Tucked on the other side of the Phoenix Mountain Preserve on you way to north Phoenix is the Moon Valley neighborhood. 7th St. & Thunderbird Rd. is the commercial hub of the neighborhood and at the southeast corner is where you'll find Charr...an American Burger Bar http://charrburgerbar.com/. Owned by the Aiello family who also own the neighboring Italian restaurant on this evening Joe Aiello is out front greeting and chatting with customers & making sure everybody is happy. For a place that is emphasizing the burger Charr has a quite a varied menu with 7 burgers($9-$14) on the menu. Several "Certified Black Angus" Choice Chuck beef burgers are available along with turkey, Portobello and salmon burger.
The Carolina Barbacue burger($12) sounded good and included my favorite ingredients of bacon and onions. All burgers are served on an in-house made garlic knot bun, which is thicker, soft and dense almost like a bagel. I was excited and hungry and awaited my rare plus burger and when it arrived I knew it would become a challenge. Topped and dripping on all sides with BBQ sauce, the way you top a ice cream sundae with hot fudge sauce, where you need many napkins for cleanup. Under the BBQ sauce you can see the 2 strips of Applewood smoked bacon but invisible (I'm not saying they weren't there) to the eye was caramelized onions and jack cheese was peeking through. On the side was a leaf of Bibb lettuce, a tomato slice and Bermuda onion slices which would soon become invisible once I added them to the burger. A nice and thick burger made bigger with it's toppings, the taste was obviously dominated by a sweetened BBQ sauce making the other toppings obsolete yet you're still able to taste the meat which had a smoky, grilled flavor that seem a bit more medium rare to medium grilling. Served alongside is a small basket of golden brown truffle fries which were very good.
1 or 2 less spoonfuls of BBQ sauce and this average burger could be a very good burger given it's size and ingredients and more in a neighborhood which could use some burger enthusiasm.
Charr an American Burger Bar is located at 777 E. Thunderbird Rd. #107 Moon Valley 85022 (602)003-2427 and is open from 3 p.m.- 10 p.m. Mon.-Thurs. 3 p.m.- 11p.m. Fri. 11 a.m. - 11 Sat. & 11 a.m. -9 p.m. on Sun.
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