Hamburger America (40 page)

In 1997 Rick moved Harden’s from its second location, setting up shop in a former truck rental business that he owned. This incarnation
of Harden’s is a virtual museum of mid-century Americana. Authentic enameled steel gasoline and soda signs are everywhere and display cases are full of vintage scale-model cars. Large, detailed model airplanes hang from the ceiling and Rick’s collection of restored pedal cars are spread around the dining room. You could spend hours in Harden’s and still not see everything.

When you place your order at the register, you are handed an oversized playing card as your “number.” Listen for your suit to be called out over the loudspeaker (i.e. “King of Hearts!”). There is a drive-up window on the north side of the building but Rick dissuades most people from just driving up. “We prefer that you call an order in to pick up at the window.” He explained that he can’t guarantee how the experience will go and recommends that you park and come inside to order. It’s a drive-up, not a drive-thru.

Burger making is part science and part art and Rick West is clearly at peace with both. He told me, “I watched what Johney did and do it exactly the same way.” Okay, part fear, too, I guess.

501 WEST CHOCTAW AVE
|
CHICKASHA, OK 73018
405-224-9912 | MON–WED 6 AM–2 PM
THU–SAT 6 AM–9 PM | CLOSED SUNDAY

 

 

“J
ust down from the courthouse in Chickasha there’s a little place that makes a
great
burger,” was the advice Bill Peterson gave me. Bill is the district attorney for the area, and a man to be trusted with hamburger knowledge. It was Bill who had led me to the amazing burger at Folger’s in Ada, so hopes were high. Not only was the burger at J&W first-rate, but unbeknownst to Bill, I had stumbled upon one of the most historically important burger joints of the Oklahoma onion-fried burger phenomenon.

Onion-fried burgers are to this part of Oklahoma what cheesesteaks are to Philadelphia. The epicenter of the onion-fried burger world is 35 miles north from Chickasha in El Reno. This
small town near Oklahoma City boasts three of the best burgers in America, served at counters that are only a few hundred feet from each other. The onion-fried burger craze, started in the 1920s, was created in an effort to stretch meat and feed laid-off railroad workers cheaply.

Restaurants serving the tasty local burger popped up all over town and competition was fierce. But in 1957 a man named Richard Want moved down to Chickasha to open the J&W Grill. He was not alone in his venture though. Johnnie Siler, already successful with Johnnie’s Grill in El Reno, helped to finance the new onion-burger counter.

In an effort to avoid confusion when attempting to figure out the rich histories of these Oklahoma burger joints, let’s just say that they are all connected in some way. Many owners and employees of the remaining burger stands have all worked at each other’s stands, though most worked for and learned from Johnnie Siler. Current owner Darren Cook seems to be the only burger man in this part of Oklahoma who did not work in El Reno. “I started at J&W when I was 12 years old washing dishes,” Darren told me, “I had to use a milk crate to reach the sink.” When he was 19, he purchased a share in the restaurant, and in 1981, when he was only 23, bought the restaurant outright. Understandably, J&W is his life and he has been at the burger counter for over 35 years. A restaurant in El Reno made a few offers to buy J&W from Darren, but he told me, “I’m only in my forties, what would I do?”

The
J
in J&W stands for Johnnie, the
W
for Want. “I think it was supposed to be ‘S&W’ for their last names but the sign people made a mistake,” Maryann Davis, wife of past owner Jim Davis, told me.

J&W has everything you’d want in a burger joint—meat ground fresh on premises, onions hand sliced in back, a basic menu, and fast service. The concept is simple. Order a “hamburger” and it comes with onions. A quarter-pound wad of fresh ground beef is pressed onto a hot flattop griddle and sprinkled with a large amount of sliced (not diced) onions. The stringy onions go limp, and the burger is flipped and pressed again, forcing the onions into the cooking beef. The result is a mess of beef and caramelized onions that create a moist burger with an intense onion flavor. At J&W, if you want a double, two wads of beef are pressed together and twice the amount of onion is dispensed.

