In-N-Out Hype
 

I'll admit, I thought the hype for In-N-Out was a bit much. But I'll give it to them, for their prices, the burger I ate was delicious. No question it is hands down better than Chadders, and was pretty tasty.

I upset my wife a bit when I brought our order back to the table and proceeded to down a 4x4. I told her if I was going to do In-N-Out, I was going to do it right. I did forget to order a shake, but my old man did and it looked pretty good. I'm sure we'll eat there again, so I'll have to give it a go.

As far as true Fast Food goes, In-N-Out is head and shoulders above the McDonalds/Burger King/Carl's Jr chains, and IMO is in the same league as a Big Ben's Burger Bar. Of course, I was raised on Burger Bar, so that may be what I lean towards for a good burger. But In-N-Out didn't disappoint me either. Were they in Utah, I'd be a regular.

Would you have to change your name to TheSizzle48?

A 4x4? Dang, you don't mess around.

Did you go animal style? I like the 3 x 3 animal style with fries well and a lemonade.

You can also animal style the fries, but that is a bit much.

IO is a nice burger, but it does suffer from so much tourist hype. Sounds like you enjoyed it for what it was....a really nice burger experience, but not the be all end all of dining. Sometimes CBers go overboard with the worship.

I agree though...normal fast food places need not apply. Yuck.

Never been to In and Out, is it really that AMAZING? Surfah says so, but I think he just wants to be cool, anyone with an unbiased opinion?

I'm not a big mustard/pickles guy on a burger, so I didn't go Animal Style. I think what I was most impressed with was their prices. It was cheaper eating at In-N-Out than McDonalds. That reason alone is probably enough to get me to go back on this trip.

No. But I would have rather been TheSizzle42.

Animal is the sauce, grilled onions, and mustard grilled into the patty. Yum. If you want to do it the real way.....

Also, try one protein style, wrapped in lettuce. doesnt taste any better, but it is a unique experience eating a burger using lettuce as the bookends.

It's actually more cool to hate on In-N-Out than like it, as there is more than one facility in existence. I think the California-ness outweighs in this case. Am I getting that right, DDD? :)

Damn...I forgot--smiley faces are NOT cool.

In-N-Out's a great burger, and I still can't figure out how they sell it so cheap. Outstanding service, great fresh tomatoes and lettuce, burger grilled fresh each time. I hear they pay their workers very well (managers can make six figures).

Is it better than Cue's Burger in Houston?

No idea.

It's probably not the best burger there is, but for a cheap fast-food burger, nothing else I've had is even close.

After just finishing reading Fast Food Nation. I can say that In n out does it right. Everything that is wrong with mcdonalds is right with In n out.

They use ground beef that is never frozen, the fries are from fresh cut potatoes, everything is fresh. The milkshakes are made from real icecream. The staff is great and well paid for the fast food industry.

Is it the best burger you can buy. Probably not. But for the price and the quality I doubt you can find many places that are comparable. Plus they have Dr Pepper so they get bonus points from that automatically.

Amen to that. All hail the Doctor.

One thing that chafes living back East is that restaurants rarely have the Dr. in the house.

I love Dr. Pepper. But since I have forsworn caffeine, I don't get it at fast food joints.

Malcolm was also a fan of the old In Out In Out.

http://lh5.ggpht.com/_j4ajgI87LtU/Rg...lmmcdowell.jpg

I'm sure you mean northern Utah, but there is one in St. George.

In-N-Out is good. It's not the end all be all of hamburgers. Personally, I'd rather have a Tommy's chili burger or even a king burger from FatBurger. I'd also rather eat one of my own burgers I grill with ground angus and mild italian sausage.

But In-N-Out is still one of those places that makes me warm inside when I go. I almost always have to hit up the one in Vegas when in town. And the In-N-Out at the top of hamburger hill off Lyon's Ave. and I-5 in Valencia was the spot in high school; so I think for nostalgia more than anything else I enjoy it.

whoa.....excuse me.

Please explain in greater detail.

This sounds magically delicious.

St. George might as well be Las Vegas/Nevada as far as I'm concerned.

I mix a good ground Angus or sirloin and mild Italian sausage. Usually a pound and a half of beef to a pound of pork sausage. I usually crack an egg or two to bind and keep moist. I then usually add a liberal amount of salt, pepper and A1 sauce or Worcestershire (probably around 1/3 C). I make huge patties about an inch thick. Throw them on a hot clean grill. Sometimes I'll even brush the grill with oil or the meat to get nice grill marks. I usually add a nice melting cheese like provolone and white American. A nice thick cut bacon baked in the oven is a nice topper also.

I just bought the stuff to do this for my game time BBQ tomorrow. Can't wait. Thanks for the suggestion.

In-n-Out is a great tasting, cheap burger. But even more, it's fresh. It doesn't feel like the greasy gut bomb burgers you get from other fast food joints. This is what pushes In-n-Out above Crown/Astro Burger in my eyes.

