Place: Shake Shack
Lunch: Shack Stack (no lettuce, no tomato, add pickle, onion), cheese fries, chocolate malt
You can come to Vegas to gamble and/or be debaucherous, or you can come for the burgers. Because a lot of regional burger (and hot dog) chains have outlets here, thousands of miles from the second closest outlet. The two newest entries are White Castle and Shake Shack, two opposite ends of the burger market.
Shake Shack is a New York-based chain that started ten years ago with a "shack" in a park and now has upscale looking stores in the East, the Middle East, the Far East, even Russia. Las Vegas is their first US location west of Chicago, but to be fair, it is on the frontage of New York, New York and is part of the park-like walking plaza with shops thingy MGM Resorts is building in between New York, New York and the Monte Carlo. So the New York park roots are there, even if this isn't a "shack".
I dropped in for the first time the other night, then again today for lunch. The building sort of feels like an abandoned organic grocery. Lots of wood tones, black, and cement. with green accents and a lot of white neon lighting. A tall sloped ceiling and lots of glass. Looks impressive from the Strip entrance.
The signature "ShackBurger" is essentially an In-N-Out knockoff. VERY similar patty and sauce. It comes with lettuce, tomato, and Shack Sauce, though you can request pickles, onions, and the usual condiments. The pickles are a more premium dill variety with a nice crunch. Almost a shame they don't put them on everything automatically.
Shake Shack offers a "vegetarian" burger known as the 'Shroom, and it's hilarious. It's a breaded and deep fried glob of mushrooms and cheese. Decidedly not vegan. (HA HA HA HA! Vegans.) Bite into the hockey puck-shaped "patty" and cheese starts to ooze out. The mushrooms taste perfect. My burger for this meal is the Shack Stack, which has the 'Shroom puck AND a burger patty. It's the best thing on the menu. SO good. SO unique.
There's also a "SmokeShack" burger with bacon and chopped cherry peppers. The peppers give this burger a really sweet relishy taste with a spicy kick. Not my cup of tea. The burger patty has almost no taste, as if they didn't season it.
(SIDE NOTE: "ShackBurger" and "SmokeShack" are single words on the menu, but "Shack Stack" isn't. No idea why.)
The fries are Yukon Gold krinkle cuts. You can get them topped in cheese sauce. Pretty good cheese sauce.
The malt is custard-based, so it's basically what you'd expect from Culver's or Freddy's. Nothing remarkable.. There's cones, shakes, and concretes. Drink options include beer and wine.
There's a line of hot dogs, which unfortunately doesn't include a chili dog. I believe they use Vienna Beef dogs. They split them and cook them flat on the grill. I had one with cheese sauce on my previous visit. Nothing remarkable.
They have a "draught" root beer that is supposedly worth trying, but they couldn't bother to have it in stock when I tried to order it.
So is Shake Shack going to become a must-visit for me when in town? Probably not, but I will occasionally drop in for a Shack Stack. And maybe make another attempt to try that root beer.
It never rains in Vegas, unless I'm in town. Then it ALWAYS rains, at least a little. It even SNOWED yesterday.
The county should pay me to move here.
I'd solve all their water problems.
