It's a Smash!

[billroper]

So I said to daisy_knotwise, "I know what I want for dinner, but it's not very helpful."

"Yes?"

"I want a chocolate malt and something to go along with it, like a good hamburger."

Now, we could have taken the girls out to Red Robin, but that would have blown out the entire evening by the time they were done playing in the mall. Cheeburger Cheeburger would have been perfect, but they closed down in this area years ago.

"Hey, what about Smashburger? Let me check the menu."

A quick search and it turned out they had burgers and malts. This looked like a victory condition. Miss Vicki delivered the soda for Picnicon tomorrow, we chatted for a while, and just as she was getting ready to leave and we were getting ready to leave, Katie lost the contents of her stomach. This pretty much put the kibosh on the family expedition.

"You go on out," Gretchen told me. "I've got leftover rib tips for dinner."

So off I went.

Smashburger is a bit more upscale than Five Guys -- which I go to way too often. They have a wider selection of items on the menu at Smashburger, including chicken, salads, and shakes and malts.

The basic fries are better at Five Guys than at Smashburger, but Smashburger has more varieties of flavored and topped fries, including sweet potato fries, so if you want something different, they're a better choice. (The fries at Smashburger are shoestrings, while the ones at Five Guys show signs of coming from whole potatoes and are meatier.) And I like the burgers at Five Guys better too, as they're a bit more solid than the one that I got at Smashburger, although the burger that I got there was quite tasty -- just really messy. The burger feels "looser" at Smashburger for whatever reason.

And when I say that Smashburger is more upscale, just for example, the Smashburger lettuce is a romaine leaf, while Five Guys uses iceberg lettuce, and the Smashburger comes in a basket, not wrapped in a paper bag.

And Smashburger has a kids menu, which can be important if you have kids. :)

Overall though, it was a happy experience, as I got my burger and my malt and they were good.

Comments

[pheltzer.livejournal.com]

When you say Cheeburger Cheeburger... I'm assuming you're referencing The Billy Goat Tavern? If so, you know there's one at Randhurst now don't you?

[daisy-knotwise.livejournal.com]

No, this was a place, part of an out-of-town chain that was in the new developement where the Glenview naval Air Station used to be.
They specialized in cheese burgers and a very wide variety of milkshakes.

But thank you for the reminder about the Billy Goat at Randhurst.

GHR

[billroper]

No, there's actually a chain by that name that once had an outpost in Glenview. There was a trademark lawsuit with the Billy Goat that resulted in their having to drop one of the "Cheeburger"s from the name. They had wonderful shakes and malts of all varieties.

[ericcoleman]

For the record, the smashfries, with rosemary, olive oil and garlic, rock

[rono-60103.livejournal.com]

I think we had a Cheeseburger Cheeseburger near us for a while - whatever it was it was kind of a 50's style diner. But it closed, and that space is now occupied with The Habit, a burger et. al. chain out of Santa Barbara.

We did go to a Smashburger around here for Tara's birthday last September, and enjoyed it. It is a bit out of the way, so we won't be there real often.

[poltr1]

There are both a Five Guys and a Smashburger near me. I tend to prefer Smashburger, mostly for their Smashfries, with olive oil and rosemary. But on the other hand, I can get a burger at Five Guys with green peppers and A1 sauce.