Five Guys Burger & Fries - $9.17

I recently relocated from Charlottesville, VA. From its beautiful neo-classical architecture, to its completely acceptable night life, to its easy access to real cities, I would never stoop to diminish the greatness of Mr. Jefferson's town. Except when it comes to food.

Charlottesville's dining scene kinda blows. My favorite place to eat there was Wendy's. To be fair, my favorite place to eat in most every city is Wendy's, but there were almost no memorably great places to eat that were not chains. (Though for some reason they had good Thai (which after going to their website I discovered was also a chain) go figure.)

Among those chains people loved so much they pretended it was local was D.C. born burger chain Five Guys. Having lived for a good stretch of time in prime burger country, I have become somewhat of a greasy burger snob. While others would sing the praises of Five Guys to the high heavens, I found it a good, but not great burger. Hell, it wasn't even my favorite burger in Charlottesville.

Regardless, Five Guys continues its relentless spread West and has now opened a location in Austin. A fellow Wahoo and I recruited a group of people to sample the Five Guys goodness. As one of the group was quick to notice, the business model is essentially In-N-Out Burger East.

You can't help but wonder what will happen when these two old-fashioned-modern burger titans clash (likely somewhere in New Mexico).

As always at Five Guys, the burger was good, but not mind blowing, the Cajun fries were tasty, but too plentiful, and the overall meal was good, but too expensive.

All that being said, it was a delight to get to enjoy a small slice of C-Ville and as Five Guys has grown from two stores to 1,000 in six years (that sounds wrong), they must be doing something right (or illegal...same diff).