Always on the lookout for a good burger joint, I came across a place in Minneapolis earlier this summer with the most intriguing name - Burger Jones. I've contemplated for quite sometime to start a second blog that was wholly about burger joints that I've visited. I even have a name for it - Burger Lust - after the wonderful little burger joint of the same name in Omaha that I've visited many times. But Burger Jones - you know, when you're "jonesin' " for a burger - may be an even better name. I was hoping their burgers were as good as their name, so I stopped in for dinner there one early evening in the late summer.
In doing research on Burger Jones, I found that the place is owned by the Parasole Restaurant Group, a Twin Cities company that also runs the great Manny's Steakhouse (click here to read about my visit to Manny's a few years ago) which is a Twin Cities icon when it comes to world class steakhouses. The Parasole Group also run other restaurants such as Il Gatto, Muffaletta, and the new Uptown Cafeteria.
But I also found that the Parasole Group also used to run one of my all-time favorite Italian restaurants - Pronto, located in downtown Minneapolis. I had eaten there in the 80's and was hooked. Cindy and I had taken a vacation 16 years ago to the Twin Cities and I took her there for dinner one evening. Unfortunately, when I began to go to the Twin Cities for business eight years ago, I found that Pronto was no longer in business. That was a bummer. It was just excellent.
I figured that a restaurant corporation that owned and ran such restaurants as Manny's and Pronto must know what they're doing. So it was with a somewhat excited eagerness that I decided to give Burger Jones a try.
I had a long day with a couple meetings and a two-hour training for Ultimate Electronics the day I stopped in to Burger Jones. I had a little breakfast, no lunch and was on fumes when I pulled into the parking lot in the Calhoun Village shopping center near Lake Calhoun (see map). I needed a beer - or two - and something to eat.
I went inside and was greeted at the hostess stand by a young lady who asked me if I wanted to eat in the dining room or at the bar. It was a very hot day outside - temps were in the mid-90's with very high humidity - and she said, "You probably don't want to eat outside on our patio."
I emphatically said, "Nooooo!" I opted for one of their heavily padded and comfortable booths in the dining room as the bar area - which was very nice - was full of people just getting off work and enjoying Burger Jones' Happy Hour specials of tall glasses of domestic beers for $3 bucks from 3 to 6 p.m. She left a menu with me and I waited for a waitress to show up.
It wasn't long before my waitress, Laura, showed up at the table wearing one of the many styles of T-shirts that Burger Jones sells at the hostess stand. She asked me if I'd ever been to Burger Jones before and I told her I hadn't. I asked her how long it had been open and she said, "We opened in June of 2009." She said they're famous for their burgers and milkshakes, but I did notice that their beer selections were pretty impressive, as well. She asked me if I wanted anything to drink while I looked at the menu and I ordered a Bell's Two Hearted Ale. She said she'd be right back with the beer. I'm tellin' you - I needed one!
The burger selections on the menu were pretty interesting, to say the least. In addition to the regular burgers - the Burger Jones and the Cheeseburger Jones - they featured "The Hangover" burger, a burger topped with bacon, cheddar cheese, hot sauce and a fried egg. That would be great at around 1 a.m. They also had the "White Trash" burger - chicken-fried bacon (whatever that is), fried cheese curds and Velveeta on top of the burger. I could just feel my arteries hardening.
Laura came back with a glass of water and apologized to me. "They're just changing the keg for the Two Hearted out right now. It should be a couple of minutes."
She asked me if I was ready to order and I was still having trouble figuring out what I wanted to try on my first visit. I told her by the time she brought my beer to me, I'd probably know what I wanted.
I was torn between the Black and Bleu burger - cracked black pepper covers the burger and it's topped with caramelized onions and bleu cheese; and the Mushroom Swiss cheese burger - sauteed mushrooms with plenty of Swiss cheese. They also had a Buffalo burger on the menu, but I was looking for something a little more juicy and less lean in my burger.
