Cheeseburger Gauntlet Day 6 – Yeah Burger
America, I can feel my arteries closing. But I’m not a quitter so the Gauntlet continues. However the Gauntlet has begun to take a toll on others. For today’s cheeseburger we were down to Stefan and myself. I don’t blame them to be honest because the day five burger from Grindhouse was easily still in my stomach. But we soldiered on to Yeah Burger.
The thing about Yeah Burger is that its perfect for Atlanta. I mean that in every good and bad possible interpritation. Yeah Burger has opened with tons of fan fare and hoopla. Far more than any of the other burger places that have gotten with the possible exception of Day Seven’s Flip. Flip’s buzz came from Richard Blais’ stint on Top Chef. To be honest with you other than the fact that it is part of the White Provision development, I’m not sure of how the buzz was really earned. Yes, Shaun Doty’s other resteraunt Shaun’s is good, but to generate the amount of buzz that it got was the perfect storm of time, place, people, and culinary craze.
Yeah Burger sits on the West Side of Atlanta not far from Day 3′s Bocado. It’s a great space and with the exception of a couple of lime green walls a fairly cool space. The patio is huge and should be fun come fall or spring. The set up is the same “counter service” experience where you order, find a seat and your food is brought out to you. The menu is a little different from some of the other places Stefan noticed. Every other place we’ve eaten offers you either a singular burger prepared the way they’ve decided you should enjoy it, or they offer some guidance with a few burgers they’ve come up with as a culinary spring board. Yeah Burger is the Wild Wild West. A menu of meats, bread and toppings displayed before you and a you have from the time you get to the door to the the time you get to the register to order to know what your game plan is.
Stefan and I both ordered the double cheeseburger with cheddar, onions, mustard, the 50/50 mix of fries and onion rings and bacon jam to dip them in. Stefan actually got ketchup on his burger as well. Let’s take a look at the burger.
Yeah Burger
America, if pictures are worth a 1000 words, the first word out of this picture’s mouth is: lazy.
I’ve eaten a whole lot of places in my life and there have been a couple of food things that have stuck with me. One of those things is that food should look appetizing. I’ve gotten better looking burgers at fast food joints. I don’t mind a messy looking burger but this is the definition of “meh”. I hate to say it but the best thing about the burger is the Holeman and Finch bun. That was the high note of the burger. The cheese was okay, the toppings were decent, but the meat was overcooked. The worst part is that you could tell it tasted good about 15 degrees before that, but now it was tasty greyish meat product.
I wanted to keep the integrity of the burger gauntlet in tact by not adding toppings I hadn’t used before. In order to get this burger down my throat I started dipping it into ketchup like a chicken nugget. The problems with this burger seem to result from the process. It’s a long wait, we went during the lunch rush. But I take no excuses. When all you make are burgers you should have the process down in your 4th month of operation. I think Yeah Burger has saved Bocado and moved into the basement. This burger gets a C- at best and some of that is extra credit from the bacon jam and the Holeman and Finch bun.
If you are a burger restaurant, you need to have that part of the process down like clock work.
