Fine Dining - The Burger Den (Denny's) Ghost Kitchen Review (or: Saved by the Claw Machine)

Episode Date: March 25, 2026

🍔👻 The Burger Den (Denny's?!): We Ate INSIDE a Ghost Kitchen… and It Felt Illegal 👻🍔 Ansley Layne (@spookyfoodie) and I return to paranormally investigate The Burger Den, except…we're now criminals. Eating inside the Denny's, being served like it was completely normal, despite the Burger Den being take-out only?? My stars!! Our waitress actually served us despite not expecting a tip (which she DID receive), the food ranged from "dad cooked this" to "please stop cooking," and there was a claw machine full of absolute nonsense. 🍔 Wake & Bacon Burger and the Double the Fun Burger (But Not Actually That Burger) 🍟 Wavy Fries That Get Worse…and Worse…and Worse 🧅 Onion Rings That Save the Food Somewhat 🥤 Oreo & Strawberry Shakes ❓ The Mystery of the All-American Sauce Remains UNSOLVED 🚽 A Bathroom So Bad Ansley Refuses to Participate 👩‍🍳 Unexpected Table Service at a "Takeout-Only" Dining Concept 🪟 Transparent Ad Screens That Feel Like Sci-Fi 🧸 Claw Machine with Italian AI Brain Rot Plushies (including the Legendary Tire Frog) 💬 COMMENT BELOW: Would YOU eat inside a ghost kitchen if you technically weren't supposed to? 📢 SUPPORT THE SHOW & JOIN THE COMMUNITY: 🎉 Patreon (Bonus episodes, extended Yelp segments & more): patreon.com/finediningpodcast 💬 Discord (Food talk, memes, cursed Yelp): discord.gg/6a2YqrtWV4 🎥 Watch full episodes: youtube.com/channel/UCLbraNhL6KhDPkdSWt2yiuw 🔗 All links: linktree.com/finediningpodcast 🎤 Guest: Ansley Layne | IG: @spookyfoodie Patreon Producers:Sue Ornelas & Joyce Van Patreon Subscribers:David Ornelas, Kellie Baldwin, Jeremy Horwitz, Herbert Amaya, Simone Davalos, Scott Bennett, Amy Reinhart, Josef Castaneda-Liles, & Travis Langley Free Patreon Followers:Joe Warszalek, Lauren Cummings, Grace Krainak, Keri Estes, Robert Duran, Patrick Elliott, Michelle Elmer, Dave Plummer, Nicholas Volney, Michael Gerard, Tracy Molino, Phuong Duong, Tyler Robinson, Brandon Gully, Mason Cruz, Michael Milito, Mez, Aaron Hubbard, Steff, Robert McLaughlin, Jewell Hermann, Renae Michael, Crystal C. 👉 NEXT WEEK: I dive into the history of Torchy's Tacos with my mom.

Is the Denny's burger-centric ghost kitchen worth ordering from? The service staff chose to serve us despite not technically being allowed to dine in, but the hash browns in the burger made me drier than a pile of sand. I love a classic backyard dad burger, but I felt like I was breaking the law by eating Denny's ghost kitchen food inside of a Denny's. The onion rings were a surprisingly great side, but the claw machine had some of the most Sid from Toy Story prizes I've, ever seen. Like the rule breakers we are, we actually ate the burger den, the incorporeal manifestation

of Denny's aspirations to enter the hamburger game inside of Denny's. It was the restaurant equivalent of smearing guts on ourselves to blend in as we walk through a horde of zombies. And I know this is about ghosts, but zombies are way better because no Tinder date has ever zombieed me. Is it possible for a burger to be great and made by Denny's? Stay tuned. This is the Fine Dining podcast. Your table's ready, take your seat, the flavor of the day is mediocrity. Wouldn't you like to try a buy? Ever feel like car shopping is designed to make you second guess yourself?

Is this a good price? Am I making the right choice? With car gurus, you don't have to wonder. You get deal ratings, price history, and dealer reviews without the surprises. So you can shop with confidence. Buy your next car gurus at car gurus.ca. Cargooros.ca to make sure your big deal is the best deal. That's C-A-R-G-U-R-U-S dot CA.

Hello, and welcome back to fine dining, the quest to compare all restaurants to Chili's. I am your host, Michael Ornellis, and this is the podcast that discovered Chili's is the most mediocre restaurant in America. Is a place good or bad? Well, we can only know by pitting it against the master of the triple dipper. By the end of this very episode, we will answer the question. question everyone had after each and every paranormal activity movie, is the Burger Den

Better Than Chili's? We found a Denny's whose manager let us eat this ghost kitchen meal in the Denies, thus defeating the entire purpose. Today, we're going to tell you everything that was good, not good, and just there, about our meal at the Burger Den before we give it a score at the end of the episode. And joining me to chat about this meal is a content creator who travels to cover restaurants and bars that are alleged to be haunted, highlighting the importance of history in education while helping small businesses in the process.

She's seen ghosts since she was eight years old, so the ending of the sixth sense was so obvious to her. It's Anzley Lane. Hey. Hello. We just ate at the burger den. We ate at the burger. We ate at the burger den. Like, we actually ate at the burger than.

We found the den. The fact that there was like an obstacle to eat there. You had to ask the manager if you could eat that food that. they made in that kitchen if we could eat in the restaurant. Yeah. Which is so freaky. Which is, it's weird, right? That's weird.

Yeah. I do want to say, I like, I like the name. Spooky food. No, the, I mean, yes, yes, as well as the burger den. Yes. Denny's. The. Oh.

It's not bad. Oh. That makes sense. Yeah, no, that's smart. Yeah. And then the melt d'enny's, yes. They should call it the melt den, but... Right.

Because that's their grilled cheese thing. And I've had the meltdown before. Yeah. And it's literally the Grands sandwich. Oh, like even like with the hash brown. Yeah. Like the moon's over my hammy, all of that. It's literally that, the meltdown.

