Posted by lamboburger on Oct 25, 2010 in
Fast Food 
Smash Burger
Today we drove the Po Po on down to visit our old friend, and ex-boss man, Chuck. It just so happens that conveniently located by Chuck’s house was a burger joint we wanted to review. So we threw Chuck in the Po Po and headed to Smash Burger in Del Mar. A courtesy mention goes out to Caitlyn… And that’s about it. You see Caitlyn can never (never!) be a guest reviewer since she does not eat meat and this isn’t ‘grilledcheesereview.com’. Tragic, we know. It must have something to do with hitting your head really hard at a young age. But Mike eats meat, so it must be something else. You might notice that Greg is very stiff in the neck in the pictures. His pain couldn’t have been as bad as what the rest of us experienced by having to listen to him whining the whole time. Troy and Mike think it’s a side effect of getting his butt scoped last week. Anyway, Smash burger is a funkified burger joint with a hipster theme. We were pretty skeptical that an artsy burger place could crank out a good burger, but Oh Man!! Friggin’ yum!!! Definitely one of the best burgers we have reviewed and a must tap for any burger lover out there. Every part of the burger scored well in the UBR rating. The fries were excellent as well, but the portion was a bit paltry. The restaurant itself only scored a 3 partly because, we think, something happened to Mike in the bathroom that he can’t seem to talk about. I think the score could have been bumped up a notch had it been a nicer day so we could have sat streetside on the patio. Nevertheless, Smash Burger was still able to earn a solid 4 in the overall burger experience. You need to go there right now.
Smash Patio
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Posted by lamboburger on Oct 22, 2010 in
Chain,
Fast Food 
Check out the 4x4
Since we took on a national chain with Applebee’s earlier this week, and since so many people have asked, we decided to tap the regional chain of In-N-Out Burger with guest reviewer Phil. Phil is also near “Associate Member” status as this is his second review. If you have ever lived in the Southwest you already know, In-N-Out clearly has one of the best tasting burgers you can find. However, since we rate the overall experience (don’t freak out In-N-Out diehards!) they only received a 3 out of 5. One of the coolest things about In-N-Out is their simple, limited menu offerings. Only the true In-N-Out aficionados know the truth that a secret menu exists. Troy happens to be one of those all-knowing types and since Greg was buying he ordered a “Big Rig” (burger with 18 patties), but had to settle for the “4X4” (four patties with four slices of cheese) since In-N-Out no longer offers a burger with more than four patties. While In-N-Out only scored a 3 on the UBR scale, one should never pass up the opportunity for a Double Double or one of their killer shakes.
Phil and Staff
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Posted by lamboburger on Oct 21, 2010 in
Chain 
meh!
Yes the UBR staff will look everywhere and obviously anywhere for the ultimate burger experience. Your probably thinking “why Applebee’s?” Well “Meat Sack Mike” was buying as usual and the big oaf likes Applebee’s so much that he has been crying for literally months to go. At this point both Greg and Troy just wanted to get it over with. Since everybody and their one legged uncle has been to an Applebee’s before, I think we can skip the description since this Applebee’s is like every other one. The reality is their burger is decent and it has some noteworthy points of a hand formed patty, good thickness and a nice burger to bun ratio. We just hope the patty hand former wasn’t the same guy that pissed all over the floor of the urinal thinking that if he didn’t touch his hose he didn’t have to wash his hands. The real disappointment was the fries. A hamster could yack up a better size portion! Additionally, they were so over salted that they were virtually inedible, but we ate them anyway. Joining us on this adventure of mediocrity was our “near associate level” member Rene.
UBR Staff & Rene
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Posted by lamboburger on Oct 18, 2010 in
Fast Food 
Looks can be deceiving
For this review we visited North County’s iconic George Burger with our guest reviewer Ryan Baldwin. George Burger started in 1976 and has been a popular burger joint ever since. Back in the day, it used to be a cool burger stand type of place. But then they relocated into a more McRestaurant type of place complete with a drive thru. This move contributed to at least a one star drop in the atmosphere rating. Unfortunately, it doesn’t get much better from there. It’s just an average run-of-the-mill burger experience. And make sure you splurge and get a double. A decent burger-to-bun ratio wouldn’t be able to save the scrawny single patty offering. The burger was mostly just boring. Boring to the point that our guest reviewer, Ryan, noticed that the burger came on real plates. We have never paid attention to such non-sense in past reviews. It even led Troy to suggest that maybe we should have a “green” scale rating (as we stared blankly at our Styrofoam cups thinking about what to write in this review). That was quickly shot to hell from the hypocrite Hybrid driving Mike. And apparently they are proud of their lettuce because there was a grip of it slammed hastily between the structurally inferior buns. The fry killer was a persistent taste of fish. The scary part is George Burger doesn’t offer any fish, which seemed pretty fishy to us. The truly sad part is if you visit their website at www.georgeburgers.com, they don’t even have a burger picture on their home page. They have a picture of a friggin’ Gyro. That is a total burger fail, my friends! Whether or not they have lost their way, George Burger still offers a decent fast food burger and its long standing iconic status in North County makes it worthwhile if you’re too hungry to make to somewhere better.
Guest Reviewer Ryan and Staff
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Posted by lamboburger on Oct 1, 2010 in
Pub 
Churchill's San Marcos
Well, football season is in full swing and Mike is off to his usual loser start in the weekly burger bet. Greg and Troy are anticipating another season of stuffing their gullets with free cheeseburgers paid for by Mike “Meat sack” Lamson. For this trip we stopped by Churchill’s in San Marcos and we were joined by the lovely Kati Skinner as our guest reviewer. Churchill’s is a very cool English pub and it definitely had that relaxing homey feel to it. Troy’s attention was immediately drawn to wide array of top quality beers on draft (fifty of them to be specific) and they have a killer list of bottled beers as well. On to the important stuff… the cheeseburger. Churchill’s definitely has a damn good burger. We rated it a four, but it was really more of a 3.5, but stupid Greg does not know how to fix our star rating to do half stars. They scored high on patty thickness and burger to bun ratio,and they had a good offering of cheeses. A special mention should also go out to them because Kati asked for Spinach on lieu of lettuce and they hooked her up. We would have pulled her man card, but god did that at birth… being a girl and all. The primary burger fail was toasting the bun top. Who the hell toast the top of the bun!! I mean come on, really? This toasting of the top nearly led to a catastrophic structural integrity issue. The fries were among the best we have had in a while and definitely took top honors in the “Steak Fry” division and there were plenty to enjoy with their generous portion size. Overall, Churchill’s was a good, satisfying burger experience. Incredibly, we made it all the way through without Mike whining once. Except when Troy blew the paper straw condom off of his drink straw at him which was followed by some nicely atomized ice tea. Anyway, hit Churchill’s sometime for the burger or a cool Belgian draft for sure!
Churchill burger
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