Tag Archives: Roadster

Roadster Diner’s Route 66 Burger

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It can’t all be all seriousness all the time, right?

I haven’t had a full-blown burger meal in a long time. After all, the 30+ kilos I lost since January need to be maintained somehow.

But I figured I’d let myself some leeway for only one day and try out the new burger at Roadster Diner, introduced for their 15th anniversary.

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Disclaimer: I do not pretend to understand meat textures, composition, cooking levels and other culinary details I won’t bother looking up to sound sophisticated.

The new Roadster burger comes with their regular coleslaw salad, which I used to normally switch out for Ceasar salad. It also has a side of crunchy fries with a dip that make the meal worth it from the get-go if you feel like splurging on the calories. I really hope they include this upgrade with other burgers later on or introduce it as an addition to the menu.

The burger itself is very different taste-wise from Roadster’s other burgers of which I am a fan. This diner serves my favorite burgers in the country so far. I’m not sure if you hear this often but the Fit ‘N Burger is, in my opinion, one of their best and, at 485 calories, suits those who are on a calories-restricted diet.

With 250g of meat, this is their biggest paddy. It comes with onion, cheddar, the burger sauce and lettuce. The taste is very similar to the burger at Frosty’s palace, if you’ve tried it, except this one is lighter on the pocket. You may find the mixture odd at first but you’ll get used to it from the second bite, be hooked by the third and thoroughly enjoy your meal.

The entire meal is priced at 24,750LL ($16.5). Adding a soft drink to it would bring your bill up to about $20. The meal big enough to satisfy you for a long time (or this could be my diet-used self only).

The waiter and the manager were both very keen to know what I thought of the burger though they had no idea about the dietary composition of it, not that you’d care that much if you’re having it.

If you’re a burger fan, I recommend you give it a try at least once.

P.S.: Prophylactically, you’re welcome.

Crepaway Taking Steps Backwards

I was overly happy when the Batroun branch of Crepaway made a separate non-smoking area for those of us who don’t like to inhale with their burgers.
However, as I visited the place with friends, I found the area filled with people who were smoking. I asked about it and was told that they had removed the non-smoking area for the day. The explanation? they didn’t want the smokers to be placed on a waiting list for the smoking areas.

Excuse me Crepaway if I wanted to dine without the smell of cigarettes and without that awful stench getting stuck on my clothes and lungs. I mean, the emphysema I am most certainly going to acquire in this country cannot really be compared to the ten minutes of wait that a smoker has to endure, right?

In Lebanon, non smokers are figuratively run over by their overly dominant opposites in society. After all, clean air is something you’re not entitled to in a country where finding hookahs in American style diners is very common and even normal and where non-smokers have become a distant minority, squashed in almost rodent-like manner.

And let’s talk about the pricing! Back in December, the natural counterpart for Crepaway in Lebanon, Roadster diner, boosted its prices by a considerable amount, causing my friends and I to lessen our visits to a place that was eating away more and more an already tight budget. In the meantime, Crepaway boosted its prices in a lighter manner and they remained quite acceptable for what was offered.

However, I was surprised during my visit to Crepaway that they had increased their prices yet again. The famous Spielmozzarella is now priced at about 17,000LBP, about $11.33 and a Chicken Escalope platter is almost 20,000LBP (about $13.33), with smaller portions of French fries and coleslaw.

I understand fuel prices are on the rise in the country but I am positive chicken is not getting more expensive and nor is meat and, well, I am not going to a restaurant to dine on 95 Octane fuel while sniffing on the “exquisite” scent of a Marlboro.