Yeah. Yeah, I appreciate a good pun. So that's it. The meltdown. I've got to say, my brain thinks in puns, and I hate that I do it. Like I hate every time I make a pun. I know. I do it too

And it's it's sad I'm like why do you why are you like that I look in the mirror and I scream Why are you like this? Why did you say that? I'm like the mom and the Babaduke yelling at her kid like why can't you be different? Yeah

Yeah. All right yeah let's uh There were a few things that we liked here So let's just go ahead and jump into talking about Everything and only the things that were good This is good Don't like it should be There stuff that's fake licking or sticking the land in there

I have had so many things shift in my notes. And the reason they shifted is because I kept eating. It was like something made a first impression that was like, oh, okay. And then you eat it after the temperature's gone down a little bit. And now it's like, oh, this moved down a section. As time went by, like the food got colder and it just started to taste so different. And it like, it never got cold. Like, it only was ever room temp.

And even still, the quality drop-off was a cliff. It was a 180. Yeah. It was a sheer drop. So I thought the burger was in the good at first. Right. At first. So did I.

And so I'm going to do something unprecedented. We're going to review this food in a few different sections. I think this has layers. Yeah. This experience was layered. It was complex. It was complex. Yes.

The bun was solid the whole time. I liked the bun. I liked the bun. It had like those little ridges. It looked like pretzel bread without being pretzel bread. It looked like hollow bread, but it wasn't. Yeah. It was like, but it was soft, which is what I liked.

And it wasn't too bready. And it was a little yeasty, which I love that. Yeah, it's like a potato roll kind of vibe. I don't know, something like that. It was good. It stayed good. So for that, I applaud the burger den. Right.

I got the Wake and Bacon Burger. Yes. Great name. Another pun. Fantastic. Another pun. Genius. My first note said, this was solid.

And I'll read what comes next in a different section. The egg was also good. I got an over medium egg in it. Yes. It was ready to burst. It was messy. It was ready to burst. It was bursting at the seams as soon as it hit the table.

Yeah. The yolk. I had a fascinating moment where I was like, I lifted the top bun off. And I saw the like top of the egg skin stick to it. And it was like, I'm ready to break. I'm so ready to break. Push me, sir. Please.

Just give me a gentle squeeze. Put me out of my misery. Yeah. And then its brains went all over the place. Yeah. Yes. But it was tasty. I love kind of like that over medium, you know, messy egg experience. Good for kind of like dipping the side of the burger into when you want more.

Yes. It also makes the bread softer. Yeah. But apparently not the hash browns. What's a what's a good thing you have noted? I did like it felt like a backyard dad burger vibe. Yeah. Biting into that first bite, it felt like I was transported to like my sixth birthday or a pool party and my dad's cooking burgers. Yeah. You know. that's how it tasted. Yeah. It brought me back to that feeling. So that was cool.

It was like nostalgic. I felt like I could smell grass stains while eating it. Literally. You're at the park. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So that was nice about it. But then it shifted later on.

It started to taste different, but we'll get into that, I guess. Yeah, I will say, you took the first bite and you were the one who conveyed to me this tastes like a backyard burger. Now, oftentimes people will make a comparison. My least favorite one is this tastes like plastic. Right. Or this tasted like cardboard. No, it's a texture of cardboard. Sure.

Nothing ever tastes like cardboard. Nothing ever tastes like cardboard. And so people speak hyperbolically. People make comparisons that I often don't see the same as the, you know, it's subjective. Right. As soon as I took the bite, I was like, this is literally someone brought their, or they got the rental grill at the park. Yeah. It really tasted like that vibe, which, yes, nostalgic is a great word for it. It's not the best burger, but they're not bad. They're not bad. It's like, it's very comforting.

And whenever I would smell that at a park, I'd be like, oh, I want that right now. Yeah. Specific type of burger. I would also say, I need that smell to feel like I got the park experience. Yes. Even if I'm not eating. Yeah. I have to smell it somewhere. If I'm there to do a raid for Pokemon Go, I still want to smell a burger patty. You know? Even when I'm going to go, even when I'm going for meditation. Like, I have to clear my mind by smelling that. These are the different ways that we live our lives. Meditation, Pokemon, Go. But we still have to smell the burger. You got to smell beef. And it has to be a dad with like four kids. Yes. If I see a woman near that, girl. There was a dad in the kitchen today. 100%. We went back there and we were like, please, what pictures do you have in your wallet? He was like, my kids. Yes, yes. You're the one. No, but my burger was

called double the fun. Yeah. Which it was another pun. It was a double cheeseburger. Yeah. And this had double the misrepresentation. Yes. In that the burger you received did not match the picture nor the description.

Which is so fitting and so on brand for a ghost kitchen. And for a Denny's. You're right. Sorry. Let's backtrack. It's both. The Venn diagram of Denny's. And Ghost Kitchen, this is the overlap in the middle.

The pattern's the same. Getting the wrong order. Yeah. But just advertising it differently is weird. Yes. Because it was supposed to be caramelized onions, American cheese, and beef, and all-American sauce. All-American sauce. Did not get the all-American sauce.

Did not get the caramelized onions. Yeah. But I got, I got no sauce. I got red onions, lettuce, and pickles. So we decided to look at the actual Denny's menu. Yeah. We brought it over. We were like, okay.

And they actually just gave me their double cheeseburger recipe. Right. That is not on the Burger Den menu. It's on the Denny's menu. Right. And I would say because we're talking about only good things, it brought me joy to be like, of course Denny's messed this up. Exactly. Like it wasn't, it didn't ruin the day.

No. It was kind of like this is part of the charm. Yes. Of doing a DoorDash order in a restaurant. Yeah. It was thrilling. It was thrilling. It was fun.

Like, it's so hard to categorize it as good or not good. But ultimately, I'm going not good, but I did enjoy it. Yes. The diner vibes, I thought were good. Love a Denny's diner vibe. Yeah. I will always love a mom and pop diner vibe better. Always.

