Sausages are all the rage these days, and why shouldn’t they be? Who can turn down a good old fashioned tube and a nice brewski? For once, I could. You see, while I headed to Wirtshaus in Mid-City fully intending to tackle some sort of “wurst,” I surprised myself by going in a different direction. This direction was that of pretzel and schnitzel (and never fear, for I made sure to take down a brewski as well).

First, let’s start with the pretzel. The menu spelled it as “Bretzel,” which I now know is some crazy German way of spelling the beloved pretzel. This was done in the Bavarian style, which meant it was big and soft. It came with a useless sweet mustard that may come in handy for some, but not for a man with mustard disdain. Unfortunately, no other dipping sauce was available, for while this pretzel was poofy and salted nicely, it was far too dry to eat on its own.

As for my main course, I went with the Wirtshaus Schnitzel, a special of theirs that was not on their regular menu. Instead of regular pork schnitzel, I opted for chicken, but the special did not end there. The schnitzel was topped with a creamy sauce and a fried egg for good measure. Then, for even better measure, it came with two sides. I chose their fried potatoes with bacon and spaetzl.

Before I get any further, you may be wondering why a man such as I did not order any sausage. Well, to be truthful, I feel as though I am spoiled in the sausage realm. I’ve had regular sausages, but I’ve also had kangaroo, wild boar, duck, bison, rattlesnake and alligator. I’ve even had some of the best bratwurst in the world in Wisconsin. Yet, when I looked at Wirtshaus’s sausage offerings, nothing stood out to me. So to me, schnitzel felt like a more interesting dish, at least on this night.

And I am glad it did.

Because the schnitzel was delicious. The cream sauce turned the crispy breading a little soggy at parts, but added a nice flavoring to make up for it. There were some little slices of tomato that had accompanied the cream sauce, but I was able to easily brush them aside and get on with my life. The fried egg was a nice touch and added a unique element to my meal. While it could have been runnier, I was happy for the unique taste and texture it brought to my chicken.

Yet, with all this, the sides almost outshined the main meal. The spaetzl (a delicious German pasta/dumpling) had been cooked and salted to perfection and the potatoes with bacon were stellar. Of course, any combination of potato and bacon should be expected to be delicious, but these things were chopped into home fry-sized chunks and fried to a crisp. Yet, on the inside they were remarkably soft and easy to eat.

So while Wirtshaus wasn’t a complete home run, it still knocked some aspects out of the park. While I’m glad their lack of interesting sausages led me to their tasty schnitzel, I definitely think they could add a few more to mix things up. It may not be the best haus I’ve been to, but it was far from the worst.

EDIT: Cooks County is now running around town going by the name of Market Provisions. No idea what that means for the food.

You may think that as a meat blogger I am constantly defining which restaurants my girlfriend and I eat at. Often that is the case, and for no other reason than that people are constantly giving me suggestions, but this weekend we reversed the trend and she took me out to dinner at a place from her own to-eat list. The place was Cooks County in Mid-City and although a quick Google search will reveal no county named Cooks, there is certainly at least one Cook County (in Illinois), which may be some sort of basis for the naming of this restaurant.

Wherever the naming comes from, this woul prove to have no bearing on the food. The menu at Cooks County is constantly changing, as our waiter told us when we noticed a couple of items missing that had been on the online menu. Apparently, this is because the place buys all their vegetables at a farmer’s market each day and that determines what will be available. I like the concept of that, but just don’t get your heart set on something before making your way to the place.

With the menu at hand, we started out with a “snack” fiscallini cheddar (from Modesto, Cal) with oat biscuits. The cheddar was of the awesome white variety, and not very sharp, which was cool although I would like mine a little stronger and more aged. The oat biscuits were definitely new to me and had a great, soft taste to partner with the cheese, but were both crumbly in texture and application. After accidentally destroying my first biscuit, I was sure to be careful with my next.

