Our very own burger master in the land of tacos, Ali Khan, travels all over L.A. to find you the best burgers you may have missed, the burgers that won’t get written up on the fancy blogs and in L.A. Magazine, the hamburger sandwiches that give you bang for your burger buck.
It has taken me a few days to recover from the burger onslaught that took place in the house that Hawkins built. While I normally always go for a double, at Hawkins House of Burgers, it was a miscalculation of epic proportions. As much as it pains me to admit, this was the first burger I failed to finish since an 8 year old boy named Ali Khan waived a white flag over the plate of a 1lb burger.
Above was the double that brought shame to the Khan name. I regrouped 24 hours later and went back for what is surely to be the most burger for your buck I have found in LA yet: the fatburger with fries and a drink for $4.99
After experiencing the double no cheese, I sprung for the extra 50 cents and went for the Fat burger con queso. Speaking of Fatburger, this is very reminiscent of their Ice Cube approved sandwiches: thick, well done, charred patties, mayo and mustard options, a resounding answer to the "where's the beef" Wendy's campaign of the 1980s(for you old timer's out there)
The All Day Special with cheese, in all her glory($5.49 before tax)
Hawkins is all about catching your eye and dropping your jaw; one burger on the menu called "the whipper" consists of two patties, cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, pastrami and a hot link. Another, called the Hawkins Special, reads like a plot synopsis from the television show Man vs Food: Three burger patties, three eggs, four strips of bacon, a hot link, chili, and pastrami. Just getting through a double felt like trying to mow down a buffet bar while fleeing the undead in some zombie apocalypse - you are hungry and there is all this food but not enough time to take it all down.
As beastly as these burgers are, you would be mistaken not to add a side of tubers to your order. These steak fries were transformed golden brown by that oil you have been smelling since you parked the car, dusted with what I suspect is either Lawry's seasoned salt or a knock off version. These are the fries you keep picking at, even though your stomach reached out to your brain several times with that memo that simply said "full"
Burgers at Hawkins are cooked through, with the exterior char being the highlight. When ordered with "the works", expect your burger to be swimming in mayonnaise, so if if you didn't bring trunks for a dairy pool, I advise to ease up on the white stuff. The same is true for the dijon mustard used at Hawkins, which carries a potency that some(including myself) can find a touch overpowering, so once again, if you are not a freak for mustard, adjust when ordering. What I found to be a surprising stand out were the incredibly fresh vegetables that adorn these burgers. It does help that they are as generous with equally fresh green leaf lettuce, tomato and red onion as they are with their beef. Bang for your buck burgers almost always sacrifice in the roughage department, but this is not the case at Hawkins.
The bottom line: a huge cheeseburger(single patty), fries and a soda for $5.98 with tax and a second bomb to drop: I could not finish this burger either. Hawkins House of Burgers delivers bang for your burger buck if you are of the set that relishes in two fisted burgers, handfuls of fries and something more than water from a tap to wash it down with. I recommend a trip to Watts for those whose bellies long to be full, belts soon to be unbuckled, and future dinner plans(or the next day's breakfasts) cancelled due to burger overdose. If these yearnings call out to you, then my friends head down to Hawkins for some heavy bang for your burger buck.