Always. But this isn't bad. No, it's not bad. It's just Denny's is everywhere. And if you have to go to the Denny's, you'll go to the Denys. Yeah. And you'll still feel like you're being comforted and taken care of. I think part of it is, like,

like the open face kitchen. Yeah. I love being able to look in and be like, oh, I can see that there's like, yes, they're working their magic back there. The neon signage. Yeah. You know. The cursive font. Yeah. And I like that Denny's too. There's some Denny's that the architecture is not like, you know, it's kind of like basic. But the architecture at that North Hollywood locations, very nostalgic. It's really cool. Yeah. Yeah. I liked it in there. The open windows. And based on the shape of the building, like the literal architecture, this feels like it was built to be a Denny's. This didn't feel like a Denny's moved into another thing that closed.

Exactly. Yeah. Now, another decor thing, there were signs at the front right when you walk into the right. And it was like, you know, fresh. And it was like a picture of like pancakes and eggs or whatever. Yes. My favorite one just said here.

And it looked like it was just like. It was the cityscape of downtown Los Angeles. At like sunset or something. In the Sepia like filter. And I'm just like, what does this mean? I don't know. And I think it's, that's the text you send somebody when you've arrived at Denny's. Here, like you're impatiently waiting on your friends to arrive.

Yes. Here. Yeah. Get here faster, please. It's nothing exciting either because you're at Denny's. You're just like, here. Do I want to win a tire frog or do I want to just sit here? It was, those pictures were interesting because half of those pictures.

looked like something you'd see at an early 2000 subway with like the ingredients everywhere. Yeah. And then the other part looked like at the beginning of Instagram when people would just take like pictures of random things with random filters. That's just how it looked. To me it looked like, you know those motivational posters with like the black border? And it would say like passion and then like a little quote underneath it about like, yeah.

That's the vibe I got from it. Yeah. Live, laugh, love. Yeah. I wouldn't have been surprised if they had that the cat that was like, in there. Yeah, dangling. We did see a cat.

We did. In a backpack. In a backpack. And the guy was also walking a dog. And he walked over to the front of the day. I peeped this guy while I'm, you know, facing the door. Yep. And I'm like, oh my God, we have a cat in a backpack.

It's about to come. No. He is not about to come. This guy is too good to come to this Denny's. And I'm not saying that he thinks he's too good. good. I'm saying he knows he's too good and I do too. Yeah. No, it was a knowing. There's no fault. There's no fault here. There's no judgment. There's no, oh, look at this guy. No. What he did was he walked over to the trash can in front of the benches outside the Denny's and threw

away, presumably, a bag of dog shit. And then continued his walk. And I'm like, yeah, that's what this is for. This is what this is for. And then we were sitting there like, why didn't we do that? Like, oh, well, unfortunately, I wasn't carrying a bag of shit with me. I usually do, but today I left it at home. Well, speaking of my bathroom experience. Oh, no. Which I guess we'll get into the bad. Yes.

What else was good, though? I have the milkshakes. I have the onion rings. And I have the server. So I actually have quite a bit and good. Right. The server was awesome. She checked on us many times.

Didn't have to serve us. Didn't have to. Like, we did a DoorDash order and we're like, can we eat in here? And I'm sure in her mind, she's like, really they're not going to tip me right we tipped her we tipped her we tipped her we took her we look we're we're good we're food people yes we're gonna take care of you yeah we appreciate you and i don't even need you to be nice but she was yeah she went above and beyond no you got to tip your restaurant workers yeah so the fact that like she came by and uh multiple times made sure our order was good

made sure to bring out our milkshakes before the whole order was ready because she could tell that we were just wanting something or whatever. She was very nice. So she's absolutely in the good category. Yeah. And I liked the onion rings. Yeah, go off about the onion rings. It wasn't like the gourmet, like fancy restaurant style onion rings where it's like really

Yeah, the beer battered. Yeah, the beer battered. Like I don't like the beer battered. I don't like it when they're like too soft and then it just falls and then like you're just eating the wet onion on the inside. Yeah. I like it when they're like a little harder like the. And it's just.

You have to break through the breading. Yes. And it's a, it was a very nostalgic onion ring. It's an onion ring that I've had a thousand times, but that's the onion ring that I expect to have when I order onion rings. And that's how I feel about mozzarella sticks too. Yeah. You want it to be harder? Yeah, a little like crappier.

For some reason in my own. A little crappier. Sure. And I do like those, like nicer onion. Like, I like a softer. I do totally agree that, like, there needs to be enough breading that, uh, not even just the soft wet onion being the thing that goes in your mouth first, but also it can scald you.

Yes. So like I hurt. I need the breading there for like temperate protection. Your fingers burn. It's like, okay, this is not battered enough. Yeah. And so those you have to kind of like wait to cool off, but then they can get greasy really fast and soft.

So like there's a sweet spot on when to eat those. But if you get them in that sweet spot, they're great. Yeah. This is a safer bet onion ring. And it was good. I went eight out of ten on this onion ring. I did too. Yeah.

It was a good onion ring. It was a great onion ring. I guess we'll present them. We did bring some of them. Present. All right. And then I have the milkshakes. I have both of the milkshakes in the good, mildly.

Mildly. I don't think these are like excellent milkshakes. You could go way better. on a milkshake, but these were still tasty. Yeah, they were fine. Like, I didn't have a problem with them. That's all I'll say. You got a strawberry shake, which I had a brief sip of.

And then I got the Oreo milkshake. My main note is that they were too thin. Yes, they were too thin. I want a thicker milkshake. Always. And then, like, the whipped cream seemed like it was fresh whipped cream. And then as it kind of like melted into the thing, it was like, oh. That was ready whip.

