Five Guys Burgers and Fries

Huntsville, Madison County

This joint is not on the AL.com list of 22 Greasy Spoon Burger Joints in Alabama you have to visit before you die. 

Oh well, I hate to admit it, but some fast food restaurant chains actually deliver a decent product. And a few of those even play in the major league of greasy spoonism. The pinnacle of that sub-group is certainly occupied by Five Guys Burgers and Fries, a “casual eatery” that started in 1986 in Virginia. As of now, the franchise has spread to over 1000 locations in 47 states 6 Canadian provinces. It is the fastest growing restaurant chain in North America.

One of the big differences to other burger joints is that you can choose the ingredients yourself – the Five Guys claim that there are over 250000 different ways to order a burger at their restaurants. You can choose between a Hamburger, regular Cheeseburger, or Bacon Cheeseburger, and 15 different sauces and veggies as toppings, such as Ketchup, A-1 sauce, BBQ sauce, Lettuce, Tomato, Jalapenos, Grilled Onions, relish, grilled Mushrooms, and so on.

After some rather delicious trial and error, I eventually found my favorite combination – Bacon Cheeseburger with grilled Onions, Tomato, Pickles, Ketchup and BBQ Sauce.

Everything is made to order, and the meat is not frozen but fresh, and they grill it. The difference to any other industrial burger is noticeable – actually, there is not even a contest. The flavor is unbelievable, the meat is juicy and perfectly cooked, the veggies are crisp and fresh, and the bun is soft and yet firm. For me, that comes very close to being the ultimate burger. And as with all great burgers, eating this monster is a mess. It comes wrapped in aluminum foil and you better grab a handful of napkins when you receive it at the counter. You can have fries with it, which theoretically come in a Styrofoam cup. Actually, they usually put as twice as much fries in the bag than the cup holds. The fries are good, but not really spectacular. Well, I guess next to the burger nothing short of a naked supermodel would be spectacular.

The only let-down is the atmosphere of the building – Grand Central Station without the trains. Even with only a handful of tables occupied, there is a constant noise level to cope with. The ceiling is very high and there is absolutely nothing in the room which breaks the noise. The walls are adorned with some rather ugly signs that quote quotes from Newspapers that are praising the burgers. There are also sacks full of potatoes lying around, and some sacks with peanuts.

So do not expect any transcendent dining experience here. What you get is just the best burger of any fast food franchise around. Ahem, I mean casual eatery. Anyway, get a burger there. Now.

Sandwich Farm

Sandwich Farm
Huntsville, Madison County

This joint is not on the AL.com list of 22 Greasy Spoon Burger Joints in Alabama you have to visit before you die. 

Just a few months ago, the owner of the Sandwich Farm had a second restaurant in Huntsville, the 3 Skillets on the Courthouse Plaza. That was a real narrow dive, with a long counter with half a dozen bar stools, from which you had a clear and direct view on the cooking griddles five feet away on the opposite wall. They had a couple of very small tables in one corner, and some tables with big umbrellas on the sidewalk. Their potato hash brown was divine, and the atmosphere was very bohemian.

Fast forward to today – the 3 Skillets is no more, because the burden of managing two different localities at the same time was too much for the owner. So she decided to consolidate her assets and only operate one restaurant – the Sandwich Farm. That joint is situated at the edge of Downtown Huntsville, in a tiny business area that also houses a recording studio, a music hall, and a photographer. So there is some bohemian atmosphere there, too, plus they have definitely a much, much better parking situation than in the middle of downtown.

The restaurant does not have any sign with its name on it, just a big yellow poster with the piece parts of a burger in one window, and some strange poster with a pig, a cheese, an apple, and a loaf of bread on the outside wall between the two entrance doors. Inside, you immediately stand before a counter with half a dozen wooden high chairs. If you sit there, your view is limited to a giant black-board with drawings and descriptions of all kinds of piece parts for the several meals they offer on it. Behind that wall is the kitchen, but other than in the 3 Skillets, what goes on in there stays hidden from the customers. You can also sit at one of the many tables, which are mostly located in the longer leg of the L-shaped room (the counter being in the shorter leg of that L).