We also ordered an appetizer of Duck confit, which came with a mini salad of blood oranges, shaved fennel, pistachios and some sort of lettuce. I’m no master of duck confit, but I’ve always seen it as kind of a pulled meat. At Cooks County, though, the confit was essentially a duck leg, whole. But with our forks and not only regular knives, but this big ones people use as Self Defense Knives, so we quickly made the leg into confit and it was quite delicious. Duck can sometimes be oily, but this was not the case with Cooks County. We both commented that it brought back memories of China, but this confit couldn’t quite compare with Beijing duck. Yes, I realize the processes are quite different, but duck is still duck.

And then there was my finale, Strozzapreti. This noodle dish was prepared with braised lamb shoulder, spigarello, walnuts and pecorino. I wasn’t really sure what spigarello was, but I figured I could pass it onto my unsuspecting girlfriend if it was some sort of vegetable. It turned out that it was kind of like a spinach and was fairly easy to avoid in my meal, although next time I will be sure to order without it. As for the flavor, this main course served me well. The lamb was juicy and tender, although I would have liked to see more meat. The noodles themselves were awesome, and I will have to look out for them in the future, as they offered a unique twist. Basically, they were noodle roll-ups. The pecorino cheese was a nice burst of flavor where you might ordinarily find parmesan instead. Finally, I really liked the addition of walnuts. Nuts always seem to be an underrated addition to dishes, but they almost always make the dishes more awesome (see: Kung Pao Chicken).

Cook County was definitely a good meal and I admire their attempt to keep their menu local and fresh. It wouldn’t hurt to add a few more unvegan choices, but I imagine such options change daily. They could definitely do a little something with the acoustics, as the room got deafeningly loud despite there being no music playing. Nonetheless, Cooks County put a unique twist on a few dishes and they turned out great. As long as they can continue to churn out that innovation, Cooks County could be a player for a long time to come.

Once upon a time, I read an interesting review of The Tar Pit on LAist. It wasn’t exactly positive, but it only covered their happy hour and seemed to be more concerned with Chef Mark Peel’s children running around than with the food itself. Most disheartening, though, was Peel’s comments to the review. Needless to say, such a big time chef should not have been so concerned about one bad review and his concern made me less likely to go than the review itself. Yet, to The Tar Pit I went, and I was glad for it.

We had made a reservation, but upon arrival we found the place to be pretty empty, except for a couple of tables full of the cast of The Big Bang Theory. Overall, the ambiance of the place gave off the look of ’40s jazz club and the pianist and vocalist playing at the front of the place certainly helped with that ambiance.

I was surprised to find a lot of good-looking unvegan options on the menu, but ultimately brought my choices down to three. We opted to split the Tar Pit Fries and Arancini, then I ordered the NY Strip Steak all for my lonesome.

The Arancini came out first, and for those unfamiliar with arancini, they are essentially Italian fried cheesy rice balls. These particular balls were packed with arborio rice and pecorino and sottocenere cheese, then thrown into a pool of harissa chili sauce. I expected to be wowed by these, especially after the waiter had recommended them over the Mac and Cheese, but I just wasn’t. They tasted no better than the last arancini I picked up at Trader Joe’s, and that just ain’t right.

But then came the Tar Pit Fries and blew away those cheesy balls. These things were seasoned with spiced lemon salt and served with ketchup and lemon-garlic aioli and that was pretty much how the menu left it, but upon arrival these fries were a bit more than that. They had either been hand cut, or specialty-cut because these weren’t your average cookie-cutter fries. Also, the ketchup was either house made or gourmet, because it was not at all Heinz or Hunt’s. I’ve had questionable house made ketchup before, but this stuff was the real deal. The aoili was also a hit, but the real show was the fries themselves. The seasoning was perfect and the fries had a nice crisp to them that hovered somewhere between steak fries and skinny fries.

