Aimee Blume|Evansville
EVANSVILLE, Ind. — Burger restaurants are famous for their intense competition. The good-natured (sort of?) rivalry between In-N-Out Burger and Five Guys Burgers and Fries is legendary on the West Coast.
A little tension is inevitable. They’re all serving the same thing — a patty or two of ground beef, with cheese, pickle, onion, mustard/ketchup/mayo, maybe lettuce and tomato all on a bun.
Every burger restaurant needs to make their own product stand out somehow.
Is it “better” for a particular burger to use shredded lettuce, iceberg leavesor leaf lettuce leaves? Whole rings of onion or diced? Red or white? Which are the “best” pickles? How sweet should the bun be? Should it have sesame seeds? Is it toasted on the griddle?
For the consumer, it’s about personal taste, but for the restaurant, it’s about finding enough customers who want to purchase your burger before the next guy’s.
So, that being said, who offersthe most appealing mid-tier burger-chain burger in Evansville?
We brought a group of seven tasters together to blindly sample five options: Freddy’s Frozen Custard and & Steakburgers, Culver’s, Five Guys, Red Robinand Wayback Burgers. We tried classic double (if available) cheeseburgers and fries from each place, making no changes from the way they were offered on the menu.
We scored the burgers on appearance, flavor of meat, texture of meat, toppings and bunand asked for comments on each. As always, take our opinions with a bucket of salt, as answers varied widely. Also note that these burgers had been packagedand transported across town, although since that’s how burgers are often eaten, we didn’t feel it was unfair to judge this way.
Two clear winners and a clear loser emerged from the pack, and we were reminded that it is true we eat with our eyes, and that the appearance of food can impact the entire experience before a diner takes a single bite.
Points, out of a possible 300, were as follows: Red Robin, 179. Freddy’s, 172. Wayback, 161. Culver's, 157. And Five Guys, 122.
On top of our burger heap were Red Robin and Freddy’s.
In the case of Red Robin, this was in large part due to the burgers' beautiful appearance. The bun was seeded and had a dark color and glossy shine. The visible red onion rings added color, the lettuce was fresh and bright greenand in their half-wrap of wax paper, heavy plastic to-go boxes and sturdy handled plastic bag, these burgers arrived at our dining location fresh as a daisy. The thick patties had a decidedly fire-grilled flavor, which some of us liked and some disliked because they thought it tasted like liquid smoke.
Comments during and after our sampling placed the Red Robin burgers as very pretty but just “fine,” not a standout. Still, the overall numbers were the highest. It also bears noting that these were the most expensive of our burgers, in part, surely, because of the substantial and effective packaging.
Freddy’s was a close secondwith highly positive comments on all criteria. The sandwich was nice looking and held together well. Everybody loved the thin, flavorful beef patties with lacy, crispy edges; the toasty, griddled insides of the bunand the exceptionally long, bright green pickles. The white onion rings were super-sweet, and we didn’t mind the lack of ketchup, as it kept the burger from tasting the same as all the others. Mustard added zing and moisture without making the sandwich sloppy, and the biodegradable cardboard clamshell container kept the burger in great shape without adding dollars to the cost or plastic to our landfills.
Although the numbers came in second, as a whole, Freddy’s was easily considered the best all-around burger.
At the bottom of our heap came poor Five Guys, but this, again, was due in large part to appearance. While these burgers got great marks for meat flavor and juiciness, their comically squashed appearance after we liberated them from their tight foil swaddling caused the numbers for appearance, toppingsand bun quality to plummet. The descriptor “disintegrating” was used more than once.
Still, we feel Five Guys deserves a bit of a break. With the abundant toppings, soft seeded bun and fantastic meat, if these burgers had been eaten inside the restaurant they probably would have come out around the top of our list. Maybe this is why Five Guys doesn’t have a drive-through.
Another prop for Five Guys – we meant to score the fries in a similar fashion to the burgers, but every order of fries, whether crinkle cut, shoestring, standard cut or steak fry, paled into bland insignificance beside the bronze mountain of Five Guys’ fresh-cut, skin on, artisan slabs of potato love.
Wayback and Culver’s scored in the middle of the field.
Wayback scored well on meat flavor and juiciness, with mentions of the pretty split bun. Culver’s was praised for a tasty bun and nice thin-griddled patties with good flavor, but the condiments placed underneath the beef made the sandwich wet on the bottom and hard to pick up after transport.
What’s your favorite national burger chain burger? Did we miss your spot? Give us your opinion in the comments.
If you go
Freddy’s is located at 2848 N. Green River Road
Phone: 812-909-4395
Five Guys is located at 5402 E. Indiana St.
Phone: 812-401-1773
Culver’s is located at 1734 Hirschland Rd.
Phone: 812-437-3333
Wayback Burgersis located at 115 Cross Pointe Blvd., Suite 4
Phone: 812-475-9272
624 East Diamond Ave.
Phone: 812-422-4999
Red Robin is located at 6636 E Lloyd Expressway
Phone: 812-473-4100
