Ingredients Matter at Elevation Burger

By ERIC WADE

          

           Ingredients matter, 100 percent grass-fed and 100 percent organic, are on the signs all over Elevation Burger, that’s the message the restaurant wants you to see, but none of these words describes the actual experience of the burger joint.

Double Beef Burger

            A restaurant with the word burger in it should have good burgers, And it’s probably fair to expect that at a restaurant named Elevation Burger, you might actually have a heightened dining experience. That is not the case.

            Elevation Burger’s grass-fed, organic, free-range beef patties are dry, spongy, thin and overcooked. There’s a fine line between cooked and overdone, and Elevation Burger’s cooks crossed that line minutes before they pulled the patties from the grill, leaving the taste behind.

            Ingredients matter. They must matter to Elevation Burger to the point that they want to keep the ingredients for themselves. On a Burger with cheddar cheese, bacon and the standard veggies, the burger came topped with a slice of cheese, one piece of bacon, two torn pieces of light colored lettuce—not the dark, flavorful lettuce—and a thin layer of mayo. You’d expect a $9 burger to be piled high with toppings to make up for the lack of beef.

Veggie burger of unknown type

            You can’t mess up a milkshake, but my tongue would disagree. The force it takes to get hand-dipped ice cream through a straw is enough to give tongue hickies and throat cramps. Maybe some milk in the milkshake would help. To top it off, the ingredients in the chocolate, strawberry, cheesecake shake didn’t seem so fresh when the strawberries came up through the straw as tiny frozen chunks. 

            The staff greeted with enthusiasm, and the sustainably constructed building is spotless. Something the Elevation Burger has going is the sustainable business model. The floor and tables appeared to be made from a bamboo laminate. The food was delivered in metal trays, and the place mat on the bottom of the tray boasts Evaluation Burger’s recycling effort.

            The fresh-cut French fries are delicious. The thin cut fries cooked in olive oil and dashed with sea salt have a unique and great taste.

Other veggie burger of unknown type

            With the quality meat that Elevation Burger claims to have, it keep the prices about the same as Five Guys and Fries.

            If you’re into veggie burgers, Elevation Burger offers two different types. One of the veggie burgers was packed full of flavorful vegetables, pressed into a patty with what looked like rice. The other veggie burger looked like a sawdust patty mixed with rice and tasted like wheat mixed with beef flavoring.

            The problem is that the food was delivered without indication of which burger was which, so it’s a mystery of which burger was the delicious burger and which was the sawdust patty.

            The premise of Elevation Burger is great. Restaurants need to think more about the environment and the conditions of where food comes from, but Elevation Burgers overall experience is poor. So, unless you’re more concerned about the environment then you’re taste buds this place needs to be avoided.

            It’s said that Five Guys and Fries have a good burger for around the same price.