It was a front, much like the Burger Den itself. The, yeah, the burger done. Yeah. So I went six and a half out of ten on the Oreo milkshakes, six out of ten on the strawberry. Okay. Yeah, I was six, six on the strawberry. Yeah. Sure.

Do you have anything else in the good? The claw machine. I like the diabolical claw machine filled with all of those strange brain rot stuffed animals. I thought, I mean, I put it in the not good, but it was also insane in like a whoever did this is crazy. I just loved it. There was a frog that had a tire. as a body. Yeah. It was just a frog's head, a tire, not donut towards you, like the edge of the tire forward. Yes. I think those might be the Italian brain rot animals. Do you know what I'm talking about?

Oh, there's Italian brain rot that's like super popular with like Gen Alpha like the kids. And it's like all these, it's all these AI generated animals that have like weird bodies. I think it's a part of that. I liked. They also head like a hammerhead shark with legs and tennis shoes on. Yes. But the legs weren't like two down here. It was like one coming out of its chest and one coming out of its tail. So like the placement on these two legs was insanity. It is like it almost is like AI generated.

Yeah. Animals. Yeah. It was interesting. I was I was here for it. I was here for it. I loved. I wanted the frog.

We tried to get the frog. We tried to get the frog. We had one one shot, one opportunity. And it didn't have. capture. We let it slip. Marshall Mathers, 2003. It was upsetting. Yeah. But I think after this podcast, genuinely, I think I'm going to go back.

You're welcome to come try with me. I really believe that we should try again. We got to rescue the frog. Okay, we did talk about it. After the podcast, Anzley and I did go back to Denny's and went to the claw machine and I got the tire frog. You can see it here, and I will be adding it to the Chotchky of mediocrity. All right. We're going to jump into talking about everything that's not good.

This is not so good. I'm not quite sure about. It could have done without it. Something brings down the... We had to break the law of social norms. Ordering a DoorDash order for pickup and then, you're like, um, actually we'll eat it here because you can't go to a physical burger den? Yeah.

Felt insane. It was, the vibes were off. I called yesterday to ask the manager. Hypothetically, if I order it to go order, but then decide I want to eat it there, can we do that? And he was like, yeah, if we have a table. I also asked for a manager right away and I think I put him on the back foot. Yeah. Because he probably assumed I was like, call.

calling to complain about something. Right. Yeah. But also it's like, it's weird that we feel like we have to ask. Yeah. Like, it's weird. I don't know. There's something about it.

Like, if we just walked into that Denny's just to have Denny's, we'd be feeling like, oh, this is a regular Tuesday. Right. But we felt hesitant to approach the waitress and be like, hey, can we eat this here? It was strange. It's just like weird. Well, I've also been to places where they say, no, you can't. Right.

So I'm like scarred from past damage, you know? I'm hurt. Hurt people, hurt people. And today we hurt that Denny's by breaking their rules. Yes. Because we've been hurt before. Or at least I have. It's just a, it's a strange reality that I didn't realize until doing that just now.

Yeah. It's odd. But it also felt like we were getting one over on The Man. Yes. Like if this was a mom and pop, I would feel like, I'm kind of taken advantage of them. The fact that it's Denny's, I feel like I won a battle. Exactly. And it did feel like we were doing something sneaky, like and rebellious. Like, this is against the law.

I was a teenager again today. Yeah. That's how I felt too. Yeah. And it's not good that that's the thing. But I liked the rush. Watch this become my new addiction. This guy orders to go orders, but then he eats them there. They make like an MTV true life about it.

me. Interview every Denny's manager, every restaurant manager. Yeah, he calls the day before every single time to make sure he can. To make sure he can. And then he just does it anyways. And it's like, but we told him that that he could. So I don't know why he gets the rush of breaking the law because he pre-approved it. Cut to you being like.

Yeah. Like a hamburger pose or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. So that's just a thing. We are hamburglers in this. the situation. We are.

So. Oh, quite literally. We look like children in bandit masks. And we wore like we wore like weird Zorro hats. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. Looking at my notes, I wrote the sentence, Denny's makes a promise it will never keep.

And I want to attack that. Because I don't know what that meant. We were talking about it. It was like the vibe, right? you go into Denny's and you're like, okay, it's going to be good this time. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You walk in, you're like, I'm going to be taken care of.

Like, thank God. And then you leave like disappointed. Yes. Oh, okay. I remember what I said. I was like, Denny's is like the dad who's like this year. I promise I'll come to your birthday. I'll be at your birthday this year.

I swear, kid, work won't keep me this time. And then, you know, September 20th rolls. around it's six days till my birthday. I'm like, hey, dad, my party's on Saturday. Are you coming? And he's just like, look, buddy, I wanted to. But Bernard's in town for a conference. And I have, you know, I haven't seen Bernardson's college. You don't mind, buddy. That's how it feels. That's how Denny's feels. I wrote down, it's your situation ship telling you they're going to change. Yeah. And they never do. I'll commit, you know. And they never do. Yeah. Yeah. That's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's. just Denny's.

Yeah. You want it to be good. And like, here's the craziest part. You walk away with an immediate, like, why don't I go to Denny's? But give us two weeks. We'll be back. Someone will mention Denny's. And you'll be like, oh, yeah, Denny.

Like, why do the bad experiences get a pass in our mind? I don't know. When it's nothing but bad, or at least mediocre experiences. It's always been mediocre, but every time I just want to go back. And I'm like, oh, thank God. I don't know. I don't know. It's like a weird inception type thing.

Like you, it's like severance. It is. You have an iny in a Denny. You have a Denny. And a ditty. And a doughty. You have a ditty and a doughty. When you're in Denny's, you're experiencing the bullshit.

And then you leave and you're like, oh, yeah, Denny's. Right? It's literally severance. It's literally severance. I don't know what they're doing, but they're doing something. That's so good. What do you have it? Not good.

Well, I wanted to try the caramelized onions and the All-American sauce. Which didn't happen. What is it? I wanted to know what all-American sauce meant. Probably Thousand Island. That was what you hypothesized. Assuming it was Thousand Island, which it probably would be. Kind of like an in-and-out sauce.

