Who says recession affect every area equally? Apparently not affected at all in the city of Compton.
Several months ago, several bloggers mentioned the best place to grab a ghetto burger would be in Compton due to the low seedy looks of the neighborhood. I just can't seemed to fathom on how or why the city continue to get a bad rap. I understood Compton had high crime rates and corruptions in the city hall during the Omar Bradley days. The 60's Watts and 90's LA riots have also contributed to make some conditions worse. However given that those dark days were long gone and the city have been revamping since then, I don't see how the tag of "ghetto" apply to the New Compton.
For a piece of mind, the neighborhood was actually pretty safe during day time and located across the street from Compton High School. Some of the new redevelopment townhouses are built in a unincorporated city of Rancho Dominguez, which shares the same zip code with the city of Compton. There were some serious wattage of bling on the tires that displayed many of the customized chrome rims driving around the city that day as they rolled into the parking lot of Mom's Burgers.
Mom's Burgers have been operated for over three decades founded by Joyce "Mom" McLaurin, who like a few others started a mom and pop burger joints around the surrounding neighborhoods. This place is a very low maintenance burger shack that had two outdoor benches and a half dozen stools around the counters.
I wanted to ordered the big Colossal burger that they had listed in the menu, but they ran out of the pastrami that day. The guy behind the big shatterproof window smoothly talked me into ordered the Mom's Bacon burger, which is almost essentially like Colossal burger, but minus the pastrami and extra patty.
I have to admit, I have slowed down on ordering these massive patties because they tend to not cook very well because of the lack of seasoning in a big burger patty and also undercook/overcook a patty because of its size. I didn't have to worry too much of that as I thought the patty was excellent. With or without that bacon, I thought the burger was juicy and a messy debacle that was easily ignored because you would inhale that in less than 5 minutes.
The burger combo comes with a side of fries and a can of soda of your choice. A major brownie point for this place: Pepsi is the prefer choice!
The next two choices are very much the epitome of what a ghetto burger is all about these days: adding egg to the patty. I guess I'm not used to it or ever really experience it other than on a sausage link sandwiches, but it was something I mostly definitely needed to add.
I ordered the popular Chronic burger which was essentially a bacon burger with an addition of an egg on top of it. So essentially, for about 76 cents more, you would get the same Mom's Burger with an added egg which was a much better selection. That was also another burger that didn't take long to wolf down.
Junior Chronic Burger Combo ($7.06)
The hot link sandwich didn't have an egg, so I added on with no fuss at all. That was one great thing about this place was that even though they didn't have much selections, but you can customized it with any added ingredients to your likings as if you were at one of The Counter franchise burger joint.
The burgers and sandwiches are on the gourmet burgers price range you normally would find at Red Devils, Blue Dahalia, or at Pete's. You won't find Mom's Burgers comparable to your average local burger joint and definitely better than the surrounding burger shacks like Fresh and Meaty or Three Bears.
Hot Link Sandwich ($2.71) + Egg ($0.54)
The big question is whether or not it's worth driving to a remote place just for a simple burger? The truth is that the burger is pretty good, but driving all the way there would required you to travel to another place and used this burger shack as a pit stop for your burger munching. Driving it for just the burger would not be necessary.
Considering the prices that was charged, I'm just shock that the burgers are recession proof. Tam's burgers are 99 cents each and In-N-Out burgers are cheaper, but for the price and value, it was worth the order.
Would this place's serving qualify as a ghetto burger? The city of Compton wants to let others know that the city is turning a new leaf and wants the label of ghetto to be repeal.
Mom's Burgers
336 W Alondra Blvd
Compton, CA 90220
(310) 632-6622