It's a happy hour burger

Classic Cheeseburger
Originally uploaded by jaceman4

I don't mean this in any disparaging way, but rather that it's not something you go out of your way expecting supreme excellence from. Really, you don't. I certainly don't walk into happy hours thinking, "I am going to have the best burger ever..." because let's be honest, if you do, then either you don't eat a lot of burgers or you have to tell me where you go to happy hour. Stanford's is a semi-local establishment, with stores in Oregon and California as well as in Washington, so a group of friends and I decided to come here after volleyball. In all honesty, I really just expected a cheap burger.

Stanford's is by no means a burger joint, it makes no claims to be one, and by my honest assessment it isn't. It's pretty much your run-of-the-mill upper-middle class dining establishment, where the food is blase and predictable, but safe. You're not going to wow anybody going here, but more likely than not, you'll probably leave thinking it was alright. It's probably somewhere you go if you can't decide wherre to eat, and you're really just going more for the company anyways.

The patty was pretty well made, I liked the beef flavor, though it was slightly on the thinner side. The bun was well toasted, which gives it bonus points, it was something of a sesame and poppy seed affair, which was interesting, but which I feel neither added nor took away to or from the experience. The fixings were fairly fresh, which I do enjoy, nothing spectacular about them. As for the condiments, it appeared at first glance there were none aside from the side of ketchup that comes with the burger, but they actually have a sweet Thousand Island/honey mustard/relishy thingy under the patty that's actually pretty good. I'd say it's fairly comparable to the sauce they use in Dick's Burgers.

Finally, the fries, well, I'm not a huge fan of shoe-string potatoes, which these essentially were, but to exacerbate the situation, these fries were oversalted. Seriously, there were points in time I was eating entire grains of salt. Okay, so their still edible, but really? French fries? Is that to be your downfall?

Rating of the Burger:
Meat: B
Bun: A-
Fixings: B+
Condiments: B+
Sides: D
Price: $4.50-$10
Overall Rating: B-
Recommended Burger: Classic Cheeseburger (during happy hour)