Finally, my NY Strip Steak was served. The menu said it came with gnocchi, raw milk cheddar fondue and radishes, but I had unveganly ordered mine sans radishes. This was a wise choice, but I was a little concerned when my steak arrived and I found a pile of green lumps in a light cheese sauce. This made me confused, because clearly the green lumps were gnocchi and clearly the light cheese sauce was the fondue, but neither of these were what the menu had told me. First off, fondue is a cheese dip. I love a cheese sauce with gnocchi and this “fondue” tasted great, but don’t tell me I’m getting fondue and then serve me a bit of sauce with my gnocchi. And as for the gnocchi, I was a bit disappointed. I’d never seen green gnocchi before and I hope to never see it again. This stuff has been infused with some sort of vegetable, which not only threw off the texture, but killed the flavor as well. Fortunately for The Tar Pit, the steak was amazing. It had been cooked to the perfect medium rare and cut away almost like butter with my regular non-steak knife. It had a light, salty seasoning to it and that was all it needed.

So The Tar Pit was a bit of a hit-or-miss place. I could see how a visitor might leave angry, but also how another customer might have the best meal of their life. As for me, I tried enough to get mixed feelings. It was kind of like one of those dates that you finish happy, but knowing you could do better. The girl was kinda cute, had a mild sense of humor and liked to read every once in a while, but in the end, I could meet another, better girl at any given moment. That was The Tar Pit to me.

Rick Bayless is apparently a pretty big deal, and not just because he got his PhD at the University of Michigan. No, he is actually a famous chef who specializes in Mexican food. Now, when I headed off to dinner at Red O, I was entirely unaware of both the existence of man named Rick Bayless and the fact the Red O’s kitchen was run by him that he was Red O’s consulting chef. Clearly this was not going to be an everyday ordinary Mexican meal. The exterior had a design reminiscent of the Bird’s Nest in Beijing. The interior wasn’t too shabby either, but this style came at a price. One of our party was sporting khaki shorts and was nearly denied entry, despite everyone else in the restaurant wearing shorts. This almost knocked the place down a notch to me, but I was willing to forgive if they could deliver some amazing food.

We had been warned ahead of time that we had to try the guacamole, so we started out with a bit of that at our table. While guacamole can sometimes be a risky move, because places like to mix tomato and onion into it. Red O, however, did not pollute its guacamole with such veggies. Yes, there were some diced onions and radishes on top, but these were easily avoided and passed on to my eating companions. With these concerns abated, I found myself eating some the the best guacamole this side of Mexico. The consistency was all at once creamy and chunky, but the greatness didn’t stop there. While maintaining a great avocado taste, the seasoning was also incredible. But all this wouldn’t have mattered if the chips had lacked. Fortunately, Red O held their chips to the same high standards as the guacamole and were both flaky and crunchy.

For my main course, I struggled a bit on what to order. This was not because of a small or veggie-laden menu. No, this was because I wanted so much. And also because this was some expensive Mexican food. Not overly expensive, but kind of in that range where you cross your fingers and hope the food is better than you corner taco shack. I did, though, find something that looked both reasonable and delicious. This was their lamb soft tacos. Described much more eloquently on the menu as “Sonoma County Lamb in Chile Colorado, guajillo chiles, roasted garlic, cumin and black beans,” this sounded like a perfect unvegan meal. My only concern was that this woudn’t be enough food, but a quick chat with the waiter told me that it would serve me at least four tacos. This satisfied my concern and I quickly turned this concern into excitement.

When my skillet of lamb arrived, fajita-style, I was all set to eat, but had to stop myself. You see, sitting atop my meat was an array of onion strings that seemed to be spitting in my face. Sure, these were pretty fried up, but they were still vegetables and had not been mentioned on the menu. This was upsetting, because they had taken the time to describe so much of the dish, but not the onions. I was sad, but I could easily brush these aside and get into the real food. I put together my first taco and bit into meaty glory. The lamb meat was incredibly tender and combined with the cumin flavor, there was almost a hint of Greek in my taco. No, this wasn’t part of the taco fusion craze of LA, but it was definitely interesting to have some new flavors in a taco (or four).

