Burger the Hut

Of all the burger joints on our list, none have quite the reputation of Hut's Hamburgers. It's hard to have any conversation about Austin's Best Burgers without this sixth street legend coming up. Many burger lists have it near the top, while some claim it's overrated.

Just because everyone says it's great, don't make it so.

Let us be the judge!

My first disclaimer is that we went on Wednesday, which is 2 for 1. Hut's has specials for every day of the week, but understandably, the 2 for 1 is a big draw. College kids to suits make their way to the Whole Foods end of sixth street to fill the cramped and boisterous restaurant. Texas-chic lines the walls in a noisy conflagration that adds to the old-time-meets-good-times feel. We were lucky to have some of us arrive early and get a prime table, thus avoiding the line out front.

My partner and I on the 2 for 1 went for the double w/cheese. The waitress was friendly and nonplussed by the crowds. Didn't bat an eye when I remembered almost too late for no mayo.

In no time, my burger arrived. And it was good. Two not-too-thin-not-too-thick patties in a nice bun made for a full flavored, unpretentious experience. The fries and rings were an afterthought as this solid burger wouldn't let me put it down until done. Hut's delivered when it had every reason to disappoint--the rep, the milling masses, the mythos--none got in the way of what is a really good burger.

This time around, the crowds don't lie.

Huts Burger

At first I was little resistant about Huts because of all of the hype. But I have to say it was delicious. We had no problem finding a parking spot or getting a table.

The buy one get 1 free worked out great for me and my friend. We split the original with mustard and no pickles. The onion rings were perfect.

I give it a 9.2 only because we still have a long list ahead of us.

Nuts for Huts

I was advised by a fellow blogger that, not only shouldn’t I drink from my neighbors cup (which I inadvertently did; I do not recommend it unless you enjoy being chastised for an ENTIRE meal), but that I must always preface my review with a note stating that I only have my burgers naked. Because of a throat closing, lung collapsing, life-threatening wheat allergy, I can not eat bread. The details of my food allergy are long and boring (this is not an allergy blog after all), but it never prevents me from participating in the delight of devouring a bun-less cheeseburger... and so my review begins.

Be warned, HUTS is not your local McDonalds food chain, so you should expect to wait at least twenty minutes for a table, and another twenty minutes for your amazing burger experience. On every inch of every wall is a plethora of old baseball and football pennants, framed photos of stars gone by, and a mounted longhorn, or two, plus a neon HUTS sign over the full service bar. It, I assume, has the Austin charm that so many of the locals are desperately fighting to preserve. I love Austin, don’t go changing...

This review is probably the most biased because HUTS is my most favorite Austin burger, ever. I have had it a handful of times and have always reveled in the HUTS dining experience. This past Wednesday was no exception. Well there was the cola incident, which left someone scarred for life... Apparently, Wednesdays is a bonus day! Who knew the delicious patty morsels could deliver even more joy?! It is a two-for-one special! BAM! This actually brings their normal price down to within a reasonably priced burger, but I am not complaining.

Huts is a great college student hangout, which sadly none of us are any longer, and is family friendly too. With that said, we wisely split the two-for-one and ate for half the burger price. The beef selection is considerable. You can choose from angus beef to the longhorn beef all the way through to the buffalo beef. I chose the basic Dag burger, which is a double patty with all the fixins, minus the bread. I ordered a basket of fries, which I shared, and a coke, which incidentally looked exactly like my neighbors coke (that, I was not supposed to share). It was delicious. Not the coke that is, the burger.

While there we made friends with a young naïve pie entrepreneur, who will undoubtedly name his pie company “Pie Hole,” or “Pie-destrian,” or “In Your Pie” simply because we demanded he should, in our drunken burger euphoria... He tolerated our company in exchange for the gifted burger that one of my fellow reviewers bestowed upon him. And he liked it. His table mates coveted his burger. They envied his good fortune. They paid us no mind. They were too busy having their own good times. Ain’t we lucky we got ‘em... But like most of our excursions, this was yet another memorable adventure. Not to be confused with our uneventful Austin treasure hunt debacle that will never be discussed, ever again.

