Burger Photo Gallery (click pictures to enlarge)

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THE JOINT

Ten22 is a new American restaurant in history Old Sacramento, CA. They specialize in a farm to table inspired menu served in a casual environment. The local owners of Ten22 also own a more upscale restaurant, The Firehouse, located a block down the same street.

I first heard about Ten22 from one of  new favorite restaurant recommendation engines: Twitter. I saw a tweet a few months about someone trying one of their specials and I started following them. Fast forward a few months to #sacburgermonth and I started hearing about their Ultra Hearty Burger from a few friends and decided to make the trip with the family of 5 for a Friday night “family date night” :)

THE BURGER

The Ultra Hearty Burger is listed as having pepper jack cheese, applewood-smoked bacon, and caramelized onions. It doesn’t mention the size (or the source) of the burger, but I would estimate the weight at about: huge. It was probably a half pound burger, but it just looked huge.

I ordered the burger medium rare and waited a little more than a while for the food to arrive. It came cooked to a perfect medium rare with a side of shoestring fries.  The hint of spice from the pepperjack cheese meshed well with the sweet caramelized onions.  The bacon added its distinct flavor instead of being a token topping. The flavor of the beef was evident due to the enormous size of the patty and the fact that it was cooked to the correct temperature. It juicy, but not as juicy as I thought it would be, but that could be due to the type of beef used (when a more fatty beef type is blended, it seems to have more moisture).  I’m not sure what type of bun they used, but it was near perfect in its flavor and ability to handle the hefty hamburger.  Most restaurants’ special sauces are about the same, but the special sauce at Ten22 gets a few extra points for having a nice slightly spicy kick.

I normally don’t comment about the service when I review burgers, but I do have to say that the timing of our particular server seemed to be off. My wife ordered the blackened red fish and my burger was medium rare, but they took much longer than expected to come out.  I asked for the check, but then decided on dessert and after the server brought the dessert menu, he didn’t return to take our dessert order for almost 10 minutes.  Usually, once the dessert is placed on the table, the check is usually brought to the table shortly afterwards, but I ended up asking for the check after my wife finished her delicious strawberry cake.

THE VERDICT

After we left, my wife asked if I’d go back and have the Ten22 burger again. That’s really what separates good burgers from great burgers. When you’ve eaten a LOT of burgers, you really look for something that stands out.  I’d definitely go for the Ultra Hearty Burger at Ten22 again. I heard that they offer a “double” burger on Monday’s for just $2 extra and their spicy special sauce was good enough for a return trip even with the service missteps.

And now, a burger music video:

Tags: bacon, bloody mary, farm to table, featured, national hamburger month, sacburgermonth