$5 Burger Special at Rosebud Trattoria

For some months Rosebud Trattoria has been advertising a $5 burger special. Here's their sign back in April.



I'd been wanting to try Rosebud's burger for a long time, especially since the Tribune ranked it at the top in their exhaustive survey five years ago. A few days ago I was around Dearborn & Illinois at lunch time so decided to finally check it out.



It sounds like a good deal but I was surprised how little I enjoyed this hamburger.





It's big but the meat was virtually unseasoned and flavorless, with an unpleasant pasty texture. What little taste there was wasn't very beefy. Credit to them for cooking it dead-on medium rare, as ordered. They must have run out of pretzel rolls so I got this lousy little white thing. Fries were ordinary and grossly oversalted. A small Sam Adams draft was $6 so with tax and tip my simple meal came to $15. Not worth it and I won't be back. I'd much rather have a burger from BIG & little's, in the same general area.

Has anyone compared the 10oz "Ballo Burger" (as it's listed on the check at Rosebud Trattoria) with Rosebud Steakhouse's signature 12oz burger? I have a hard time believing the $5 special would rank as anyone's favorite, much less "Phil Vittel's" (good name for a food writer!) despite what's printed on Rosebud Trattoria's menu. I was curious enough to go back to the Tribune's original hamburger article.

In the Chicago Tribune of 14 June 2005, Phil Vettel wrote:If you can get past the eerie feeling of ordering from a tuxedoed captain, this Streeterville steakhouse is Burger Heaven. The burger is a massive 12 [emphasis added] ounces, and so juicy the kitchen should consider issuing bibs. The burger, cooked precisely to order, arrives on a soft but chewy pretzel-dough bun that handles the juicy meat without falling apart, and the flavor --with or without melted cheese -- is sensational.

Pretty classy of Rosebud Trattoria, altering a newspaper review about a different burger at a different location to make it seem the reviewer was writing about their own.

Rosebud Trattoria
445 N Dearborn St
Chicago
312-832-7700

BIG & little's
939 N Orleans St
Chicago
312-943-0000

Edited to emphasize the altered part of the Vettel quote.

the burger in your pic is not even close to the one at Rosebud Steakhouse. Very odd because last time I was at Rosebud Trattoria (was still called Ballo's back then), they had the Steakhouse burger.

The one in your pic is a travesty.
Personally, I think the Kobe burger at Park Grill is the best

pocky wrote:the burger in your pic is not even close to the one at Rosebud Steakhouse. Very odd because last time I was at Rosebud Trattoria (was still called Ballo's back then), they had the Steakhouse burger.

The one in your pic is a travesty.

I can't criticize Rosebud Trattoria for serving a large (though not very tasty) burger with fries for $5. I can and will criticize them for changing a quote from a Tribune review to mislead customers into thinking they're getting something they're not. I'm not sure if the other burger is still on the menu. I fell for their deceptively described special and didn't read the rest of the menu.

A photo of the real Rosebud burger can be found in this G Wiv post (plus another pic in stevez's post directly following).

I've been curious about what burger that place was pushing for $5, so thanks for taking one for the team. That is decidedly not a pretzel bun. A shameful ploy.

Rene G wrote:

pocky wrote:the burger in your pic is not even close to the one at Rosebud Steakhouse. Very odd because last time I was at Rosebud Trattoria (was still called Ballo's back then), they had the Steakhouse burger.

The one in your pic is a travesty.

I can't criticize Rosebud Trattoria for serving a large (though not very tasty) burger with fries for $5. I can and will criticize them for changing a quote from a Tribune review to mislead customers into thinking they're getting something they're not. I'm not sure if the other burger is still on the menu. I fell for their deceptively described special and didn't read the rest of the menu.

A photo of the real Rosebud burger can be found in this G Wiv post (plus another pic in stevez's post directly following).

Dang, that looks like a Costco 8oz chuck burger with a Costco hamburger bun, seriously!