I also managed to snag a bite of the short rib meatball tacos being eaten at the other end of the table. These meatballs were actually better than my lamb and the potatoes that accompanied the meatballs were enlightening.

So in the end, the tacos turned out to be incomparable to those of a local taco stand. Red O managed to elevate its Mexican food above and beyond the norm and didn’t just create upscale versions of normal Mexican food, but added unique flavors and ingredients to make it a place worth revisiting. It’s not going to remind you of the food you may have eaten in Mexico, but it will certainly not disappoint.

Taking advantage of a special from Living Social, the girlfriend and I headed to Cobras & Matadors in Mid-City for a bit of a date night. The place specializes in tapas and is BYO with a slight corkage fee. We forgot the booze, so had to make up for it in food instead. The deal was for 70 bucks worth, so that meant we had a lot of tapas to eat. As usual, I eyed cheeses and meats, and was happy to be eating small plates because so much looked good.

We narrowed our tapas list down to something reasonable and placed our order. First and foremost were the bacon-wrapped dates (blue cheese, almond and port wine), followed by burrata in a jar (basil, olive oil, grilled bread and sea salt), baked Spanish goat cheese (port honey wine reduction, warm grapes) paprika spiced patatas and an order of oven roasted mussels for the girlfriend. It was a good start and we looked forward to downing our tapas.

First up was the burrata. This delicious, creamy derivative of mozzarella tasted amazing when spread across the pieces of bread that came with it. Not content to be a simple burrata, the flavor of basil and olive oil made the burrata in a jar a great way to start the meal. By the time the bread was finished, there was still burrata in the jar, so we saved what we had in the hopes that it could enhance a later dish.

Our next plate was the bacon-wrapped dates. Aside from the strange green plants (they looked like clovers, but do people eat clovers?!) garnishing the tops of the dates, they looked incredibly delicious. But with only four of them, I was bothered that they were 10 bucks. Had I not been getting a Living Social deal, this would have really gotten to me, put I pushed the thought from my mind and dug in. I found some very welcoming dates with nice, crisp bacon. Inside, the almonds added a nice crunch, but I found a lack of blue cheese. I don’t know if this was forgotten or what, but blue cheese is certainly a flavor that sticks out and refuses to be subtle. As if to apologize for this lack, the dates had been placed upon a wide, thin sheet of Italian meat that was essentially a pepperoni. It was a pleasant surprise, but I’m not sure if it was enough to make up for the missing cheese.

Next came the paprika spiced patatas. These were sort of like potato wedges, but in little chunks the size of home fries. Covering both American and European styles, they were served with ketchup and aioli, but I found an even better condiment: burrata! That’s right, although the ketchup went well with the patatas, I scraped what was left of the burrata and created a tasty mega-tapa not to be reckoned with.

Finally, my last dish came (remember the mussels weren’t for me), the baked Spanish goat cheese. Wow I love goat cheese. It was served on some bread with a reduction that ended up tasting a lot like balsamic. The combination was pretty tasty, but I couldn’t help thinking I could easily make this at home. The warm grapes that came with it, on the other hand, were simply weird. I don’t know why people decided it would be fun to warm up grapes, but to those people I have a message: If you’re going to heat them up, make sure you heat them enough that they dry and become raisins. Otherwise, keep them cold because they are just better that way.

With all of our dishes served, it was time to choose a dessert. And what dessert should we choose? More cheese! Yep, none of the actual desserts compared to how attractive the cheese platter was. I’m not really sure what cheeses were served aside from blue (stolen from my dates?) and some slices of what I assumed were Manchego. Yet, whatever they were – coupled with candied walnuts, apricot jam and some grilled bread – these cheeses made for a perfect unvegan dessert.

The cheese platter was a perfect way to end a great tapas meal. I always say there can never be too much cheese and this meal proved it. Plus, it doesn’t hurt to have some bacon, pepperoni and potatoes thrown in there.