Maybe it was like a ketchup mayo hybrid. Like a fry sauce, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Something like that. But didn't get to try that. It was a little bummed, but it was fine. Your French fries.

Okay. The visual of them, I don't, it's just mismatched. It was strange. The crinkly. Yeah. So they called these wavy cut fries, which, okay, I guess. It just felt like a straight fry, like, fell and got stepped on and then was put back on your plate. It just has like a crease in the middle.

Yeah. It had like one or two creases in the middle. Right? Yeah. It felt like a collection of different fries from other places all put on your plate. Like they just went on to the managers like the floor of his Nissan Maximar or something. It was just like, oh, that was my McDonald's last week and like just collected. Yes.

And it was like, that's how it felt to me. Yeah. And at the end of the, at the end. of it all. They were so hard. Yeah. When they got fully cold. So the burger was one where I moved it from the good to the just there. The fries are something that I moved from the just there upon my initial visit to not good. And so what a fast drop off. This is a thing where like I had a fry, you had a fry and we're like, oh, not bad. Right. And then five minutes, 10 minutes passed. I have another fry and I'm just like, excuse me, excuse me, miss. I know I'm, I know you don't know me.

Yeah. Might I trouble you to try this again. I'm not doubting your initial opinion, but I think you'll have a new one now and you have it. And it was hard again. It was just, it just changed. It changed. And then another 10 minutes go by and I'm like, oh, excuse me, miss. Yeah. I know you thought it couldn't get worse before. But it does. But it has. And for that reason, I brought a couple of fries to go. And I just, I want to know what the floor is on these.

I really do. I want to know how bad these can get. I really want to know how bad it gets. The second bite, the one that was just 10 minutes in. Yeah. It was so chalky. Right. Ooh, I smell this container, which, you know, I'm not going to, I'm not going to say.

This smells like room service when you leave it. Right. All night. And then you wake up the next morning. You're like, that's that smell. Because there's no fridge in your. room. So take one of the fries.

Oh. I just. Oh, you went full ketchup. Cheers. Cheers. This is probably going to be way worse. This is to censor the unpleasant sounds of chewing. This tastes like.

This is to censor the unpleasant sounds of chewing. Like a metallic. Crayola. Like a silver crayon. This is to censor the. Unpleasant sounds of chewing. I don't even have words. It's just so like, what's that?

This is an actual. Graney. I don't know what that. Yeah, I think grainy works. Shockey. This is actually stealing all of the moisture, not just from my mouth, but from my body. I can, you know how we are like 80% water or whatever it is? I am now 60% water.

My mouth is drying up. Yeah. It's not a good fry. It is not. It never was. I don't want to finish this. And that was the remnant of his, bacon. Oh yeah. This is the

the wake and bacon burger with a fried egg. Oh, God. Can you just touch the bun? Why is it slimy now? You know, when you it's the scene in Titanic where the handprint on the car it's that amount of condensation on this burger. That's wrong. That's what that is. But that's what happened with the burger for me too

is as the time went on, at the end, it completely changed flavor for me. Yeah. I don't know how or why. That usually doesn't happen to me at most places. No, usually food is like a consistent thing unto itself. Right. And this was just, this hadn't reached its final form yet, and its final form is worse. It's so weird.

This is like if Charmander was the most powerful one. Exactly. You wanted it at the beginning. By the time it's Charzard, it's just like, it's like falling apart. Yeah, and it's like, I can't take this. It has one wing. Yeah. Yeah.

I found that so interesting. What else was bad? Oh, the bathroom, which it doesn't, I don't have to get into so many details about the bathroom because obviously, like, it's about the food. It's about the experience. But I believe any bathroom is still a part of a restaurant experience. I do think that the way they keep their bathroom is reflective of the quality of sanitation they have for their kitchen.

Oh, well, that's really, really. really good to know. You look like you just went to Vietnam in your eyes. The flashbacks that I've had from really bad food poisoning experiences. You walk in there, it's a dungeon. It's dark. It's, it's metal and darkness. That's about it. Like, it's underground. Like, it's not actually underground. I just feels, it just feels like, it's a bunker. It feels like that. It was just total vibe shift. I was like, whoa. And I was like, but I've been in really bad bathrooms before. So it's fine. I can do it. Couldn't do it. I texted you. Immediately, I said horrifying.

Yes. Because it's the type of bathroom that they clean the toilet seat, but they don't clean like the... Anything else. The toilet part behind the toilet seat. Yeah. So there's just explosive diarrhea remnants on there. And I couldn't do it. Yeah.

I put down the cover and I was about to. And then I just saw it and I was like, I'm going to leave. I think I'll be better off not. Yeah. Yeah. And there's diapers in there. So I was just goodbye. If I pissed my pants now, I think I would be happier than experiencing.

Yes. Yeah. It would be in a cleaner environment for sure. Right. My own laundry. Right. Yeah, you are your own quality of cleanliness. Exactly.

And it is a higher standard. Yes. So, yeah, the bathroom part was the only like bad thing. Yeah. Everything else was like, fine. Oh, I'm going to put this in the not good. You can't customize your food in the app because we did. it on DoorDash and I didn't want cheese on my burger. And it literally has a thing where it's like

specifications. Yep. And you click on it. And the only specification it gives is if your order isn't available or your item isn't available, how do you want them to proceed? Call you, cancel the order, replace with another item or refund or what, you know, whatever. Right. And that doesn't make sense because every single place should have a customized option. A customized option. There's a weird one. My favorite sandwich place near me, I can't order on DoorDash because DoorDash requires pepper and chinis to be added to a sandwich that it just doesn't belong on. Like you can't unselect it. And so, and the sandwich doesn't otherwise come with it. Right. But for some reason, the way their DoorDash is set up, it's like adding this thing. And then they don't have like a note section to like add custom stuff. That's another thing. I feel like. People can get away with a lot now with delivery food. Like they can forget ingredients. They can, you know, they can be a little lazier with your food.

