Dream Burger

Paccini Restaurant & Bar

1717 SW Park Avenue Portland, OR 97201

Paccini’s is a restaurant and bar (as you would guess by their name) on Portland State University campus in SW Portland. When you first walk in, it initially seems like a pizza parlor with limited seating where you can order pizza and sandwiches. As you walk back into the rear of the building, there is a bar and a dining room with a full menu.

Their mission statement: “Wanting nothing more than to make you happy with quality scratch cooking, a warm and comfortable environment and friendly service.”  I guess they don’t mean warm in a literal sense since it was absolutely freezing cold inside. Anyway. The menu description:

Cheeseburger 3.00

They really could be a bit more descriptive with this. When I ordered it, I was expecting a bun, a tiny slice of beef, and a bland slice of cheese. The bartender handed me a number, I set it on the table, and my plate was delivered about 15 minutes later.

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Fire On The Mountain

1706 East Burnside Street, Portland, OR 97214

Fire on the Mountain is a restaurant at East Burnside & 17th serving a wide variety of chicken products, burgers, and other fried foods. They also have a North Interstate location, which is smaller in size but has a similar menu.

The set up is kind of confusing if you’ve never been there before. As soon as you walk in, there is a counter where you can check out the menu and order your food. If you’re eating inside, you take a number and place it on your table. There is no hostess or waitstaff, so you seat yourself – and if it’s busy, it’s a good idea to grab a table prior to ordering.  At the counter, you can sample any of their wing sauces with a piece of celery prior to ordering and committing yourself to a sauce you’ve never tried before.

Anyway, I’ve eaten wings here a bunch of times and have always thoroughly enjoyed them, so I figure I should try out the burger. They offer a regular burger and a bison burger with the following descriptions:

Basic Burger – A half pound of all natural Painted Hills beef with lettuce, tomato, onion and garlic mayo. $7.95

Bison Burger – A half pound of all natural, free range bison with lettuce, tomato, onion and garlic mayo.  $9.95

The burgers are served with fresh cut fries, but you can substitute potato salad or chili for an additional $0.95. I ordered the Bison Burger with fries and added cheddar cheese (+ $.50). The wait was pretty short, and after a few minutes the cashier brought over this plate:

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Holman’s Restaurant

15 SE 28th Ave Portland, OR 97214

Holman’s Restaurant is a dive bar (or not – they don’t have PBR on tap) in SE Portland at 28th and Burnside.  The outside doesn’t seem too inviting, and the only reason why I even ate here was because it was raining and 3 other restaurants didn’t have any open tables.  I would say the menu has a nice selection considering it’s a bar, but the pricing is a bit high for food. There were 4 or 5 specialty burgers available, as well as a build-your-own-burger option. A burger with lettuce and onion starts out at $5.50. I added cheddar cheese ($1.00) and tomato ($0.50) and a side of french fries ($1.95).  Ten minutes later, my plate arrived:

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Hopworks Urban Brewery

2944 SE Powell Boulevard Portland, OR 97202

Hopworks Urban Brewery Portland’s first Eco-Brewpub, offering “all organic handcrafted beers, fresh local ingredients, and a sustainable building with a relaxed and casual atmosphere.”  The place is pretty big and has parking for seventy cars, eight motorcycles and up to fifty bikes – which is a good call since every time I drive past, the place seems absolutely packed. There are 4 areas within HUB – the bar area (with bicycle frames strung across the bar itself), a family-friendly section with play area (A+ for keeping screaming obnoxious children out of my sight), a banquent mezzanine, and an outdoor beer-garden. They have a nice selection of beer on tap, and a very extensive menu. I can probably hype this up more, but all I really care about is the cheeseburger:

Brewers Burger – 1/2 Pound beef patty. Served on a Tillamook cheddar cheese & onion bun w/ lettuce, tomato, red onion & mayonnaise.
The Standard $8.75
Tillamook cheddar, provolone, or Rogue River blue cheese $9.50
ESBBQ, bacon & Tillamook cheddar $10.75
Add bacon or avocado $1.50

They are are served with “your choice of house made potato chips, organic thick-cut french fries, house salad or soup of your choice.” I ordered a burger with cheddar cooked Medium with a side of “thick-cut french fries.” I am adding quotes around this horseshit because check out what HUB really means by that:

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Pickle Barrel

1301 E Carson Street Pittsburgh, PA 15203

The Pickle Barrel, is located on Pittsburgh’s South side, and is well known for its incredible low prices and consequently its appeal to those on a budget. Many times, usually when I am strapped for cash, i find myself thinking ” It can’t be that bad.” If there is one thing I pride myself, it is on not being wrong. This is one time where I just have to swallow my pride (after swallowing a mysterious patty marketed as beef) and say yes, it can be this bad.

I ordered a combination meal and received a double cheeseburger (ketchup, mayo, onions, and tomato), french fries, and a 20oz drink in a Styrofoam cup (Coke). It is nearly impossible for me to include a menu description as I ordered from a piece of poster board listing very straight forward options with no descriptors. Roughly 8 minutes later I was confronted with this basket of value:

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Under Wonder Lounge

128 NE Russell Street Portland, OR 97212

Under Wonder Lounge is a restaurant/bar located, as you would guess, underneath the Wonder Ballroom. The drinks are cheaper than they are upstairs, and I was hungry, so I decided to check it out. Their small menu consists of two sections, Under $5 and Under $10.  Here’s the menu description of their burger:

Wonderburger 8.00
Choice of flame-grilled all beef or traditional Garden Burger ($7) patty
Choice of cheddar or Swiss cheese. Served with lettuce, tomato, red onion and garlic aioli. Add smoked bacon $1

I ordered the beef (of course) burger with cheddar, cooked Medium with a side salad and a large side of Russell Street Fries ($3).  I probably definitely should have just went with fries as a side, seeing as whenever I order a salad, the lettuce only serves as a tool to hold ranch dressing en route to my mouth. This practice is only one step away from eating ranch dressing with a spoon, and two steps away from drinking it from a bottle.

Anyway. The wait was really short despite the place being rather crowded due to the show going on upstairs.  The burger:

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Skyline Restaurant

1313 NW Skyline Boulevard Portland, OR 97229

Skyline Restaurant is an old-fashioned drive-in located right at the corner of a 4-way intersection in NE Portland . It’s about a 15 minute drive out of the city, but is totally worth the trip. They are very well-known for their tasty old-fashioned burgers and shakes. Their menu is filled with things you would expect from a drive-in, including a nice variety of burgers.  I ordered the Skyline Burger, their standard cheeseburger.

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