This time in my defense, my phone was almost dead so I left it behind in the truck.
On my way out today, still at the same truck stop I was from last entry, I decided to eat lunch before heading out. The WV Turnpike doesn't have many viable, or cheap for that matter, food options for truckers going south. There's the big service plaza at Beckley and...that's it. There's 3 (that's counting Beckley) going north but south there's 2 rest areas and Beckley. Bummer.
So back into the T/A I went, determined to try something else from the special menu. I eyed that pickled onion burger like before but I just could not do it. I went with some more bold. More brazen. More could-they-pull-this-off?! The bacon jalapeno burger on their new pretzel roll...with regular fries.
The server brings it out to me and the thing just looks a mess. There's no much going on. There's the burger, there's the cheese melting and dripping off, there's the fried jalapenos...fried jalapenos?!..piled haphazardly, not arranged but thrown on almost like a "oh sh--, I almost forgot about those!" There's the other half of the burger with the lettuce and tomato (again, hold the pickle please). Then to be nice there was a cup of mayo placed on top of the cold side.
First thing's first, off came the cup of mayo. Won't be needing that, plus the burger had a chipotle mayo sauce on it already. Let's just eat the slice of tomato, otherwise it's going to get in the way and make the burger slide all over the place. I was tempted to try a lone fried jalapeno to see how much heat those pack after deep frying but I thought "No, let's be surprised". So I carefully assembled my burger and prepared to dig in.
Once again, like before, I noticed no heat. There was the crunch of the jalapeno but there was no heat from the jalapeno. Was my tongue numb? Was I immune to it? No, that's not likely, I'd notice the spiciness. The next thing I noticed was the lack of anything the bun brought to the burger. It's like it was just there. It didn't add anything, it didn't take away anything. You could probably have put this on a sesame seed bun and got the same result. I'd like to think it was made with pretzel dough and baked. It was a little greasy, both the top and bottom, I did notice that. It didn't seem heavy. It didn't seem like anything really, it was...just there. It held together pretty well, it just started to separate a but toward the end with the way it was rolled and baked.
Then you had the chipotle mayo..and the fried jalapenos..and the bacon..and the burger..and the cheese...and then with the bun. I....I just don't know. It's like they're trying too hard. "Let's put all these flavors together and it's going to be amazing!" When in execution it all falls flat and, yes, I'm just going to say it again, it feels like they're trying too hard.
Couple things I would do that I think could improve on this. First, axe the current bun. Go back to a regular bun. Second, axe the bacon, it's unnecessary. Third, axe the fried jalapenos and instead arrange a few regular sliced jalapenos. More heat and a little better since they're not fried. I'm thinking frying the jalapenos killed the heat from them. Keep the chipotle mayo, keep the pepperjack. Just make those few little changes and I'm sure you'll have a better burger. Well I think they would anyway.
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