On a beautiful morning, I got a call from my buddy who wanted to grab some brunch. He suggested Dougboys over in Mid-City. From what I’ve heard of Doughboys, I expected there to be a huge line, so I wasn’t too into the idea, but we still decided check it out with the intention to go somewhere else if the line was long. Fortunately, we found a manageable line and the fact that there were only two of us made the wait just about 5 minutes.

Once we took our outside seats, we took a look at the menu. Normal brunch food wasn’t too appealing to me, but did find something towards the back of the menu that looked delicious. It was called the After School Special and definitely fit the title. At $9.95, this special consisted of grilled cheese with french pan de mie bread, emmenthal, white cheddar and fontina cheese. To complete the special, it also came with a bowl of creamy tomato soup for dipping.

Although I expected a huge grilled cheese based on the ingredients and just enough soup for dipping, when my grilled cheese came out I found the opposite. Although the grilled cheese wasn’t technically small, it looked like a dwarf compared to the massive bowl of soup. But the grilled cheese looked crispy, gooey and delicious and I dug in. After a few bites, I was one happy, cheesy unvegan, but after a few bites more my mouth began to get dry. Now I’ve never been one for tomato soup with grilled cheese because I’ve never seen any reason to taint a perfect sandwich with tomato, but staring at that big bowl of soup, I realized I had to moisten my grilled cheese somehow.

I was a bit scared with my first dip, but I only used a little soup and it managed to redeem the dry grilled cheese. Rather than having a strong tomatoey flavor, the soup was more on the creamy side and tasted more like a creamy marinara sauce. Or at least that’s how I justified dipping my grilled cheese in it. With the soup, the grilled cheese ended up pretty tasty, but not as tasty as it could have been if it had started out more buttery.

I liked my After School Special, and although it did a decent job of making a grown-up version of my favorite sandwich, it was just a little too dry to kick me all the way back to my schooldays.

On a Saturday night the girlfriend and I were sitting around feeling lazy. Neither of us had eaten dinner, and we weren’t terribly hungry, but we knew that we needed some sort of food in our systems. It had to be light, and as I looked over my list of restaurants I wanted to try, only one seemed to tickle our fancies. This was a remotely new (8 months or so) restaurant called Tinga, in Mid-City.

The interior of Tinga has a nice wooden atmosphere that is almost like a bar except that it is BYO. In the middle of the small seating area is a long communal table and the walls are lined with stools. The ordering takes place at the counter and although the full menu is on the side wall, they also have paper menus for those who don’t want to stare awkwardly over the shoulders of fellow patrons.

A lot of their menu looked delicious and although a lot of them had a stray vegetable or two in them, I was still impressed. Tinga seemed to have done something I haven’t seen done in a long time. Instead of getting muddled up in fusion this and overpriced that, they conceived of some truly creative Mexican fare, without abandoning the Mexican roots of the food. Not only that, but they kept the prices reasonable, with almost every dish under 10 bucks.

After being tempted by many dishes, my stomach finally settled on their 48 Short Rib Tacos. I’m not sure what the 48 meant, but I kind of hoped it meant I would get 48 tacos (sadly the menu informed me that I was an idiot and it only came with two tacos). 48 tacos or no, they ingredients looked delicious, consisting of salsa verde, raw tamatillo salsa, papas bravas, queso fresco, crema, the short ribs and then some nasty red cabbage. I ordered mine without that cabbage, and although the helpful man behind the counter insisted it added a nice balance to the tacos, we came to an agreement that I would humor him get it on the side. In addition to the tacos, the girlfriend had heard that their Elote Especial (grilled sweet corn, creamy lime, chili and poblano puree) was particularly delectable, so we ordered that as our side.

