew up in the area, went away to culinary school, then cooked in restaurants in Ireland, England, Asia and California. He and his wife came back home recently because a relative was quite ill.

Tony grinds the meat for the hamburgers fresh every morning form cuts he selects at the butchers shop. He created the recipe for the buns. He orders a specific type of potatoes, cuts them, rinses and dries them, blanches them, then holds them for final frying. He makes the pickles. He makes the sauces and ketchup and mustard. Holy schnikes.

He offered us a small cup of mac and cheese. He made the freaking mac from semolina flour. The sauce was from scratch. He made the bacon garnish from raw pork bellies.

I asked why he did all this for a burger in a bar in the middle of nowhere. He said because that's how he does things and it's okay with the owner.

It was the best hamburger I've ever eaten, period. The. Best. Ever.

I'll be going there again.

Michael Haz said...

Sometimes we go to the Delta Diner, which sells hamburgers as the only menu item on Mondays. They are another place out in the middle of nowhere.

The burgers are made from three cuts of steak, marinated overnight, and ground Monday morning. They make enough for 100 hamburgers, and post the number remaining on their website.

Something so simple, and so much work goes into make it extraordinary.

ndspinelli said...

Great review, I'll try the place. Always look forward to visiting Beaver Dam, Wi., home of Fred McMurray and Bobby Hatfield of the Righteous Brothers.

DADvocate said...

Looks like a Five Guys burger. Five Guys has all the same stuff, fresh beef and soggy fries. I never get the fries, just snarf down some of the free peanuts. Five Guys appears to be much cheaper also.