Craftsman – Encinitas, CA
Okay, so football season is in full swing and it’s time to post some burger review. Sadly, this first one is from last year… Our bad! This particular UBR location was recommended by a few of UBR’s superfans. Yeah we got fans, tons in fact! Craftsman is located a few miles inland in the nearby town of Encinitas, however, it a bit of coastal hipster wannabe feel. The inside is nicely decorated with rustic wood and wall art as well as a bar area which made for a good cheeseburgering environment. Craftsman also had a TV that was only turned on after “Meatsack” Mike whined about it loud enough for everyone to hear. The cleanliness of the restaurant has to be noted as well, in fact it was so clean that our OCD resident Marketing staff member Caitlyn even used the restroom, without having to “hover” which we understand is a big step for her.
Our waitress Lindsey was extremely informative and friendly, enough to put up with our obnoxious antics at least. She took our order quickly and even gave us the hookup on their special bacon onion marmalade as well as the world’s smallest cup of soup for tasting. UBR staff loves extras! When informed of Mike’s bulimia problem that he was able to overcome in the womb, Lindsey even tried to be nice by saying his body type shows a certain type of “confidence.”
There was only one burger option on the menu, and at $15 it was a budget breaker, we can only afford a retired cop car as our staff vechile after all. We also sprung for the deviled eggs at $2 a pop because it was payday and why not celebrate? The restaurant was so expensive that we watched one of the staff members leave on their lunch break, presumably to go across the street to hotdog on a stick where she could afford to eat.
After a little bit of a wait we received our burgers (and lame tuna sandwich to be consumed by a nameless non-meat eating dummyhead) on a nicely presented plate with fries. Okay first the burger. We don’t want to go in to too much detail on the burger because it was not the star of the meal (it was good to average with the high points being beef flavor, patty thickness) But the Fries! OMG! The deal is they are fried in duckfat! Yeah!!! Frickin for real! Duck fat! Who was the genius that though this up! We want to put up a bronze statue of them in the UBR park we don’t have. Let us tell you o’loyal followers of the knights of UBR, these were the best fries we have yet to come across our gullets in our long tenure of burgering experience!
All in all, Craftsman knows how to serve a good burger with the best fries frickin ever, but that comes at a cost. However, the price and speed of lunchtime service was almost completely mitigated by the great food and friendly service. While the restaurant received a solid four, it will be location save for special occasions like Mike’s induction into the AARP and the recognition of him beating bulima.