My Dag burger and fries was filling and extremely satisfying, until somebody decided we should split milkshakes, which took our dining experience over the gastric edge. This is obviously less of a review than it is my personal burger dining diary, revealing my true burger lusting nature, but if you ask whether you should try Huts or not, I exclaim and emphatic YES! Go now. Don’t turn back. Go on without me. (Ridiculous drama ends here). I am nuts for Huts. It gets a sloppy 10 on my scorecard of beef. And if you go on a Wednesday and have an extra burger lying around, help a good cause, remember that children are our future, find em and feed them, let them lead the way and feed a college student. You won’t regret it.
Timbo

The Burger House built in Amityville

I delayed and stalled, denied my availability, and abstained from attending the Wednesday night burger experience for three weeks straight. I should have made up another excuse to avoid the Burger House burger exploit, but “I will go next week” lost its charm on my fellow burgermates. And how could I muster an excuse when they altered the schedule to accommodate my lazy a__.
First I must preface this review by saying that I have a wheat allergy. Although certain individuals, whom shall remain nameless, do not believe me, and welcome the opportunity to impale me in the chest, a la Pulp Fiction, with my epi-pen, this rare and (often) deadly allergy prevents me from indulging in any bread-related bun products. Therefore, all my burger reviews will be bun-less. For that I am sorry. (At least they are not meatless).
The energy in Burger House was lack luster. The decor nondescript. I ordered an Old Fashioned or a Mary Mary quite contrary naked with a fries and a coke. I should have paid more heed to the stigmata that revealed itself and warned of a cursed burger experience, but I did not. First, Satan taunted me on my reciept, with his $6.66 mark. Then, when I poured my coke from the fountain, a brownish, blood colored liquid curdled from the tap. It tasted like seltzer, but I knew the devil was near. Laughing as she prepared her toxic, odorless disk wedges. She knew I would not resist. Finally, while waiting outside in the dismally (rare) cloudy afternoon, the rattle of a death metal siren farted my order on the bullhorn. Like bullets sputtering, flailing and drowning a name, apparently mine. The disk they served me was bland, even with salt, ketchup, lettuce and tomato. The fries were over peppered and the coke (post fountain repair) was barely consumable... I didn’t even return for my obligated free refill. The only thing I can say positively about Burger House was the company I kept. There is safety from the devil in numbers. We laughed in the face of these artery clogging death disks and their textured blandness, and lived to tell this tall tale.
I can not and will not recommend Burger House because the only thing good about it (the company) is on to another venue, continuing the search for Austin’s Best Burger.
Sincerely,
Oprah

I hate cheese

Yes, the burgers were bad. All bloggers agreed on this. But the grilled cheese? Surely the comfort food of preadolescents and poor college students couldn't be ruined. Surely ...

After ordering my grilled cheese (no veggie burger here) and heading for the quiet patio, a gruff, garbled elecronic (some say devil) voice called out my name, I walked up to the window and picked it up, my own cheesy torture device. Between two toasted buns were three slices of American cheese, stubbornly square and not at all melted. The first bite was dissapointing. It was warm but not hot, soft but not gooey. The cheese had a greasy sheen from the over-buttered bun. I should have known after the first bite to put the sandwich down, but hunger drove me to finish. This was a bad move, something I'd regret later. That cheese danced an evil tribal stomp in my stomach hours after the taste of processed cheese had been pushed out of my memory.

I did like the fries. They were thin (I prefer thick), peppery and crisp -- a huge improvement on the main part of my meal. I'd say that the fries were a redeeming factor, but honestly anything would have trumped the sad excuse of a sandwich.

Burger House = Bad. If your all about good fries, McDonalds would be just as good and you'd get a better meal.

Burger House No Bueno

I ordered the old fashion minus pickles. It was not good. In fact I hated it. It tasted like the hamburgers you get in elementary school. Which were fine when you were 7 years old but as an adult you understand that soy/horse meat are not the way to make a good burger. I didn't even finish my burger. Plus, I had better fries from the frozen food section in HEB. To be fair, Let me say some good things about the place. The all you can pump ketchup outside was nice. The free refills on Coke products were good, but the best thing about the place was devil possessed intercom. At least we had something to laugh about other then the burger. I give The Burger House a 2 out of 10.

Another reason why Dallas sucks

Burger House is a Dallas-based chain that somehow found its way to Austin. Too bad for us.

I ordered a cheeseburger made "old fashioned," which includes mustard, pickles, and onions. I could definitely taste the pickles and mustard, but the burger itself was invisible. I thought this odd until I realized later that the meat was actually a ninja in disguise, hired to assassinate my colon. It nearly succeeded.

I felt sick for fourteen hours after eating this burger. And it wasn't a fluky, bacterial or food poisoning sickness. It was much more sinister. These burgers are up to no good.

On the other hand, the fries were okay, and they did toast the buns, and the bottom bun was nice and crisp. While I enjoyed it at the time, I know now that it was the sleight-of-hand, distraction technique that makes ninjitsu so mysterious and dangerous.

I will not go back to Burger House. I will not recommend it to anyone I know. Unless I've been hired to kill that person.