After a short wait, our meal was brought out and looked incredible. These were some good-sized tacos and accompanied by some chips and salsa. I bit in and found myself in taco bliss. The meat was as tender as it could be without melting into a pool and the potatoes were perfectly seasoned with a tenderness on par with the meat. Then there were the dual salsas on the taco, which each added a nice burst of flavor that paired perfectly with that of the potatoes and beef. Finally, the cheese and crema were like the icing on the cake of my tacos, except better because cheese and crema are awesome. I will admit that I gave the cabbage the old college try in one of my bites, but found that it added nothing positive to my taco. It wasn’t necessarily negative, but I didn’t need to waste precious calories on something as empty as cabbage.

As for the Elote Especial, similar to the tacos, this was one well-planned and well-executed dish. The corn had been grilled to a crunchy and juicy perfection, while the lime, chili and poblano puree added perfect accents of flavor. Alone, I could have tackled this dish by the forkful and loved it, but it also made for an amazing dip for the tortilla chips that had come with my tacos. In fact, I’m pretty sure the Elote Especial would have been delicious on top of just about anything. Especially cake.

I left Tinga a happy unvegan, filled with some delicious food. It was obvious that the place had taken their time to come up with some innovative, yet well-balanced Mexican creations. And in doing so, they have given LA a great alternative to Mexican fusion, taco stands and unnecessarily overpriced “gourmet” Mexican restaurants.

Every once in a while, my girlfriend likes to say how much she wants to go to Campanile for grilled cheese night. Of course, this night is only on Thursdays and whenever I ask what she wants to eat on a Thursday, she has no opinion. Finally, after talking about it so much, the two thought processes finally collided and we made our way to Campanile on an actual Thursday for their grilled cheese night.

The first thing you notice about Campanile is the awesome building. The inside is gray, bare brick, with a vaulted glass roof that gives the impression that you are sitting outdoors without being kitschy. The next thing you notice is that this place is actually pretty fancy. Although the concept of a grilled cheese night evokes thoughts of childhood when life was cheap and easy, Campanile doesn’t make things cheap. A quick look at the regular menu showed some prices that made me immediately reach back for the grilled cheese menu.

The grilled cheeses themselves weren’t exactly a bargain though. The Classic Grilled cheese starts at 15 bucks and the prices only go up from there. Since this was ordinarily something I could make for less than a buck in my own apartment, I already had myself some high expectations for these grilled cheeses. I perused the menu and was disappointed in the lack of a simple grilled cheese with bacon. Instead, I found the next closest thing, called the Autostrada. This one was made with cured meats, provolone and cherry pepper for 17 bones. A quick search of the Google told me that cherry pepper was more than just Cherry Dr. Pepper. In fact, it was sometimes a hot pepper. As for the meats, I figured they would be of the delicious Italian sort since autostrada is the Italian word for freeway. When the waiter came for the order, I asked if the cherry pepper was spicy, and when he said it wasn’t I asked for my autostrada to be free of the pepper. We also asked what came with the grilled cheeses and were told they came with salad and fries. Although I had no need for the salad, I didn’t order without it because I knew the girlfriend would want to eat mine.

After no time the autostrada arrived. The grilled cheese was dwarfed by the size of the salad, but the sandwich still looked great as it sat there oozing with meat and cheese. I quickly dumped the salad and went to work on the grilled cheese. The fries weren’t out yet, but I had no desire to wait. This thing had been cooked to a crisp like a panino on the outside, but the inside was still nice and gooey. As for the meats, there was a nice mix, but the only meat that I could definitively isolate in terms of flavor was salami. Aside from that, I’m sure there was something ham-esque, but whatever they were, they all tasted great when grilled together.

Midway through the sandwich, the fries finally came. It would have been great to have them when the actual sandwich arrived, but I suppose I was just happy to have them at this point. They strangely came in one basket for the two of us, which led me to wonder if a place that charges 17 bucks for a grilled cheese was actually being cheap about their fry portions. There were definitely plenty of fries, but I was still a bit suspect. Combined or not, these fries provided a great side to my autostrada that the salad could not.

Grilled cheese night at Campanile was ultimately deemed a success. It was one of the best grilled cheeses I had ever eaten and I could probably try a few more on the menu and be happy. The timing of the fries definitely could have been improved and although my sandwich was quite delicious, it is just really hard to justify spending 17 bucks on a grilled cheese, even if it is stuffed with delicious cured meats.

