Pop Burger a Bust

Last Thursday Rob and I headed down to Pier 54 to catch a free Blonde Redhead show. Unfortunately, it rained like hell and after an hour or two of waiting in (I mean "on"... sorry, I'm from Connecticut) line, we were both soaked and starving. I decided to save the day by taking a detour on our way back to the L and veering left on 9th Ave in search of a burger joint I was sure existed, even though I can't remember when I saw it or what made me think it was worth going to.

Fortunately for us, the burger joint in my imagination turned out to be real -- Pop Burger, right between 14th and 15 streets. I must have remembered it from its neon signs promoting "luscious mouth watering warm buns," "creamy shakes" and "sizzling steaks." This is the kind of dumb marketing I always fall for.





Pop Burger has both the layout and the atmosphere of a garage, so after we walked in I grabbed a spot by the counter, as far away from the rain as possible . Rob went up and ordered us two cheeseburgers with grilled onions, an order of fries and a vitamin water. There wasn't a menu displayed -- I guess you have to ask for one special -- but I assumed our order would be standard enough.

Unfortunately for us, we didn't have the foresight to know that regular Pop burgers are fit for midgets and not starving normal sized people soaked in rain. When they finally called Rob's name and I went to pick up our tray, I asked the counter guy "this is supposed to be for both of us?!" without even thinking. The scowl I got back from the cashier was not the face of a pleased man, so I grudgingly took our bland and mini-sized burgers back to our table without further complaint. The fries were ok, they may have been battered before they were fried but there wasn't a whole lot of them to fill in the gaps of our hunger.

I'm still not sure how we were supposed to know it was a mini burger spot. I'm all for mini burgers, as long as they are specified somewhere ahead of time. The smallish burger as a cute replacement for the "O" in the "Pop Burger" logo just doesn't suffice. Also, this whole experience somehow wound up costing us $15 -- crazy!

We went home, dried off and ordered a couple of miso soups to console us after a disappointing evening. Sakura to the rescue!