A lot of the time, most of the time, my order gets screwed up or there's something wrong. It's out the door. It's out of mind. It's no longer their responsibility, which it should be. Yes. But it's not. Yeah. And then, oh my God, I have never been closer to just kind of like screaming into like a void.

when like you get dropped off a postmate order. I had to quit the delivery apps just because of how angry I would get. It's a different kind of anger. That you can't call the driver that just dropped off your food to say, hey, I think you gave me someone else's food. It's not even from the restaurant I got. You're going to have two people with messed up orders. And you were here 30 seconds ago.

And I can't reach you. it's so crazy it's it makes me crazy it makes me go insane and like i have a pretty slow temper same i can put up with a lot and be like i'm like who cares you know i don't find a lot to be like truly livid about but bad customer service communication availability yeah is like the number one thing especially when you're paying, you're waiting, and it comes to food. Yeah. Food is important. Yeah.

It's an important part of your day. Of course, you're going to get mad. Yeah. I do too. And then postmates is like, oh, we can just, we'll give you 10% off your next order. Sorry about that. I'm like, no, I want all my money back. I want you to comp this order that I'm mad.

I'm not going to eat or I'm going to give to somebody else. It didn't solve the issue that I had that led to me ordering food in the first place, which is I'm hungry and I want this thing. Yeah. You know? But yeah, just bad. customer UI. I remember I pre-ordered a PlayStation 5 during the pandemic. I'm immune compromised. I'm not like I didn't want to go into a store or anything to pick up my PlayStation. And I about had a panic attack because I pull into the parking spot where it's like, oh, you can call in and have them bring it out. And they're like, oh, well, you picked online that you would pick it up in store. There's no way for us to bring it out there. And I'm like, what do you mean? mean there's you know I ordered it I can confirm I can show you ID I have the the email and you

have people walking stuff that that thing to people's cars oh my God and by the way I did pick curbside right and then got an email that they defaulted it back to in store at a point but like that whole conversation that I had with them of like sorry we can't was with a person who was walking another person's order to their car because calling that Best Buy just took you to like the centralized Best Buy call center. There was no way to talk to that store. And I'm just like, that is crazy because that's always how it used to be. So there was a conscious choice to cut that from the process.

Yep. I deleted all of Postmates and all that kind of stuff because somebody stole my food, like one of the people working. Oh, the driver? Yeah. It was like $130 with the food. I couldn't get in contact with the customer service. It's horrible. Yeah.

And then, I mean, finally the next day, but like going a whole night, no food and like $130. Like in the whole. Yeah. I was just like, I'm done with this. Like, I should have just walked outside and gone to McDonald's. Yeah. Jeez, like this is dumb. The boldest thing I've had happened on DoorDash or Postman.

I forget which one it was. But on one of those apps, the driver, you know how they do like the picture of like it's at your doorstep? It was of the past. passenger floor of his car. That's exactly what happened to me. They sent the picture of it still in their car, which I'm just like, you're making a record of it. I know.

And I think it's them being like, well, the company's not going to ever investigate this hard. They're not going to know if I like just did it and then dropped it off to you. They can get away with it. Yeah. It's crazy. Anyways, that was a tangent that I feel was necessary. It was necessary because it pertains to this whole culture. Oh, yeah.

So I did walk in and go, can I get my burger without cheese? and they were like, oh yeah, let me run to the kitchen and like tell them. And they took care of it. But it was still way more involved than it needed to be. You know, just put. She had to physically chase down the dad. The backyard dad in the back. Because it was actually, it was her dad.

He was the one cooking. He's the communal Denny's dad. He's the communal. He's the DD. Oh, and then, yeah, I mentioned the fries, fell to the not good. And then after what I just had. I'm going to go even lower. I wrote it as a 2.8 from my last bite in the restaurant.

I think that was a like 0.3 out of 10. That was in the zeros. Yeah. I give that a zero. That was an unredeeming fry. Just no. There's a special place in hell for that fry specifically. Yeah.

So. Okay. That's everything that's not good for me. Not good. Anything else for you? That was it. Honestly, for me, I guess it was just the bathroom and the Dad Burger went downhill.

Yeah. Later. And the fries. Cool. We're going to jump in to talking about everything that was just there. This is a weird one. I'm not quite sure what you say about it. It is jump.

I think this is the best part. Everything that was just there. Just things that are noteworthy, but didn't mean anything to me. Sign technology is getting crazy. Insane. So, you know, people, when you're driving past a McDonald's and on the side of the window, it says the McRib is back and it's like a big sign.

It's a decal. We saw those signs outside this Denny. Denny's. Outside this Denny. Sorry, I have Denny's brain. The singular Denny. When we went inside, it was a, like you could see the outline of the sign, like a square. Right, but you could fully see through it.

Totally translucent. zero indication that there was an advertisement on it. This was cool. It was insane. And you couldn't even notice it really. Like I just thought I was just a window. I totally forgot there were decals. And then you really,

you specifically pointed it out and I was like, whoa, wait. Well, because I wanted to mention that the sign said now open 24-7, which is weird because Denny's is famously open 24-7. Yeah. Like all Denny's. Yeah. So to say now open 24-7 struck me as odd. So I was trying to point to the sign and it's like, where'd that freaking sign go?

I know. It was literally invisible. But you know what this tells us about Denny's? They have the money. Is that, well, that. And they value our dining experience. Sure. They like us looking outside of the scenery.

They don't want it blocked off. Yeah. You know, I feel like they wouldn't care if they weren't thinking about us. Yeah. I don't know. The natural windows are nice. And it gets you natural lighting. And what I wonder about, and I kind of think it would, does it offer a shade from heat?