I was very happy to find basically the same menu that the 3 Skillets had. So I chose the Skillet Burger, with extra bacon. That is an in-house hand cut and ground beef patty with the usual suspects – lettuce, pickles, tomato, red onions, cheese – in a brioche bun. Brioche? Sounds French, don’t you think? And indeed, it is French - a pastry, really, that is similar to highly enriched bread with a rich and tender crumb. It has more butter and eggs in it than normal bread, and is slightly puffy on the inside, with a somewhat flaky crust on the outside. Sounds fru-fru, doesn’t it? Well, yeah. To be honest, it is slightly sweet and thus gives the burger a distinctive flavor. To be quite honest, I could live without that French sweet flaky puffiness. And the Brioche did not even elevate the burger to new lofty heights – it was rather pedestrian instead. Don’t get me wrong, it was a good burger, but really nothing special, nothing to write home about, nothing to be put on a list of things to try before you die. It was okay. That’s it.

Because they do not fry stuff at the Sandwich Farm, I had to pick a different side than the ubiquitous Fries. Which is a good thing – I did not need even more French stuff on my plate. So I chose the potato salad, which was really great. Red skinned potatoes in sour cream, only lightly seasoned – very yummy. I will definitely be back at the Sandwich Farm, but a burger I will not order there again. They have way better things on the menu. What would go well with potato salad?

Waffle House

Waffle House
Madison, Madison County

This joint is not on the AL.com list of 22 Greasy Spoon Burger Joints in Alabama you have to visit before you die. 

When they open a Waffle House, it will be in operation 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks per year. They turn out the lights for the first time when they close it for good. They serve Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner all the time, independent of the time of day, no questions asked. At three in the morning on any given Saturday, you will probably find every Waffle House in the South crowded with hunters and anglers. You will be called sweetie and honey by the servers, and if you want to have your waffles with pickles, strawberry jam, and bacon, they will not refuse you – they probably have seen stranger things. It is an icon of southern culture. My son told me the story of a friend, who does not own a smart phone or a GPS, but is able to navigate his way through Alabama by using the Waffle Houses as landmarks. So, for some it is not only an icon, but also a beacon.

Waffle House Number 1956 is located in Madison, Alabama. It opened just a year ago or so, and so it has at least two more decades of service in it before the lights go out. I’ve been to countless Waffle Houses during my travels through the South, and of course, its layout is the same as all the other restaurants of this chain. There is a counter with half a dozen stools, half a dozen booths at the walls, windows all around the dining room, and an open kitchen where you can witness first hand how your meal is prepared, if you sit at the counter. The menu is fairly simple, with typical American breakfast stuff, basic sandwiches and burgers on it. Although the waffles are a southern icon of their own, I usually come here to get a sandwich or burger – I am not a breakfast person at all, preferring hearty food over fluffy sweet stuff, even in the morning.

I chose the Angus Bacon Cheeseburger, make it a double please, with all the fixins’ and hash browns. This is a very basic burger, no frills, no bells and whistles, no nonsense. Just a bun, two beef patties, cheese and sautéed onions (if you like …). Lettuce, tomato, and pickle slices came on the side, probably in case somebody is allergic to veggies or is on a meat-only diet. Since I don’t have any reservations to eat the food for the food, I put all those veggies on the burger, plus a good helping of ketchup. The plate also came with a pouch of mayonnaise, which I pushed aside indignantly. Veggies is as far as I am prepared to go on my burgers.

So, as one can see, no fru-fru stuff, just a plain basic bacon cheeseburger. Well, I do not kid you, as I write this, saliva is gathering in my mouth, only from thinking about the burger. I hereby declare the Waffle House Number 1956 bacon cheeseburger the standard on which every other burger has to be measured against.

Juicy, flavorful, succulent, tasty, awesome. A splendid experience. Nough said.

And the hash browns – divine. Crispy and savory, in an entirely different league than your ordinary potato based side item.

And for roughly ten Bucks, including a sweet tea, it is a very fair deal.

I do not know if this particular burger is equally good in other restaurants of this chain. That could be a kind of weird quest of its own, to travel from Waffle House to Waffle House, comparing their Angus Bacon Cheeseburgers. Weird, but certainly entertaining and truly iconic.

Hamburger Heaven

Hamburger Heaven
Gardendale, Jefferson County

This joint is on the AL.com list of 22 Greasy Spoon Burger Joints in Alabama you have to visit before you die. 

The AL.com list with the 22 Greasy Spoon Burger Joints in Alabama you have to visit before you die has two minor flaws – one is that Number 22 is actually a Hot Dog place (although I am certain that it fits well into a list of Greasy Spoon places), and the other one is that one of the joints is actually a small local chain of restaurants.

Hamburger heaven started out in 1982 with a restaurant in Irondale near Birmingham, and has since added four more locations in the Birmingham area. They claim to have the World’s Best Burgers, Shakes, and Fries, and they promise you to make everything fresh to order, and not to pre-cook, microwave, or thaw anything. They call it the old-fashioned way, and I find that very commendable.

