Sidestreet has added the Olive Branch Pizza Company and is one of the best pizza joints in the city.
Okay, this is a little different. Typically, I’m all about finding spots in Memphis to hit and get my consumption on. Today the fam didn’t feel like taking the jaunt over to Midtown Memphis or Downtown Memphis, but we knew we didn’t want any chain restaurant food although it was short notice and on Tuesday night, we really can’t keep the kids out because I didn’t feel like cooking. A while back when we did the Nashville trip, we decided to use Trip Advisor to find places near our house once we got back. We had eaten a ridiculously good burger at The Pharmacy in Nashville and decided that we needed to find a burger joint that was comparable. Now I have to admit we’ve been to a lot of places, but if you notice I’ve only done burger reviews on Oshi (which I won’t link here, because this is all about a new discovery).
I’m a little ahead of myself. We live basically on the State line of Mississippi and Tennessee. Our area is completely devoid of family owned/locally owned restaurants. The majority of food joints in our area are chains and since we really don’t visit chains, we have to work a little harder when we have to grab something on short notice. Well, we attempted to visit Sidestreet Burgers a few months back after we found it on Trip Advisor, but it wasn’t open. Their hours are Tues-Sat 11pm to 8pm and Sunday 11 to 6pm. They are closed on Mondays. Today we almost missed out again. We really cut it short, and they were in the midst of cleaning and preparing to call it a day, but we made it with 4 minutes to spare.
Sidestreet is appropriately named as it sits on Highway 178. The street is kind of tucked away in Old Town Olive Branch and if you’re doing the speed limit at 45mph if you blink, you’ll miss it. Here is a little pointer though if you’re driving south once you guy under the overpass it’s to your right. If you’re driving north, it’s before the underpass… that really doesn’t help does it? Maybe looking for the multicolored sun on the side of the building will help. Well, no that doesn’t help either because it’s not a sun, it’s a sun/burger that looks like it’s setting, and someone took a bite out of the logo. I’m rambling.
Like I said we got there right before close and instead of the guys working looking at us like, “What the hezell are you doing here?” The first response we got was, “This your first time?” with a smile. This automatically tells me to give a point for service. The small storefront/house styled restaurant has about 4 tables inside and a small patio outside. Not a lot of seating, but I have to assume it’s excellent for turning tables fast and boy is the service fast. One of my biggest complaints with many small restaurants is speed. This should have been an issue since they were closing, but (this is not an exaggeration) we walked in, looked over the menu (short and concise with some very cool names like “You’re My Gyro” and “Fat Panda” which I’m really hankering to get back there and try-) and we ordered. By the time we walked over to get drinks, pull up a chair, and sit down, about 5 minutes later we were being called to pick up our meals. I guess it took about 10 minutes to get our plates.
Okay here is where Sidestreet excels, in California we had a chain called Fuddruckers. It was a big stupid hamburger that didn’t have any flavor, but what really made the restaurant work was that you could select your own toppings. This meant I could throw onions, jalapenos, or any number of things onto my burger. With Sidestreet that Fuddrucker moment happened. They told us that we could top our own burgers!!!!! They didn’t charge us for extra anything. The lettuce was still crisp, as were the other veggies. There was also Memphis styled BBQ sauce and of course Siracha! We topped our burgers, packed our bags and headed out. Since we all got the Sidestreet combo we were going to have a similar experience just with different toppings. What I forgot was that we got what we thought were standard fries. Now we were told these were not fries, but homestyle wedges crusted with garlic. My first thought was, okay we will see won’t we. Sidestreet gave us our Sidestreet Juniors (1/4lb) seasoned and moist. Now I know moist isn’t a great explanation but let me explain. Most people think a burger is supposed to be flat and without character. This is because they go to chain restaurants. The reality is I should have a little char on my burger and hint of garlic, pepper and salt to flavor. This burger was perfect and topped with cheese and bacon and when you bit into it, although we drove for a few minutes to get home, it was moist and tender, but still had that little char on it. The buns were placed on the grill giving it the toasted taste.
I can get long winded, here but I’ve dragged this on for too long. Here is my review. This is based on a comparison of the burger joints I’ve been too in Memphis (Oshi Burger Bar, LBOE, Hueys, Babalu, Lot A Burger):
Cost: Our 4 Sidestreet Jr Burgers, 3 orders of Garlic Potato Wedges and 3 drinks totaled up to $29.43 . This gives Sidestreet a 5/5 Our trips to each of the above restaurants, which are obviously in more popular locales in Memphis (except Lot-A-Burger) would have ran us 40.00 dollars at the least and over 50.00 at the highest.
Taste: We all thoroughly enjoyed the flavor, and the burgers are on par with each of the restaurants above, but when I make a strong comparison, I have to give the bread edge to LBOE and this drops Sidestreet to 4/5. This is not a bad thing at all. The bread at Sidestreet is toasted and soft. It holds the burger and doesn’t fall apart. Most important that grill prevents any of the various sauces you add from turning your burger into a mushy mess.
Service: Like I said earlier, they were about to close and no one, NO ONE looked bothered that we showed up with 4 minutes left before closing. 5/5!
Am I going back? Damn skippy!
I highly recommend Sidestreet Burgers if you are looking to get another burger option in your life. It’s well worth visiting and tracking down.
Website: Sidestreet Burgers
Twitter: @chefmah
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SideStreetBurgers
I wanted to post a picture, but my hand was shaking so I’m putting the pic down here because it doesn’t do the burgers justice. However, look at that blurry string of cheese hanging. That’s when you know a burger is going to be good, lol.