Smashburger

We went to eat dinner at Smashburger - a new location for this franchise opened near where we live.

Mushroom and Swiss Burger

Mushroom and Swiss burger - The burger patties here were just right; thick but not too thick and filled the bun. It would be hard to go wrong with a mushroom and Swiss and they didn't.  The cheese was nice and melted into the patty and mushrooms gave it that juicy pop of flavor.
As a side with this burger we got Onion petals with sauce. Well when we hear petals, we think of something like a flower that you can grab onto and hold a dip of sauce. We were hoping for something like onion rings, but they need to rename these and call them Onion strings because that is what they were. They were fresh fried onions, kind of like what you get for a green bean casserole topping. These onion petals would make a great burger topping but at as side they didn't cut it. They were hard to pick up with your fingers and even harder with a fork because they were so small that once dipped in to the sauce they either broke or didn't hold the dipping sauce. SKIP this as a side. 

Spicy Baja Burger

Spicy Baja burger - yum! Nick had been gradually increasing his spice tolerance and this was definitely helping that tolerance.  It had a healthy topping of Jalapenos, pepper Jack cheese, spicy chipotle mayo and a chipotle bun.  Nick thought it was a great combo with the coolness of the avocado and the zing of the everything else. We go the signature Smash fries with this order - they were coated in olive oil, rosemary and sea salt. They were very good fries and we would recommend this side for sure. Nick liked these fries a lot more then the over-hyped Truffle fries that every one is pushing these days. The fries were long and slender and crisp. We got a generous portion and liked them much more then the fried onions.

Final thoughts on Smashburger:
Food - good burgers.  We chose burgers off the menu but you can customize your own burger with the toppings you like.  Stay away from the onion side.
Service - You order your food at the counter and the food is brought to you at your table.  All of the staff were almost too friendly. Maybe we got there at a shift change.  We were sitting in a direct path where all the servers came in and out of the kitchen so we were often asked by multiple servers if every thing was ok, which is nice but too much of a good thing can even be bad.
Atmosphere - the restaurant is clean, neat and new.  It will be interesting to see how they fare against home town faves such as Palmer Place and Back alley burger in La Grange. We do like that there is close parking; something that isn't always possible in La Grange.