The Counter Burger

Friday was the last day for one of our coworkers and we wish him the best in his future career plans. To bid him a celebratory farewell, we took the entire team out to lunch at Counter Burger in Marina del Rey. This is a relatively new location in the CPK shopping center, which shares space with SugarFish, Chipotle, and a few other eateries.

Counter can be best described as the antitheses of Father's Office -- you can get your burger your way with any combination of toppings you desire. You take your seat, fill out a Scantron-like form with a small pencil, and hand over to your waiter. Just quickly doing some math with the options and selecting only two toppings, I calculated some 2,073,6oo possible combinations of meat/size/cheese/toppings/sauce/bread. Compare that with ONE option at Father's Office (although you can specify the done-ness of your meat). Anyway, enough with the pre-eat routing, here are a few pics of the finished products:

1/3lb burger with roasted peppers, tomatoes, a fried egg cooked a perfect medium, and regular bun. Mayo on the side.

1/4lb house-made veggie burger with goat cheese, lettuce blend, honey-cured bacon, English muffin, and sweet relish on the side.

I actually had the veggie burger this time after reading other boards and blogs that this was one the best veggie patties in existence. It did not disappoint, and with the goat cheese and honey bacon, it was easily one of the most satisfying burgers I've had, beef or turkey or any protein for that matter. I've had the beef burgers here and they are indeed very good and the Counter cooks will cook them a bit rare if you'd like; I've also had the turkey and I would not recommend it as they are very dry and bland. Truthfully, I have yet to find a turkey burger that can equal or better the Gouda-filled ones I make at home.

Now my all-time favorite burger is still the Father's Office dry-aged prime burger with the usual components of bacon compote, arugula, and stinky Maytag blue cheese, but these are two different venues which in my opinion, fulfill two very different desires. At FO, you take a bow to Sang Yoon and his prized unalterable trophy burger, whereas at Counter you're the one calling the shots and creating your own masterpiece.