Upon taking your first step inside Dog Haus Biergarten just off the main drag in Pasadena, you will pretty much get the place in 30 seconds or less. Flat screens playing sports, full bar and a food dude centric menu. What you may not get, at least until you sink your teeth into one of these over the top burgers is that the topping combos actually work together. And considering that some of these topping combos resemble an upper tier ...

My first successful visit to the Habit was the start of the Teriyaki Burger Movement. Faced with the stark reality that some burger establishments insist on cooking their burgers to the minimum temp of Medium Well . . .  Humanitarian relief efforts in the form of cheese and a few ingredients from the Polynesian cupboard seem wholly necessary. The results?

The Valley is home to many a random burger dive, some of them, like Bill’s of Van Nuys, carry a following and reputation that make them a worthwhile stop. But once upon a time, in the beginning, some brave soul had to conjure up the courage to try the place for the first time thereby unleashing burger glory from a diamond in the rough. Burger Hut was my opportunity to find that anonymous burger joint and plant a flag.

The Los Angeles food scene has evolved much in the last 10 years. We got pizza joints that NYers make plans to visit, gastropubs that are growing on trees and iconic sushi restaurants spawning more iconic sushi restaurants. One aspect of the eating scene here that has been steady eddie has been the promise of shacks serving cheeseburgers and tacos. This meld of fast Mexican and American food was a natural osmosis. The kicker is finding the right mix of ...

Visiting B-Man’s would eventually lead to opening a veritable Pandora’s box of Bang for your Burger Buck. It comes down to this: the Teriyaki Burger model elevates the offering of the common burger stand. The glaze would be wholly unnecessary unless the patties were cooked beyond medium well and the sweet zing from said sauce and the pineapple assures the eater that this burger is something fun, best served slightly after school but lunch hour is fine too, along with ...

Burger Plaza Grill is just that perfect combination of randomness, an overall lack of promise and the plain truth of affordable price that makes it a classic case of Bang for your Burger Buck. These guys are about as interested in staking their claim in the burger world as I am in counting the calories they just so happen to provide on their menu. But know this: my jaw dropped when I saw the size of the patty that was ...

At first, it may seem hard to imagine a 1/2lb double cheesburger for under $6 being called a “sleeper” on the menu, but such is the case at Fat Sal’s where getting fat isn’t just easy, it’s kind of creative. Fried mozzarella sticks on a sub? Genius. But so is this burger . . .

Years ago a dear friend explained that burgers fall into one of two camps: “restaurant burgers” and “everything else“. This was a time when chefs weren’t tweaking burgers of convenience like what Andre Guerrero does at the Oinkster or when gastropubs miraculously brought beef back onto our dinner plates during the recession of 2008 with the advent of the $10 and up burger. The Park is very much a “restaurant burger” since it is served at a restaurant that also ...

In N Out maybe the single reason why I will always try a random burger shack: to disprove the hype that surrounds this iconic burger stand. Over time I would come to realize that the faults I had with In N Out was not with me, them or the stars but in relying on their standard menu. This post was as much an exploration into the wonder that is the “Secret Menu” at In N Out as it was an ...

The search for Bang for your Burger Buck can take you parts of town you might otherwise seldom tread. To places in your ‘hood that you never got around to trying or even a place you may not ever return to, unless the just the right circumstances place you there. Patras is such a place and it is a good thing. Good because it lies conveniently near dive bars like The Short Stop and Gold Room, makes a perfect stop ...