Stripburger

There's a need on the Strip for places like Stripburger.

Actually, I have a sneaking suspicion that Stripburger was born of need, necessity being the mother of invention and all that. It's adjacent to sister tapas restaurant Cafe Ba Ba Reeba, and shares the latter's kitchen (and indeed is even sort of subtitled, "at Cafe Ba Ba Reeba").

And while I haven't gotten confirmation of this from the powers-that-be at Lettuce Entertain You, which owns both restaurants (as well as a few others in town), it seemed to me that Cafe B's menu, stellar at the start, had been dumbed down over the past couple of years, presumably in response to the Strip hordes who just couldn't get their minds around tapas and paella. Voila! Stripburger, and what seems to be a resurgence in the quality of Cafe B's menu. Could be just coincidence.

At any rate, what Stripburger brings to the party is burgers on the Strip -- good burgers, at good prices, which are more rare in our tourism corridor than you might think.

Stripburger is kind of an anomaly in other ways. It's strictly open-air, amounting to little more than an elevated covered patio on the north corner of Fashion Show mall. There are heaters for the winter and misters for the summer but guests are exposed to the Strip in all its glory, be that traffic noise, the hubbub of the passing crowds or some poor shlep trying to hail a cab and getting really frustrated when one won't just stop in the middle of the street for him.

The front section of the restaurant is circular, with tables around its outer perimeter and a circular bar in the center and extremely loud music of a somewhat peculiar all-things-to-all-people mix. And as you might expect in keeping with the party-all-the-time spirit of the Strip, drinks are a big draw; here a 32-ounce raspberry mojito is actually a reality, and the Fat Tire Amber Ale on draft ($4.95 for 16 ounces, $9 for 32) hit the spot. And where else can you add a shot of Kahlua ($6.95) to a thick, soda-shop-worthy chocolate shake ($3.95)?

As for the food, it's pretty straightforward, in keeping with the spirit not of the Strip but of a basic burger place. Our Famous Blue Burger ($8.95) was your basic blue-cheese, onion-string-topped rendition, though better than most in part due to the fact that it's made with never-frozen fresh-ground beef. (Then again, so are the burgers at In-N-Out, and they're not $8.95. Then again, In-N-Out doesn't have a front-row view of the Strip.) We also were able to get it medium-rare, despite the fact that the menu said all burgers are prepared medium, so remember that it pays to ask.

Sides are extra (but the burgers are pretty big, so sides really are optional) and we tried the fries and onion-string combo ($5.50), with the fries being basic fries but the onion strings delicate, crisp and sweet. We also had some pickle fries ($3.50), which were nice and crisp but overly salty. Somebody in the kitchen needs to remember that pickles are salty to start with.

And a chicken sandwich, which is something we'd expect to be pretty good in a burger joint. Actually, it was the Hickory Chicken Sandwich ($8.95), and the menu description that referred to "hickory-smoked sauce" should have been our first clue, because no, there was not even a pretense of barbecue here. In fact, the chicken tasted like it had been simply topped with the sauce (and bacon and some onion strings) after it was cooked, which meant the meat itself had very little flavor.

Also lacking was the service. Oh, our waitress was great, but it took so long to get our food we were ready to start chewing the linen napkins -- which, by the way, were a nice touch in so casual a place. The main reason we didn't try one of the restaurant's baby cakes is that we didn't want to wait again.

Then again, maybe we just weren't in tourist mode. If ever there's a place to sit and gawk at the goings-on on the Strip, this is it.

Las Vegas Review-Journal reviews are done anonymously at Review-Journal expense. Contact Heidi Knapp Rinella at 383-0474 or e-mail her at hrinella@ reviewjournal.com.