I had heard about Magnolia before, but I hadn’t eaten there. When it popped up in my search for a burger in The Haight I immediately got excited, especially after reading the menu: HALF POUND PRATHER RANCH HAMBURGER 13 – lettuce, tomato, onion add Cheddar, Gruyere, or Blue 1.5 – add Hobbs’ bacon, 2. Sound’s good, right?

So Albie and I set out to have some burgers for lunch. I ordered mine with cheese, gruyere. After what seemed like a long wait the waitress finally came around the corner with our burgers and I was surprised at how tall they were, so tall the chef had to put a big stick through the middle of one to keep them from falling over. And as you can see from the picture, I forgot to order mine without onions. No problem, I promptly removed them after taking the picture – yuck!

The burger was cooked just the way I like it, medium-rare. Check. After the first couple bites it started dripping. Check. And I must say, it was quite a tasty and delicious burger. Check. Only one small problem with it – too salty. Boo. On the whole a little more expensive then the average burgers we’ve been sampling, which is why (along with the saltiness) we both knocked it down from five stars to four.

On a side note, the fries were just ok, not crispy enough for me. But they make their own rootbeer, which is really neat and that tasted good. And when they brought out the ketchup and mustard I was totally grossed out, just take a look at it!