To grab some dinner, and take advantage of one of our seemingly endless restaurant gift cards, the girlfriend and I headed to Maggiano’s Little Italy next to The Grove. When we arrived, there was a pretty long line, but their bar had a first come, first served policy that had the full menu and we quickly found ourselves a nice table there.

Although Maggiano’s is a national chain, I’d never been and dove right in to the menu head first. I found a few things that looked great and had a hard time narrowing down to an appetizer and main course. Fortunately, I found that one of the main courses I was staring down also repeated as an appetizer. Such genius. This was the four cheese ravioli, mmm four cheeses. These were in some pesto-alfredo sauce with mozzarella. After a little browning in the oven, this ravioli looked great and tasted just as good as it looked. The pesto sauce was nice and creamy and although the marinara sauce was unnecessary, it was nice to feel thought-of.

Then came the main course, one of their baked specialties. This was baked ziti with sausage. It came in a huge bowl stinking of deliciousness. The sauce was decent, but not as good as that of the appetizer. The dish made up for it a little bit with some tasty sausage and although the ziti noodles were good, the entire thing just wasn’t as good as the ravioli. No offense to Maggiano’s, but the bar was just set too high with my appetizer.

For my first foray into Maggiano’s Little Italy, I was a happy unvegan. The ziti could’ve used a better sauce, but I still definitely enjoyed the experience.

Inspired by my own awesome burger list and having passed the new place last week, my girlfriend and I headed to Burger Kitchen on 3rd Street over the weekend. The place just opened two weeks before, so I figured it had worked out enough its kinks and was ready for a good old unvegan review. After looking over the 22 burgers (including one for $50 and another for $65!) for a bit and having a hard time deciding, the girlfriend discovered a great deal, The Champagne Brunch.

This brunch, served on weekend until 3:00, had a limited selection of burgers and came with a side and a glass of champagne for only $15. This was a great deal since the burgers were all around 10 bucks and the sides were 3.50. Fortunately, the brunch also included one of the burgers I had been eying. It was called the breakfast burger and I had been drawn to it for a few reasons. The first was that it had a fried egg and bacon on it. I love bacon on burgers, but love it even more when I discover one with an egg. The other reason was that the burger made no mention of coming with lettuce, as all the others seemed to. It had tomato on it, but I just ordered without. For my side, I chose their home made waffle cut chips.

The champagne and side came out first, and while the chips were a definite step above regular bagged chips, they were greatly aided by the garlic aioli that came with my girlfriend’s sweet potato fries. The glass of champagne was also a decent size, too. It definitely wasn’t some sissy champagne glass that you pay 14 bucks for at a martini bar. After sipping and snacking, my burger arrived and I was quite disappointed with what I found. Piled on top of the top half of the bun was a whole load of lettuce. And not just some leaves, no, this was the shredded kind you usually find in a taco. Fortunately this was served open-faced and I could wipe the lettuce off pretty easily, but it was certainly an effort I had not anticipated. After taking care of the greens, I found one massive top half of my bun. This thing alone was taller than the rest of the burger (including the bottom bun) combined, and when I placed it on top of the burger and began eating, it really showed.

The burger was cooked to a nice medium and had a pretty good taste. The egg was slightly runny, but could have used a little more juice. Yet, overall it was tough to get a good grip on how tasty the burger was. This was because the bun was just overwhelmingly big. It was a shame, too, because the bun was actually good. It was soft, a little buttery and had a good amount of moisture. The bottom half did a good job of absorbing burger juices, but I was tempted throughout the burger to just take that top half off and eat the thing open-faced.

Despite the bun difficulty, I felt pretty contented with my meal. They didn’t try to do anything crazy with the burger and stuck with some nice ingredients. The Champagne Brunch portion definitely made the meal worthwhile, but next time I’d like to see a little less bun and lot more burger.