Green plastic chairs and tables with white tablecloths had been set up while we were gone. It was weirdly festive considering the circumstances. As for the burgers, all I can say is they were a revelation. First we filed past a long table where all the fixings were: warm whole-wheat buns, cheeses I’d never heard of, crisp leaves of rich green lettuce, deep red tomatoes, crunchy onion circles, three kinds of pickles, five kinds of mustard, four kinds of mayonnaise, and gourmet barbecue sauce. I admit I put one kind of mustard on the top bun and another on the bottom. Then, along with the Camembert cheese, lettuce, tomato, and onion, I went with all three kinds of pickles. And of course, zero mayonnaise. I won’t go into all the side dishes, except to point out they had no French fries, so I chose the fancy macaroni and cheese, which, by the way, was white, not yellow, and had jalapeños in it. Now, I’m not going to declare the meat was grilled better than anyplace else, but I can guarantee this—the ingredients were mind-blowing.