Like, does it insulate the window at all? Maybe. Or safety, too. Like, if someone's outside, you can see outside, but they can't see. I don't know. Yeah. I'm sure there's, like, weird people that'll, like, walk up to a window and just, like, stare at somebody eating. Yeah.

So it's nice to know that although it'd be so much funnier. That would have been awesome. You see them and they think they're just reading a special. They think they're just like, oh, there's two for one. Moons over my hand? Okay, yeah. And then they're just like staring at you and you're like, what's happening? Why is this person stalking me?

That's funny. Also just there. Oh. This little treasure. The price possession of the entire day. Their receipt for you is of the Burger Den. Yeah. Because we mentioned in the Yelp reviews, someone, you know, someone picked up on, oh, this is just Denny's.

Yes. When they ordered their burger den because it had a Denny's receipt. All of the review says. that they've fixed that although it does say the burger den customer name customer phone number that's not my phone number uh denny's restaurant number nine three eight one okay so it still says it the burger den dot com below it though i wonder what that website looks like i look into it later the burger den dot com yeah with tire frog as their mascot uh i think that's all i have in just there originally the fries but those have those are dead to me now yeah just there for me was the

the advertisement for Sprite next to us. Enjoy this dessert with a Sprite. And it was like... It's just sponsored by Sprite. It's sponsored by Sprite. But the thought of pairing Sprite with a cheesecake or a double Oreo hot fudge cake or a strawberry cheesecake, it's like next to that. Like, pair these with a Sprite. No one's ever going to pair those with a Sprite.

I don't want carbonation with like a hot cake. No, Sprite and cheesecake do not. go together. Also, everyone just wants milk. Yes. You're giving me an Oreo dessert. I want milk. I'm not going to, and the Oreo dessert is the biggest one next to the Sprite. Like, they really want you to do that. This is the pairing that's going to change your life. And it's not. It's not. It's not going to ruin it either. Right. But that just made me contemplate. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, and the art that was on the walls. Oh, those pictures up front. Yeah. There was one picture that we saw. It was like a picture of a Denny's. And then there were people in front of it that were like AI generated almost and they were half translucent walking into the Denny's. It was the actual ghost kitchen. It was just it was funny art. Yeah.

It was quirky. It was quirky. That's all the elements for me. Is there anything else you want to talk about with Denny's or with, sorry, with the burger den? I misspoke. I misspoke. No. Also, before we move out, I want to say the reason that the burger got dropped down is because the hash brown in.

And it just dried the whole thing out. So because of that, my burger fell from initially liking it to being a 4.5 out of 10. Well, that is all of our thoughts. We have to put all of this together into a score. But, Anzley, this is your first time on the Fine Dining podcast. You haven't, look, I know you eat at a lot of restaurants, but you have not eaten at the same, you know, 120-ish restaurants I've been to. in the run of the show. My scale is calibrated.

I just need to get on the same page as you. Right. So we're going to jump into this week's calibration station. So what I'm going to ask you to do is just to calibrate your scale. I want to know your zero, your 10. I want you to tell me about the worst restaurant experience you've ever had. And the best restaurant experience you've ever had. Okay.

You can pick which one you want to talk about first, but the floor is yours. The worst restaurant experience I've ever had was at a KFC, actually. That's going to go back to KFC. It is very low on my scale as well. There was a rat that was fried into one of the chickens in my bucket. In your bucket. This is like one of those stories that goes viral. I know.

Man finds a thumb in his Wendy's chili. I know. I'm so sorry, KFC. I hope this doesn't make beef between us, but it did happen. It was an ice school. They're a chicken place, not a rat place. Not a beef place. Also then.

But they are, apparently. We didn't eat it. We saw the tail. Like the tail was, my friend was like, what is this? And you could see a tail, like a rat tail. And then we just looked closer and there was a paw. She just threw it. She screamed.

I was like, holy crap. And it was fried. Yes, it was fried. And then it turns out that KFC did have to shut down. They did have a really bad rat problem. And like just general really bad health problem. We did not. Thank God I didn't even take a bite.

Like it was the top of the bucket. Thank God I didn't take a bite of any of it. But it was very scarring. And I couldn't eat at KFC for a few years. But then like I've recently started to go back to KFC. I liked KFC. But I've heard enough of horror stories like this from like. Really?

I don't need to roll the dice. All right. And then your best restaurant. Does it have to be a chain? No. Oh, okay. It can just be the best restaurant experience of your life. I've had a few and it's so funny.

I'm like blanking on the name right now of it, but it's in Death Valley. And it's in an old brothel. Great. And it's this chili restaurant that I just like happened to stop by. I was like kind of tired. Was it called Chili's? Yeah, it was actually Chili's. It was called like the Happy Burroughs.

The Happy Burrow. That's what it was called. Okay. And this was a few months ago. And I stopped there and they just have chili and beer. And I was like, sick. So I go in there and I order the chili and the beer. And then there's like a really old guy outside.

And I'm kind of like, this place is cool. I want to make a video, I think. Like, this place looks awesome. And then I start talking to him. And he was like, this is my granddaughter's chili recipe. She's third in the world for chili. And I'm like, for her chili recipe. And I was like, what?

She's like, he's like, yeah. you got to try it. Like it's, he showed me like all this stuff about it. And I was like, oh my God, okay. So I tried it as the best chili I've ever had in my life. I didn't even know that chili could be that good. Yeah. And the beer with it.

And it was like dive barry. And this old man like actually lives on the property in the former brothel. So he like took me into the brothel and like showed it to me. Very old building. So the whole experience was like really cool. And everyone there was super chill. What else was like notable about the building? I like it.

It just felt like a. family vibe. They had like pictures of, you know, their bar regulars and like things collected over time from Root 66. It was just like it was cool. It just felt it doesn't feel like anything here in LA. It just felt lived in and like local. Yeah. It's what I liked about it. Just like kind of eccentric and yeah. It's cool. It's not your not every day where you're in a former brothel eating chili and having beer. Really? You don't think I do that every day. I mean. Okay. Okay. Um, okay, well, somewhere between the third place chili in the world in a brothel and rats in your bucket lies the burger den. So we have to take those into consideration as we put it to the Chili's Test.