The restaurant sits on the busy thoroughfare of Choctaw Avenue near downtown Chickasha. It’s a very visible red and white cinder block structure with a large American flag painted on one side. The long, low, wood-grain Formica counter has sixteen swivel stools that are never empty at lunchtime. “It gets crowded in here at lunch. The line goes out the door,” counterperson Brandi told me. The good news is that the average time at a stool is 10 minutes and, Brandi said with a smile, “We can move them in and out of here in fifteen.”

Brandi knows just about everyone who walks in the door and calls out their order to the grill
cook before they even take a seat. Biscuits and gravy are a big seller in the morning, but she told me some customers order burgers first thing. “We’ll start making burgers at 6 a.m. if someone wants one.”

When I visited J&W there was no music playing, just the sounds of the exhaust fan, regulars talking about just getting off a night shift, and the sizzle of burgers on the griddle. It was refreshing to enjoy my burger without music for once, just the mesmerizing sounds of America.

 

 

S
teve Galway is a dedicated man. The first time I visited Johnnie’s to taste an onion-fried burger, the pride of El Reno, Oklahoma, Steve was not there. “He comes in every day at two,” a counterperson told me. But it was 3 p.m. and he was nowhere to be found. That’s because Steve comes in every day at 2
a. m.
to prep the restaurant for the day and is gone by 11 a.m. Now that’s dedication to burgers. When I finally caught up with him we had a long talk about what it takes to keep a restaurant successful. “Give the best you’ve got and the people will come back,” are the words he lives by. He must be doing something right because every time I’ve been there the place has been packed—the people most definitely come back.

Don’t be fooled by the fairly nondescript exterior of Johnnie’s Grill. Located on one of the main drags in downtown El Reno, the simple, brick-faced restaurant is set back from the street by a small parking lot. The only windows are the glass in the front door and a small drive-up on one side of the building. The inside is bright and clean with a sea of tables and booths, a fact you could not imagine from a parking lot assessment. There’s also a short counter with seven stools and a clear view of the large flattop griddle that’s usually loaded with onion-fried burgers.

This version of Johnnie’s is new as of 2005. Prior to that, Johnnie’s was a narrow burger joint at the same location with a counter on the left and four booths on the right. Prior to that, the original location was across the street, but, collapsed under the weight of snow in 1986. Today’s Johnnie’s could easily seat up to a hundred. There’s even a “party table” in the new Johnnie’s that seats twenty.

But for all its newness, Johnnie’s remains one of the most historically important purveyors of the El Reno onion-fried burger, important because it seems that all roads lead back there. Sid and Marty Hall from the popular Sid’s (only two blocks away) both worked at the counter and Johnnie himself brought the onion-fried burger south when he opened the J&W Grill of Chickasha in 1957.

Order a hamburger at Johnnie’s and it comes
standard with onions smashed in. In the old days, onion was used in a burger to stretch the day’s meat and to add flavor, but Steve told me, “Back then it was a lot of onion and a little meat.”

The grillman takes a ball of fresh-ground chuck, slaps it on the grill, covers it with thin-sliced onions, and starts pressing the patty until the onion and red meat are one. The thin patty cooks on the hot griddle until the beef has a crunchy char and the onions are caramelized. As it nears doneness, a white squishy bun is placed on the burger, softened by onion steam. The burger is served with pickles on the side only. All other condiments are self-serve.

Steve started working at Johnnie’s for then owner Bruce Otis at age 12, over 40 years ago. He and Marty (from Sid’s Diner) worked at the grill at the same time and have remained friends. “It’s not like it used to be,” Steve said, referring to the cutthroat competition in the early days between rival burger stands in El Reno. “If I need some sacks (paper bags), I’ll call Marty. We try to help each other.”

If you really want to experience El Reno at its peak, show up in town on the first Saturday in May. That’s when this proud town just west of Oklahoma City celebrates Burger Day. Thirty-thousand people descend on El Reno for live music, a car show, and a public construction of the “World’s Largest Onion-Fried Burger.” The three main burger outposts, Sid’s, Robert’s, and Johnnie’s, all within a block of each other, operate at beyond capacity. “That day we’ll have a six-block line for burgers and forty employees,” Steve told me.