Burger Photo Gallery (click pictures to enlarge)

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THE JOINT

de Vere’s Irish Pub is, as the name suggests, a traditional Irish pub in the downtown area of Sacramento, CA.  It is locally owned by an Irish family from that immigrated to the US over 30 years ago.  The inside has the low lit feel of a true Irish pub and the woodwork on the bar and interior decorations was actually crafted and shipped over from Ireland.

I think I first heard about de Vere’s from my one of my favorite sources…Twitter. I think it was October of 2010 that @deverespub started following me and I started reading tweets about different events happening at the pub.  Halloween rolled around and my wife and I were headed to a party later that night with some friends and I suggested we stop by there first to grab a bite to eat before the festivities started.  I had a cheeseburger with fried egg and my first taste of Irish bacon, snapped a photo of it and posted a few days later on Foodspotting.

One of the owners of the pub (@henrydevere) who is pretty active on Twitter saw my photo and took the time to leave a comment which started a dialogue between us. Fast forward a few months and we teamed up to bring Sacramento the first #sacburgermonth in May of 2011 to help celebrate National Hamburger Month locally.

THE BURGER

As part of Sacramento Burger Month, the chefs at de Vere’s came up with progressively crazier (in a good way) burgers to be featured each week with a specially selected beer pairing. First there was the Tostada burger, next came the Firestone burger (one of my favorites), and the 3rd week is the Stadium Burger.

The Stadium Burger features a double ground chuck beef patty that is stuffed (juicy lucy style) with 1.5 ounces of sharp cheddar cheese, coated with whole grain mustard and smothered with a house made relish that features delicious pepadew peppers. They surround it all in a soft pretzel bun.

On this particular burger adventure I was on a lunch date with my wife.  After I told her about the pretzel bun and sharp cheddar cheese insides, she was all in.  We arrived at de Vere’s for an early lunch, had our pick of seats (true pub style), and didn’t even let the server finish his pitch before we let him know what we were there for: “2 Stadium Burgers” :)

I ordered mine medium rare and she ordered hers medium and they came out in a reasonable amount of time, both dripping with juices. I like how the burger looks so unassuming at first. It’s a good sized burger, but if you take a first glance, it just looks like a burger patty on a cool looking bun.  The cheese on the inside is like a piquant present in a beautiful burger wrapping.

Mine had its inner cheddar bursting at the seams, ready to get down to business. Here’s a video of the cheese burgasm in action:

The burger was cooked perfectly on the inside and the sharp cheddar cheese was evident in each bite. The coarsely chopped relish gave the burger a much fresher taste than just the standard lettuce/tomato/onion, and the sweetness of the peppadew peppers. These peppers are said to have a touch of heat, but I didn’t get any spiciness from the sandwich. So if you’re averse to spicy dishes, I don’t think this burger would trigger any grabs for a glass of water.

When I first heard about this sandwich, my main concern was the pretzel bun. I *loved* the idea of a pretzel bun, but I had tried a couple different burgers on pretzel buns and they both were not as spectacular as I was expecting. That was not the case with the Stadium Burger pretzel bun. Sufficiently soft (instead of tough like the previous pretzel buns I’ve tried), good bakery fresh flavor, and just the right amount of chewiness to keep itself together while you finish your sandwich.

THE VERDICT

I personally love Juicy Lucy style cheeseburgers (with the cheese on the inside), and de Vere’s Irish Pub’s Stadium Burger version is a slam dunk. After the first couple of bites my wife exclaimed that it was “fantastic” and before we were done with our lunch we were already making plans to come back to de Vere’s the next day with the whole family to get another Stadium Burger in before it was no longer featured. My burgerjunkies insider tip: if you order the french fries with your meal, ask for the curry ketchup (it’s amazing)!

The Stadium Burger is featured in the ESPN Fanwiches competition. Please give it a vote today!

Tags: cheesy, featured, juicy lucy, national hamburger month, sacburgermonth