From the outside, and also from the inside, the Hamburger Heaven in Gardendale - which is the newest addition to the chain – does not look very much different from every other burger joint any of the big franchises would put on that piece of real estate. There are some booths, some free-standing tables, a couple of flat screen TVs, and the only thing you might not find in any of the national burger franchises is a wall that is decorated with Crimson Tide memorabilia.

So, the atmosphere is rather unspectacular, if not a little dull. The burgers, on the other hand, ain’t. I had the Holy Cow Special, which is a half-pound double jumbo cheeseburger, large fries and a large drink. I was on my way home from a football game in Birmingham and hadn’t eaten all day (except for a slimy hot dog in the stadium), so I was hungry as a wolf, and the Holy Cow Special sounded like something I needed at that time.

But, holy cow, that is a lot of food they are giving you for roughly eleven bucks! The burger is huge, and it comes with all the veggie fixins’. I especially liked the shredded lettuce, which is much better to handle on such a mammoth burger than the usual leaf, which always works as kind of a slide for the meat patty and thus makes for a very messy eating experience. Well, I am not saying that in this case it was not messy. The sheer size of the burger and the fact that the bun slowly but surely disintegrated the more I pressed on it to get a good grip, left a pile of stuff on the plate in the end. Which, I admit this without shame, I scooped up with some fries. The sauce they use is more on the tangy/sour side of the spectrum, and it is very delicious. It is something completely different than the usual ketchup-based concoction, and it reminded me a little bit of a sour variety of tartar sauce.

The beef was juicy and succulent, and very flavorful. Altogether, the whole burger was a splendid mess, so to speak. But is it the best in the World? Well, I travelled the world to some extent, and had quite a few burgers, especially in the USA. And while I would not dare to pass a judgment about if this burger is the best on this planet, it certainly is one of the best I ever had. The fries on the other hand are really nothing special, so to include them in the “Best in the World” spiel is a bit cocky in my point of view. And for the shakes – I do not know. I intended to have one as dessert, but after I was finished with the burger, I was finished period. So I guess an additional visit is in order, maybe even at the original place in Irondale. I will just stay away from the Holy Cow next time.

City Cafe Diner

City Café Diner
Huntsville, Madison County

This joint is not on the AL.com list of 22 Greasy Spoon Burger Joints in Alabama you have to visit before you die. 

This restaurant is part of a small franchise that has two more like this in Georgia. Nothing wrong about that, it is always nice to see when an idea evolves into a concept and with a lot of hard work and a little bit of luck the whole thing takes off and spreads to other places. The building in Huntsville they are in has seen its good share of restaurants. I still can remember the time when that was my favorite Mexican place. It was cozy and kind of dark in there, with wooden walls, gaudy decoration, and a lot of nooks and crannies where you could sit virtually all by yourself. The interior of the City Café Diner is the total opposite – bright and streamlined, with two distinctive dining areas, one with booths and one with tables. The decoration consists mainly of neon signs and the ubiquitous flat screen TVs in the corners. This might resemble a classical diner design, but for my taste it is a bit sterile.

Their specialty seems to be cakes, of which they have an impressive array displayed in some glass cabinets near the entrance. Also, they have a mix of American food, like Burgers, and Greek food, like Gyros, on the rather convoluted menu. It took me ten minutes to go through it and decide what to order.
I eventually ended up ordering a Memphis Burger – that is an 8 oz beef patty with cheese, topped with diced “pulled” pork and BBQ sauce. . It comes open faced, with onions and tomatoes on the side. You also get a small cup of mayo-based cole slaw, which is actually very tasty. The fries that come with the burger are of the ordinary kind and nothing to write home about. There were also a pickle spear and two fried onion rings.

The burger patty was actually very flavorful and succulent. I prefer my burger meat to be cooked well done, and that sometimes lead to it being a bit chewy. Not in this case though, the beef was tender and perfectly cooked. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said of the “pulled” pork. That was a very chewy affair, with big blotches of fat on the diced, not pulled, pieces. And, of course, it was by no means slow smoked pork. It was clearly cooked and nothing else. The BBQ sauce was of the thick red sweet’n’sour Kansas City variety you can get at every supermarket.

Together with all the fixins’, the beef patty, and the BBQ sauce smothered pork between the two buns, the overwhelming flavor was that of the BBQ sauce, with the two meats contributing next to nothing to the taste. That was not what I had expected and although the burger was by no means a bad one, except for the chewy-ness of the pork of course, it was clearly lacking the sophistication the menu seemed to promise.