Overview of Restaurant and concept: We decided to head over to Mary’s and check out the $5.99 “cheap lunch” special. Hamburger Mary’s is what I’d expect a restaurant to look like if your ex-cafeteria lady drag queen uncle designed a restaurant.It’s flamboyant and a bit out there but I supposed it has its own sort of charm. As we walked in the door a 6 foot tall drag queen greeted us and we were shown to a table. One of the first things I noticed was how dark it is in the dining area. That’s a pet peeve of mine with restaurants. Dark dining areas make me sleepy. It’s never a good thing to get sleepy at lunch time. There were probably 15-20 people in there for lunch on a Wednesday. Continuing with the cafeteria theme they serve lunch on tables with laminate faux wood tops setup in long rows touching each other and the kind of cheap thin metal forks I remember eating lunch on in Jr high. It’s definitely a unique sort of place.
Minis and Broccoli Cheese Soup @ Hamburger Mary’s Cheap Lunch
Location:
ADDRESS
3333 Beach Blvd.
Jacksonville, FL 32207
PHONE
(904) 551-2048
WEBSITE
Food: Let’s start with the good stuff. The Chili is homemade and it’s definitely good. It has a nice hint of sweetness that really makes it different and enjoyable. Also it’s made with ground beef you might find in spaghetti rather than chunks of beef like you often with find in chili. Normally I’d think that would be a negative but in this case it worked. The BLT comes on buttered toasted bread with a HUGE amount of bacon. Warm, buttery, and salty with a nice crunch. It’s pretty darn good.
Now to the bad. When you order broccoli cheese soup you want something cheesy. This one wasn’t. It was closer to a mediocre cream of broccoli with a hint of cheese. Maybe they should have called it that. The soup came out luke warm. It had a weird texture almost like a smoothie. There were large pieces of broccoli in it that tasted okay. Who really wants luke warm cream of broccoli with a hint of cheese soup? I don’t. Stay away.
Next up was the two mini’s with a caesar salad for $5.99. Another disaster. The mini burgers came with a pickle and a dash of mustard on them. They were dry and didn’t have much flavor. The were just slightly warm when they arrived. Not good.
The Caesar salad was one of the worst I’ve ever hard. It’s hard to screw up a caesar salad! Hamburger Mary’smanaged to do it! A caesar salad should come tossed so the dressing is evenly distributed over the salad. This one came with clumps of dressing unevenly plopped all over it. The salad was sort of drowned in dressing. Most of the cheese was sitting at the bottom of the salad. Overall it was a disaster.
Chili @ Hamburger Mary’s Cheap Lunch
Service: This category is another giant fail for Hamburger Mary’s. Our server was friendly but that was the only real positive. The food came out fairly slow. I quickly drank my Coke I never once was offered a refill in the hour or so we were there. We hardly saw the waiter. The check did arrive promptly. We were never once asked if everything is okay or if we enjoyed the meal. How can a restaurant make sure they’re serving food people like if they never ask?
Caesar Salad @ Hamburger Mary’s Cheap Lunch
Value for money:
This is the one Category that Hamburger Mary’s does okay in. They offer 12 options for $5.99 during weekday lunch hours and the portion sizes are very generous. They also offer a $3.99 half pound burger and fries during weekday lunch hours. As long as you can dodge the brutally awful items and happen onto one of the good ones this could be a great value.
Editors Note: I agree with this review, but for a $5.99 lunch (yep, I order water to drink) I’ll put up with a lot. So, while not one you should run out to…its still lunch for like $8!
Positives:
- The price is right
- Good chili
- Generous portions
- Cheap Lunch
Negatives:
- Some of the food is truly awful
- Bad service