While I do like a bleu cheese burger, sometimes the taste of the bleu cheese overpowers the burger. When Laura came back with my beer, I ordered the Mushroom Swiss cheese burger. She said, "We make our burgers 'sorta pink' or 'no pink'. How would you like yours cooked?" I told her "sorta pink."
She asked if I wanted any fries or onion rings with the burger. The parmesan waffle fries caught my eye and I noticed that they also had a number of dipping sauces available for 50 cents. I told her that I'd try some of the waffle fries, but had trouble figuring out which dipping sauce to choose from. They had good ol' fashioned beef gravy to dip fries into, they also had a smoked tomato ketchup dip, a seasoned sour cream and bearnaise sauce as some of the others. I almost got the beef gravy, but decided to try the avocado mayo dipping sauce.
Burger Jones is not a burger "joint" by any stretch of the imagination. It's a nice, upscale burger place that caters to families, professionals and young urbanites. The dining area is a good sized room with large windows that look out onto the patio which, in turn, looks out onto Lake Calhoun just across Lake Street. I've always like the Lake Calhoun area near the Uptown neighborhood in Minneapolis. In fact, I'm beginning to really like going to Minneapolis. With a new dealer I got a huge commitment from earlier in the day, I'm sure I'll be in the Twin Cities more and more.
About 15 minutes - and one beer - passed before another waitress brought out my burger and waffle fries. The presentation was very nice - the burger was dressed with heaping globs of mushrooms and swiss cheese. The patty sat on a small bed of lettuce and the bun was a nice flaky egg bun with sesame seeds on top. The burger was cooked exactly how Laura described it - "sorta pink". Perfect, in my eye.
I took a bite and I noticed that it had some sort of a salty seasoning on it. It sort of took me aback at first, remembering how my visit to Red Robin was soured because of the horrible salty seasoning they put on everything they made (click here to read about that). But with each bite, the taste sensation of the salty seasoning seemed to diminish. By the time I finished the burger, the seasoning taste was hardly noticeable.
The bun was just fabulous at Burger Jones. I've said time and time again that the bun is what can make or break a burger. The bun was flavorful, it held together and was light and chewy. It was a top notch burger all the way around.
The waffle fries had a generous amount of parmesan cheese on them. Of course, the cheese got all over the place including my rust colored shirt and black pants that I was wearing that day. But they were good and the avocado mayo dipping sauce was actually pretty good.
After finishing my burger, I went to the restroom. But along the way, there's this huge picture on the wall of a guy really going after a burger. It was interesting and funny at the same time.
When I got to the restroom just past the picture, I had to stop for a moment as instead of "Men" and "Women" on the door, they had "Chuck" and "Patty" for the signs. Going into the "Chuck" room, I had guessed right. At first, I thought it had to do with the Peanuts cartoon strip since Charles M. Schulz grew up in the Twin Cities and because Peppermint Patty used to call Charlie Brown "Chuck". But I finally figured out that it had to do with the burger concept at Burger Jones. I'm such a dolt sometimes.
I got back to the table and Laura came over and asked me if I wanted one of Burger Jones' desserts or an after dinner specialty milkshake. I declined on both and got my check. Burger Jones isn't cheap - the Mushroom Swiss cheese burger was $9.99, the fries and dipping sauce was $3.49 and the beers were $4.95 each. Some will argue the merits of a $10 dollar burger, but it was pretty good. I can't say it was a great value. But Laura did a good job in taking care of me. She was very attentive and got a nice tip for her efforts that evening.
Before I left, I took a look around the place. The bar area had cleared out and only a couple people were dining at the bar. I would have sat at the bar had it not been so crowded earlier. But it was well past 6 p.m. and Happy Hour was over. Next time, I'll go a little later and sit at the bar.
I'm beginning to find some excellent burger places in the Twin Cities and Burger Jones is no exception. I'm not overly certain if I liked the seasoning they put on the burger - I'm sure I can order it without the seasoning on my next visit. But with a great selection of beers on tap and a damn fine burger, Burger Jones has just gone on my list of "must revisit" when I get back to the Twin Cities.
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