Hello and welcome to another random food review. A friend and coworker of mine, Joe Froemming, who runs the The Joe-Down and reviews movies, wants to find the best burgers in Fargo.
As someone whose life goal is to find the best chicken strip basket on the planet, I obviously wanted in. So we ate a couple burgers and are bringing you delightful human beings a joint review.
On a dinner break last week, we ventured to Crooked Pint Ale House, which specializes in burgers, particularly Jucy Lucys. Guest reviewers go first, so, Joe, take it away:
I was pretty excited to try this bad boy out. It contained almost every element of food I should avoid: Beef, bacon, cheese, beer cheese sauce and whatever the hell was in the bistro sauce. Even the onions were bad for me, since they were (REDACTED) deep fried and stacked upon this beast.
So, you know, this thing was winning my heart.
But as burgers go, there were issues. Pretzel buns are not all that great, and this one was confusing in that there was too much bun at the end, but somehow not enough to hold the ingredients in place. The haystack fries all lopped over to one side of the burger, so at the halfway point, I am getting a mouthful of them. Also, having beer cheese AND bistro sauce made for a confusing taste to me.
The plus side was the juicy Lucy action, the bacon and the slice of pepper jack cheese. These were the strengths of this burger and it did not disappoint. If those were the burger, this would have been much better.
Overall, not a bad burger, but it did not floor me. I give it a 7.5.
Thank you, Joe. Very professional review.
I’m a big fan of jalapeños on burgers, so I opted for the new Wrangler Lucy. This beast is stuffed with jalapeños and cheddar cheese, and topped with haystack onions, bacon, more cheddar cheese and bourbon molasses sauce. Very healthy.
It was a solid burger. The beef was good enough and I didn’t have a major complaint about any toppings. The bacon was cooked how I like it — crispy, but not burnt black and far from flimsy. Deep-fried onions are always a plus for me, and the bourbon molasses sauce did a nice job of cutting through all the savory flavors of the beef, bacon, onions and cheddar.
My gripes — I wish there would have been more jalapeños and sauce. The jalapeño flavor I love didn’t quite come through as strongly as I’d prefer, and I could’ve used just an extra half teaspoon of that bourbon molasses sauce.
The half-pound of fries (yikes) that came with the burger was quite solid. I have a feeling, if this place did chicken strips (cough-cough, looking at you, Crooked Pint), they would rate highly. Good ranch can often lead to good chicken strips.
Overall, I’ll give Crooked Pint’s Wrangler Lucy a 7.2. It was a good burger, but the jalapeño is what caught my eye and I was hoping for more of it.
This was fun to write and even more fun to eat, so I hope to collab for another Thrilling Joe-Down burger review (see what I did there?). Thank you and stay safe out there.
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