Showing posts with label cheese. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cheese. Show all posts

Sunday, June 10, 2012

Squeeze Inn

My family descended upon the poor unsuspecting Squeeze Inn in Galt, California (right outside Sacramento) to try their famous grilled-crisp cheese cheeseburgers.  Once a modest establishment, Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives, and other accolades have caused rather rapid and aggressive expansion.  We ordered just about every type of burger and fry they served, milk shakes, and other artery cloggers.  In the end, we enjoyed ourselves, but a mix of average service and often underseasoned food caused the overall assessment to be rather lower than where they could, and probably should, be.
The milkshakes were large and delicious.
The fries were fresh and cooked perfectly, but needed more salt.
The chili fries were a meal unto themselves and featured good, Texas-style red (no bean with meat) chili.
The sweet potato fries (a new addition) were rather disappointing.  They had an odd taste, were crisp but not 100% delicious, and the wasabi ranch sauce was probably powder ranch mixed with powder wasabi (resulting in an extremely tart, oddly tangy - in the wrong way - pretty impossible to eat mix).
The burgers were beastly (hand for scale) with a delicious side of crispy cheese (which I folded back onto the burger).
And filled to the gills!  (Fork for scale of crispy cheese).  The patties were the thin variety, not fat "Red Robin" style, but more expanded "Wendy's" style.  This said, they were juicy and well cooked.  We couldn't be sure they weren't frozen, but such is life.  The main issue with the burger was the meat was underseasoned.  Salt - Pepper.  Feel free to also add a little Garlic Powder, etc.

Overall, good but not great.  We were glad to have gone.  Crispy cheese, what a fantastic idea to create a unique burger experience around it!  Bravo!  Our party could have been a little nicer, and so could the host/first server.  For example, as we arrived (with a large group) the servers were unwilling to allow us to move together a few tables (with 3/4 of the space open).  They wanted us to sit near each other, but not connected or wait for at least 10-15 minutes.  Some quick subterfuge later and the tables were connected.  

This did not seem to be a problem for local high school kids around.  The staff seemed perfectly content to allow them to nurse their fries for 45 minutes or more and drop by to see what they needed.  It appeared we caught them between shifts though, as one less helpful waitress left, a new, more helpful waitress arrived.  Seemed they may have wanted us to wait because one waitress did not want to help a big party and end up with no tip.  I cannot say I completely agreed with how our group handled the situation, but the service from hosting to serving never was super impressive.  

The Squeeze Inn
545 Industrial Drive  
Galt, CA 95632
(209) 745-4313
3.5 of 5

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

my wife's old obsession - burrata and how to cook a wolf

Quite some time ago, a friend couple took my wife and me out to dinner at Ethan Stowell's How to Cook a Wolf.  I had not developed my (annoying) habit of taking pictures of what we ate.  The dinner was excellent (and below I will give a rough idea of what we ate and our opinion).  

The star of the meal though was the Buratta dish.  Buratta is a mozzarella cheese with normal mozzarella on the outside wrapping mozzarella on the inside that is mixed (minced) up with creme.  I am fairly certain that after that point, Buratta became the basis for an extra five pounds around both our waists.  You can typically buy some (not quite as good as Stowell's) in Seattle at:

Quality Cheese
Pike Place Market
Corner Market and Sanitary Market
1508 Pike Place
Seattle, WA 98101
qcheese@nwlink.com

DeLaurenti Specialty Food and Wine
1435 1st Avenue
Seattle, WA 98101
206-622-0141

Borracchini's Bakery & Mediterranean Market
2307 Rainier Ave S
Seattle, WA 98144
206-325-1550


Here are a few shots of Buratta from How to Cook a Wolf (they are not mine).  The first is a better shot, the second is closer to what we ate - burrata with a salad (not shown) and figs (shown).  

So, our impression of How to Cook a Wolf?  It was delicious.  Think Italian tapas.  We ate at least the beets, burrata, escolar, beef tartare, tagliarini and campanelle.  There were a few other seasonal dishes that have since escaped me.  Obviously the Buratta was a huge hit, and my wife was surprised to enjoy the tartar so much, but I also remember thinking that it could have been even better (ergo, no 4.5 or 5 star).  My wife and I enjoyed it quite a bit and are planning a return visit soon...

How to Cook a Wolf
2208 Queen Anne Avenue North
Seattle, WA 
206-838-8090
4 of 5