5 guys? red Robin?
“Sent out to be heated up”? Like, they take them to some other facility to heat them, and then bring them back to the restaurant? I’m confused.
Frozen raw hamburger patties are sent out in trucks to the BK restaurants from wherever it is frozen hamburger patties are made.
.
The patties are put on a conveyor belt and cooked there (NOT just heated up, I mis-spoke) in a new kind of oven. No ‘flame broiling’ (if there ever was such a thing) is involved, and the taste and texture are different now. That’s all I know, I don’t work there.
I don’t consider them to be fast food. Red Robin definitely isn’t; they’re a sit down place with waiters. But even Five Guys isn’t really fast food in my mind. I would say they fall into the category known as “fast casual” in the restaurant industry, a notch above standard fast food.
A $9.99 burger can be had at “25 Burgers” / “30 Burgers” (the ‘6 Alarm’ is Great!) but it’s still a pricey lunch for ‘fast food’.
As mentioned, 5 Guys is a fast casual place, not fast food. It also isn’t cheap. But it is.
I mean to say that you will pay an arm and a leg for a cheap ass burger. What you are paying for at 5 Guys is extreme customization options. And their fries suck just as bad as In-N-Out, but in a totally different way.
I haven’t been to Five Guys in years, but they were weirdly generous in how many fries you got. They’d put the little packet of fries in a bag and then pour a whole lot more in after that.
I think you know my opinion on this, but I agree with you that In N Out fries absolutely suck, no matter what secret words you try to use to order them. Even slathered animal style, they somehow fail to impress.
OTOH, the only problem I have with 5 Guys fries is they give you too damned much of them. #1 fry in the business by my book (or, let’s just say top tier), but everybody has different expectations of fries, I suppose.
Which is the way they do it at The Hat, but with infinitely better fries. Too bad the Hat doesn’t even make “Regional” in the rankings.
puly - Yep. Everybody has different things they look for in a french fry. To me, 5 Guys fries are nothing but a full bag of greasy starch sticks. As opposed to In-N-Out fries, which are undercooked starch sticks no matter how well-done they cook them.
BK has been cooking frozen patties on a conveyor belt that travels through a “grill” at least as far back as the the 1980s. I think they’ve always used a conveyor belt grill, but I can’t be certain. If you’ve noticed a change in the taste and texture, it’s for some other reason.
I really do like the “25 guys” / “30 guys” burger and what comes with it.
There is one about 10 towns away from me… but it would mean driving on a highway with red-cap Aholes. I need to find out what it takes to set up a Grub-Hub account so that I may have that delivered.
They just opened a 5 Guys in my town, all of 200 yards from In-N-Out. Something tells me a fresh side-by-side comparison test is in order someday soon.
Sometimes… I’d love a 1/4 lb of seafood salad to put on white bread.
Sometimes I’d like a 1/2 pie of pumpkin pie… because nobody likes it but me.
Sometimes I’d like that delivered because I don’t want to be driving that day.
Maybe I am retired…
Sounds like pies come in the convenient two-serving package. I see no reason to complain. Order forth!
I liked the Sonic double cheese burger. The classic was well made and reasonably priced. It came on a larger bun.
Sonic changed their burgers. They’re basically the same now as other chains. They even have a quarter pounder.
Door dash lists the Sonic cheeseburger for $5.72 and the double $7.92. The quarter pound cheeseburger is $3.65. Pretty cheap.
It does seem like Wendys, Sonic , and Dairy Queen all offer a burger similar to McDonald’s.
5 Guys refuses to have 1000 island dressings for their burgers, and besides that, they are not as good. However, the fries are no contest. In & Out does not make the kind of fries I like.
No argument there. Just elsewhere. 
Lots of people agree with you and puly.
I have no confidence in a sample that judges so highly McDonald’s salted cardboard matchsticks.