My wife gets mad at me if I have a double-double, I can only imagine how she would react if I had a 4x4

I do not either! I merely point out that nobody needs 46 grams of fat in one meal.

An anxious nation awaits your findings. Seriously, out of the mouths of two or three witnesses shall the menu for our Friday evening soiree be established, and Surfah's recipe sounds enticing. I await your review.

Translation: You still nag and give him shit for it, instead of letting him enjoy it.

We are doing this recipe for lunch today. I will post my findings in about 4 hours.

I am excited, though.

Besides Obama, nobody stirs the masses into a frenzy like Surfah.

Hey, she has to sleep with him. Maybe she wants the MP funk with the toned sexy core and not the one that air humps to Journey's Separate Ways.

It's true. Style over substance. ;)

My report: in short, a smashing success and very worthwhile. Adding the sausage to the beef makes all the difference. A did make a few tweaks:

I used ground sirloin and spicy Italian sausage. I kept the 1.5 pounds beef/1 pound sausage ratio. The yield was about 8 or 9 VERY large patties.

I used 2 eggs to bind.

Added salt, pepper, garlic salt into the mix. Hand pressed into patties, covered with plastic wrap, and let sit out to room temp for an hour or so before cooking.

I oven cooked thick cut bacon to use as a topper. About 18 minutes at 400 degrees was perfect.

I also pre-fried eggs to add (in the spirit of a King burger at Fatburger). Left some yolk uncooked.

Used spicy jack cheese as a topper.

Made the patties about an inch or so thick and about 6 inches wide....caution...instead of shrinking, these burgers balloon up and contain massive amounts of juice. Be careful when biting initially, esp just off the grill. You can seriously burn yourself.

As with all my grilling, cranked up the heat to high, get the BBQ nice and hot, then turn the flames all the way down low. Brush the patties with olive oil on both sides before placing on grill. Flipped every 4-5 minutes. After about 3 flips, it was cooked all the way through. Also, reapplied light coats of olive oil after each flip to keep burger moist.

With about 2 minutes to go, I placed a fresh-cut pineapple slice on top of the patty, let is start to cook (didnt grill them directly because I didnt want to lose any juice, although this could be a delicious add if grilled with brown sugar).

With about 1 or so minutes to go, I placed the fried egg on top of the pineapple slice, then covered the egg in a slice of cheese, let the cheese melt.

Upon removal from grill, top the cheese with bacon and present.

Garnish with grilled onions, fresh tomatoes, lettuce, grilled jalapenos, onion buns.

I did not add sauce to the beef mix. Instead, I added Peter Luger sauce as a condiment on my burger (no mustard or ketchup) and that was an amazing touch.

One side effect: burps an hour later....yikes!

Sounds great. I may have to try the spicier route sometime. I love pepper jack. Avocado would be great as a topper to cool the palate just as your pineapple would. Lots of variations to this. But like you said the beef and sausage mixture is the key. Glad you liked it.

I won't go into the detail that DDD went into, but it was good. I like the Luger's idea. I may try that next time instead of A1. I did pretty much exactly what the recipe Surfah suggested with two small additions. I added crushed roasted garlic that comes in the bottle at the grocery store and a little bit Italian spices ground in.

I only grill over coals, so I used hickory coals and let each side cook for about 8 minutes open and about 4 minutes closed. About 25 total minutes. Thick patties, so it takes a little longer to get it cooked all the way through.

The one thing that surprised me is that there was very little dripping. I thought it would be a lot of flare ups on the grill, but it didn't happen. Very juicy and great flavor burger. I also had I added two slices of sharp cheddar to each patty also. Garnished with fresh from my parents garden, tomatoes, onions and lettuce.

I will be doing this again soon. Very good burger.

I LOOOVE In-N-Out.

I lived in California for two summers, and ate as many as I could.

Animal fries, wow

Made this with avocado and blue cheese last night. Good stuff. The mixture's a little sausage-heavy for my taste so I might cut that back a little next time, but good idea nonetheless.

Question for DDD/Surfah/whomever: Adding the egg is a new idea for me. Do you always do this? What kinds of other ideas for a good burger mix do you have? Say you don't have sausage on hand.

Since I moved here, In n Out has turned me into a fastfood snob. I can't tell you the last time I ate a burger from another fastfood joint. It just doesn't happen anymore.

I miss In N Out. Back when I was able to eat beef, the perfect meal was ordering two "double meat protein animal style" burgers. Without the bun, you're able to taste all of the meaty goodness, and the extra lettuce makes everything more fresh.

Can't wait until I can eat cow again.

Did you convert to Hinduism or something?

No, no, I love beef just like most Mormons. I'm on a special diet, on orders from my Chinese doctor. In terms of meats right now, just pig. Think of it as my own personal word of wisdom.