Fast Food Friday – Five Guys

All summer long, I have been eyeing the empty store front in the strip mall close to work.  “Coming Soon Five Guys” the sign on the window said.  It seemed like an eternity…about every two weeks I’d drive to that location to get my coney dog fix across the street and that sign just kept mocking me…until last week!

That’s right, Five Guys Burgers & Fries opened in Troy, MI and I can’t be more excited.

Five Guys is a chain that started in the DC Metro area. With just a few modest stores, the five brothers (Five Guys) convinced their dad to start franchising.  In less than 5 years, the chain has grown to include 450 stores in 30 states, working their way out west one store at a time.

There is actually a Five Guys closer to my house, but it’s in a location that just isn’t convenient and if I was to get Better Half to actually go out to eat somewhere with Lil’ Baird tagging along, well burger joints just don’t typically come to mind.  So I waited…

I got to tell you - the burger was WAY worth the wait.  But what about the BACON?  Well let’s find out…for the “Fast Food Friday” test, we ordered the bacon cheeseburger.

 

I opened up that simple foil package and found a great lookin’ burger but immediately there was a problem…I opened my bacon cheeseburger only to discover – NO BACON!  THE HORROR!!  I went back to the counter to inquire and received back another hunk of foil filled with slices. 

Let’s get that bacon on the burger…

Oh what a sloppy, beautiful mess.  I spread out the bacon the best I could.  I don’t know the actually method they used to cook it but from past experience it looked and felt like this bacon had been dipped in the fryer to cook. 

This is good old fashioned strip bacon.  You’d expect to see this on your plate at breakfast.  Irregular shape, slightly uneven cooking…this wasn’t the same stuff I’ve seen at the other places I’ve visited to this point.  The bacon was a little too crispy on it’s own, but worked really well in the burger.  You could bite through pretty easily and there was minimal crumble (like you’d typically see when eating bacon that was overcooked).  I was also surprised just how much bacon taste I got with each bite.  There is so much meat on this thing that I thought I’d lose the bacon, just as I have experienced at the QSR burger “holy trinity”. Not so…

Since that first visit, I have been back and ordered the bacon cheeseburger again.  I thought my initial results would have been slightly skewed.  It seemed like I got a few extra pieces of bacon because they initially got my order wrong.  Turns out that yes, I did get some extra slices but in terms of flavor and overall coverage (I had four slices on my second trip), they still delivered.

As someone who loves burgers…if you haven’t tried Five Guys, go today!!  Get their fries too…VERY good!!  In terms of the bacon, we go to the tale of the tape according to The BRS…

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Restaurant: Five Guys Burgers & Fries
Menu Item: Regular Bacon Cheeseburger

Appearance: 1 2 3 4 5

Overall Coverage: 1 2 3 4 5

Bacon Per Bite: 1 2 3 4 5

The left end is “not enough” and the right end is “too much”, so a perfect score would be 5

Pork Flavor
not enough << 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 2 1 >> too much

Smoke
not enough << 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 2 1 >> too much

Salt
not enough << 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 2 1 >> too much

Sugar
not enough << 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 2 1 >> too much

Fat
not enough << 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 2 1 >> too much

Texture
too chewy << 1 2 3 4 5 4 3 2 1 >> too crisp

OVERALL SCORE: 3.33

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A new winner in the clubhouse.  Nice job Five Guys!

Oh…my coney place isn’t taking the Five Guys opening lying down.  Check out their new banners:

So take that!

Next week – another new kid to the Michigan scene – SONIC.