It's not due set scale. Is it the worst? It's the best. Let's put it to the Chili's test. When I got onto DoorDash and saw that I couldn't customize, I knew I was in for like a rocky experience at best. I walked in the doors. They were nice, but not necessarily like excited that we were eating there. So we did have to feel like we were like getting away with something, which is fun.

But also it puts a big spotlight on you that I don't necessarily want. Her face like dropped. Hi, like, can I get your table? Oh, I spoke with the manager about it. Okay. And I do think that came from a place of, I'm not going to get a tip. And she did. And she did.

But it's like, can we eat here? And it's like, well, you've already been given your food and you're not being served. And you've already paid. That's the thing. You can't, for a pickup order, you're not tipping in the app. There's not an interface for that. No. So I get it.

But you don't feel welcome. Tire Frog is both the highlight and an insane thing. The burger got worse. The fries got way worse. The milkshake was fine. It was good, it was good, but not like a milkshake should be great. I love. Milkshakes are just at a baseline.

Yeah. Great. Yeah. This was not a good experience. for my money. And so if anything better than Chili's is good and anything lower than Chili's is not good, I have to say for me, this is not good. I went 4.07. Right. For this Denny's Burger Den experience. Right. I got, I did 5.55. Okay. I just, I love being in a Denny's. So maybe that's a part of it. I don't know how it would be if I had burger den in my own home.

But like I feel like I raised it up a point because I just like Denny's. Like I like being in the restaurant. So the experience of it is fun. Yeah. It's nostalgic for me. But yeah, the burger, it was good at first. It had potential. I actually liked biting into it.

It felt nostalgic. Yeah. But then by the end when it started to taste different, then I was like, meh. But like I gave it a five still because I was like, it was good for a minute for a moment in time. Yeah. Same with the onion rings are actually, they're probably still good. I wouldn't be surprised.

I don't know if I want to take that gamble. No. No. But it could be. Now, would I willingly ever do this again? No. No. So.

The podcast. No. I hated this. No. He made me try to flashlight in my eye. I'm done to do this at any time with you. Like, I've had a blast. I love all these places on your wall.

But like would I willingly do that? out of my day. Yeah. No. No, I wouldn't. I'm. Oh, I'm craving Burger Den, a Denny. No.

I'm eating Denny's exactly one more time in my life. I've done an episode on Denny's where I ordered not breakfast food and went at like 2 a.m. And I've done this Burger Den episode. Yeah. I will do a future episode where I do proper Sunday morning breakfast Denny's. Right. And that'll be my retirement from ever going to Denny's. Are you sure about that?

Yeah, because I love Mom and Pop. diners. Well, same. So if it's like two in the morning and there's a 24-7 diner that isn't a chain, I'm going to go there. And if it is a chain, I'm going I hop. Oh, oh, absolutely. You're right. There's no reason for me to go to Denny's again.

There's not. Cut to you. Just like. Two in the morning. Angry. Nothing else was open. I did go to Denny's the week before the Breaking Bad finale and put 52 in bacon on my pancake. Oh, my God.

God, that's so cool. I had to do that. But, like, you know, that was 13 years ago now. Yeah. So it's like, I don't need it. And I'm fine to never have it again. I'm not mad at anyone who likes it. It's not White Castle.

It's not Big Bang Theory. God forbid. It's not hometown buffet. I've never even been there. So you can't anymore. It's gone. Okay. But when you put your 5.55 with my 4.07, that averages out to put the Burger

Den. up on the Chochie of Mediocrity at a 4.81. Wow. Right above Margaritaville. And right below Taco Bell. You know, I know I trust you because Rainforest Cafe is an eight. Yeah. Like, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's where it belongs. Yeah, Margaritaville was just a weird day. So maybe that one scored a little low, but I still. stand by that that day, it was a 4.79 or whatever. I feel like you'll have to reevaluate IHop then. That one I did breakfast food. Oh. Yeah.

I mean, to be fair, I scored Burger Den down here. I scored I hop higher, you know, but this is average. Yeah, no, I love that most of it is in the mediocrity. Right. Yeah. And like, and genuinely, most places are like more than the midpoint. Right. Because that's a restaurant that's going to stay open.

Right. You know? I would love to get more down there, but at the same time, I don't want those experiences. But I do want this thing to be more balanced. Anyways, that does mean that the Burger Den is officially not as good as Chili's. Not as good as Chili's. Objectively not so good. All right.

Well, I need to go somewhere next time. I need to figure out where I'm going to review next. So I'm going to reach into the You Must Bowl. And we're going to see where is it going to be. Next week on the podcast, I will be going to Torchise Tacos. All right. I love that place. Or do I?

I don't know. It's up in the air. I don't want to agree to us. Thanks so much for coming on. Thank you. It's been so fun hanging out, eating not great burgers, eating even worse fries. But it's been fun. Maybe the ghost kitchen experiences are the friends that we make along.

the way. They're the souls of the friends we made along the way. Yeah. Yeah. If you want to tell people where they can get you online, you can find me on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube as spooky foodie. Great. And you can follow the show on Instagram and TikTok at Fine Dining Podcast. You can listen to exclusive episodes on Patreon where I cover a whole restaurant that I don't do on the main feed. And oftentimes they're ones that I travel to go do because I don't bring my whole. video set up there. But I can talk into anything. Absolutely. I'll see you all next week.

That's another one in the books. I'll see you next time. Thanks for watching. Have a fine day. Well, there's another one in the folks. We judge the service up to the cooks and while we may have gotten a couple of dirty loves.

No, the journey can never stop from the bottom down to the top. And that's because chill is to the like for a while. We'll see you next the week and next the week, baby. Have a fine day.