Henry’s Hat

This one was a little off my radar, but my friend Brandon bought a Living Social coupon and we decided to check out Henry's Hat (@henryhatla). At first, I was skeptical seeing as the restaurant is located on Cahuenga just across from the entrance to Universal Studios. Thankfully there is valet parking for a reasonable (for LA at least) $4. Inside there are TVs everywhere so it is a great place to watch a game. They also have a big bar with seating and a huge community table in the middle of the restaurant if you want to make new friends. The most interesting part of Henry's Hat is that they have board games and some video games available for you to play while eating. This would be a great place for a birthday party (young and old) or just a place to hang out while playing games and being served good food and drinks.

The burger I chose is the Black and Blue. This normally comes with sautéed mushrooms but seeing as how I am not a big mushroom fan and this was the closest burger to the others, I ordered it without the mushrooms. The meat is Meyer Ranch Prime beef. The patty itself was just average, but cooked perfectly medium with a little pink color inside. The onions were also sautéed, but in balsamic vinegar. The onions were very good but a little sweet and a little over powering. The burger came with Danish blue cheese, which was nice and creamy but not overpowering, and arugula. I wish more of the peppery flavor of the arugula would have come through as that would have been a nice complement to the onions and the cheese. The bun was a brioche bun that is becoming almost expected as I go through this adventure. The bun was actually a very nice addition to the burger as it was not greasy and the softness of the inside was a nice contrast the rest of the textures of the burgers. Overall, this is a very good burger but not spectacular.


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Seven Mile House

While I was in San Francisco, I was looking to find a place to watch the USC v UCLA game after my cousin's birthday in Brisbane. My sister and her boyfriend had gone to a local sports bar called Seven Mile House. This place was originally built as a stagecoach stop back in 1853. It evolved from a trucker/biker hangout to a sports gambling joint. Now it is a place for watching a game or catching a great band play. They also have some pretty good food. We started with some appetizers. The clear winner here was the Lumpia. If you haven't had them before, find a Philippine restaurant and go get them. They are little egg rolls filled with pork and came with a sweet chili sauce. So good. Also, if you go make sure you order the garlic fries. They are perfectly crispy and too much garlic that would overpower the potato. As more of our family showed up, they convinced me to test the burger.
 

Now on to the burger. Obviously, if you are watching a game, there is little better than chowing down on a good burger and drinking a cold beer. The burger comes on a standard sesame seed bun. The patty is Angus ground chuck and cooked very well. The burger comes with bacon, lettuce, tomatoes, mayo, sautéed onions and pickles. It is your standard sports bar burger, but made a little better than most. While I don't think I will be craving this burger when I go up for my next visit, this is a very cool place to take in a game or just hang out and get some great food. 

Roam Artisan Burger

I was up in San Francisco for my cousin's first birthday and so it was the perfect time for an Adventure outside of Burgerland. I have been in contact with the Best Burger in SF blogger and decided to go to the only place she gave 5 out of 5 stars, Roam Artisan Burger. We decided to make this a family outing. Roam Artisan is an interesting place. It has the feel of a bar and a great place to hang out. The issue I had was that it was run like a fast food restaurant. To order food or drinks you had to go up to the counter and order from the register. Considering we did not all get there at once and were going to order a few rounds of drinks and appetizers, we could not even start a tab. The service was also lacking a bit. They accidentally spilled one of the beers and did not seem to have much initiative in cleaning it up. They also had some issues with the numbers given when we ordered food and it didn't all come out at the same time.

In keeping with my standard of ordering similar burgers, I got the Pacific Blue. At Roam Burger you get to choose the meat. I chose the beef (obviously) and the patty was great but a little on the small side. Unfortunately the great patty was overshadowed by the overly sweet caramelized onions and the blue cheese. The bun was a bit uninspired. The watercress was a great addition. Overall I was not impressed.