Every Tuesday, Complex.com's City Guide reviews a burger based on price, convenience, and taste.
From the picture above, you can see I'm not about keeping my burgers neat. I like a variety of vegetables and sauces on my patties that will ultimately require at least four napkins and a fork to eat the rest of the meal. So while back home in Oakland for the holidays, I had to stop by Barney's Gourmet Hamburgers to get my messy fix.
Keeping reading for the review and the Pickin' Burgers Index...
By Dominic Green (@DOM_IZZO)
Whats so good about Barney's—besides the fact that you can lace your burger with a number of toppings—is that if you're not a fan of beef, their turkey patties and chicken breasts are just as mouth watering. I was in a bird mood, so hidden under the green and red bell peppers, grilled onions, and sauteed mushrooms laid a perfectly cooked turkey patty. As I ravished my meal as if it were my last, I did notice it got a little annoying to keep having to stuff all my toppings back on the burger just so I could have a little taste of everything with each bite. But that's not enough of a reason for me to not order the same thing when I go back. One complaint that I did have was that the teriyaki glaze was a little salty, like a kick-in-the-mouth type salty. But that can probably be combated by just asking them to just throw the sauce on the side. Overall though, this is one stop that has to be made anytime you touch down in Cali...trust, you wont regret it.
Barney's Gourmet Burgers: The Pickin' Burgers Index
• Price: 4 ($9.25).
• Convenience: 2 (7 locations in 1 state).
• Taste: 7.5. Don't get this ranking confused, I'm not rating all the burgers this way. There are so many to choose from so there could be a 8,9, or 10 on the menu but the saltiness of the sauce knocked it down a notch.
• Total: 13.5 (out of 20).
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***The Pickin' Burgers Index explained:
• Taste is ranked on a 10-point scale, and is entirely subjective, entirely at each individual reviewer's discretion.
• Price and Convenience are objective measurements on a 5-point scale. For Price, a "5" is given to burgers costing less than $2.50, a "4" to burgers costing $2.50 to $10, with a point drop for each subsequent $5 price increase (an "3" for $10-$15, a "2" for $15-$20, etc., to a "1" for $20+).
• For Convenience, a "5" is awarded to burgers served at over 1000 locations, a "4" to burgers served at 100-1000 locations in more than 30 states, a "3" to burgers served at 10-100 locations in more than one state, a "2" to burgers served at more than one location in a city or region, and a "1" to burgers served at one location.
RELATED: Pickin' Burgers: Five Guys
Like burgers? Got one that you want to index? Hit Complex City Guide editor Jack Erwin at @JackEComplex. If your review is published, we'll pick up the tab!
