Eating From the Trash Can: Dave’s Triple from Wendy’s, Which Is The Best Thing Ever
Life is often a study in contrasts. Earlier this week, we had a lovely little conversation about the old-school world of Dick’s premade burgers, with 1955 recipes, 1955 service, and a 1955 approach to substitution — spill your own ink over the comment it makes on old-school conformity, Americana, and Donald Trump — and came away, well, a little unsatisfied. I mean, it was good — four star, Trash Can Seal of Approval good, in fact — but it was…missing something.
Wendy’s “Dave’s Triple” is missing nothing. It is the sine qua non of burger perfection. It is monstrous yet approachable, simple in execution while being…OK, equally simple in presentation. It is a giant Eff You to foodies while proudly trumpeting the quality of its ingredients and the fresh-never-frozen mantra that usually defines the likes of In-N-Out or Five Guys.
It is, in the simplest terms and the purest of forms, a masterpiece.
That is, when the idiots behind the counter get the order right. I ordered mine with “only cheese, pickles, and ketchup”, not because I’m a picky eater (I will eat pretty much whatever Purina Prole Chow you dump in front of me, especially if I’m sufficiently famished), but because I wanted to taste this burger a certain way, as unsullied by adulteration as possible, because I wanted to make a point about simplicity.
This was harder than it needed to be thanks to the dingbats in downtown Kent, who served me a burger with no cheese, no pickles, and with mustard added to the ketchup, this despite me barking the order at them five times during the burger’s preparation in hopes that the imbecile cashier and the poor, beleaguered cook (who was clearly working from a prep sheet that had been rung in wrong) could come to a consensus with me, the paying customer. I will not dock the food this; I will only warn the diner not to try and special order through the drive-thru, because these people will get it wrong, guaranteed.
Anyway, on to the burger. I don’t know how it is possible for beef to somehow be “beefier” depending on where you get it, but Wendy’s beef is beefy. Unlike McDonald’s pallid, sorry-looking discs of sadness, the Wendy’s burger has a very distinctively plate-grilled flavor to it, possibly the result of whatever they’re using as grill seasoning, more likely because the square burgers are brought up to serving temperature in a way that actually sears them rather than merely heating them (up your game, Mickey D’s. It’s shameful.)
Wendy’s beef is also greasy as hell, in a good way. This is the kind of burger that’s designed in such a way as to derive a lot of the richness of its flavor from sitting in a drive-thru bag and coming down to merely warm from hot-off-the-grill. When some of that grease reforms within the patty, it provides mouthfeel. But when it’s running hot and juicy? Whole different ballgame. And one I’ll argue with myself all day with over which is the better formulation, because hot damn, is it ever delicious any way you cut it.
The lack of rabbit food and especially the lack of mayonnaise on this burger changed it from a holistic experience of eating a sandwich to a purist’s take; if you want a burger that tastes like the beef, the whole beef, and nothing but the beef, with a couple of pickles, some ketchup, and the cheese serving as flavor and texture enhancers and naught but accessories, this is how you go about doing it. Your experience may vary, but this is the purified essence of why Wendy’s is an evolutionary step in fast food.
PROS: The beefiest goddamn burger that ever burgered, the fries ain’t bad either, and you get enough food to feel like you ate an anvil for nine bucks before figuring the tax into it.
CONS: If you’re in Kent, don’t order from the drive-thru unless you want to park the car, go in, and yell at the top of your lungs at the manager for hiring people who flunked out of special ed.
THE VERDICT: 5 stars out of 5, the Trash Can Seal of Approval, and the status of One Of The Best Things Ever.
