We're the Lucky Dogs Here
- Kaitlynn and Dylan Henderson
- Jul 31, 2017
- 5 min read
We'll be honest here, we cheated a bit this week. Every week so far we've gone to a new restaurant to provide an authentic review, but this week we went to an old standby, Lucky's Burger and Brew in Roswell. There are currently three locations of the restaurant: Brookhaven, Emory Village, and the original in Roswell. Since we live in Sandy Springs, often enough we find ourselves making the trek to Roswell for a burger. If you have never been, the restaurant is themed around the owner's dog Lucky. There are pictures of him all over the restaurant and even a little story about him and his owners on the menu which certainly makes for one of the more adorable and possibly the most dog-friendly restaurant around town. They actually have two outdoor spaces, an attached patio and recently added pavilion, because of just how many dogs come to enjoy Lucky's. We were seated out on the pavilion with our pup today which was so nice. The whole area is covered, there's fans and comfortable seating so even though it was in the mid-80's, we never started to sweat or feel uncomfortable.
We will say though, the service can be very hit or miss here. It's never been terrible enough to make us rethink coming, but for example, the last time we were here (just last month I believe) our waitress brought out a bowl of water for our pup, talked with us about the menu, the puppy, the weather things like that, she never let our drinks run low, all in all a very attentive and wonderful waitress. This time however, we hardly saw our waitress. She came around to take our drink orders and shortly came back for our meal orders, I ordered a mint julep (I recently found a recipe for them and I was dying to try one and their "old fashioned" drinks are delicious) and it took until just before our food came out for her to tell me
there was no mint and asked if I'd like to order something else. I asked for the drink menu and off she went. We had finished our meal for a good couple minutes before she arrived back with the drink menu and asked if I even wanted it anymore, I told her no and that'd we'd just take the check. She was polite and you could tell she was stressed, but it was certainly a let down since normally we are pretty well taken care of.
Anytime we go to Lucky's we have to get the Fried Pimento Cheese Bites. They are little bites of heaven in the shape of a ball of fried pimento cheese, drizzled with red pepper jelly and perfection. They melt perfectly and are never gritty or over-fried and there's always just enough jelly to give you that kick you need. Just like normal Dylan decided to get his favorite burger, the Undertaker, which is probably one of the most artery clogging burgers out there, but it's so well done you have to try it. It's their traditional beef burger, with applewood bacon, cheese, mayo, fried onion straws and an over-easy egg on top of a soft toasted challah bun. The burger is made of dreams, it's overwhelmingly juicy and tender, the egg is always cooked well so that the whites stay together but the yolk is runny and mixes in nicely with the beef, the bun in soft and stable and perfect for holding such a heavy burger in place. The only thing that's not my favorite is their fries. They're a fairly crispy shoestring style fry that are well salted, but could stand to be a little crispier. Since Dylan got his normal go-to I decided I'd branch out and for-go my traditional Georgia Dawg Pounder and try out one of their chicken sandwiches. I did a quick glance through and decided I needed to try the French Poodle Chicken, it was a huge buttermilk fried chicken breast topped with caramelized onions, Granny Smith apple slices, melted brie slices and dijon mustard. When I ordered this I definitely thought this was going to be my new favorite order since I love the combo of brie and tart apples, but to be honest, this sandwich let me down. Don't get me wrong, it was still delicious and if I'm not in the mood for a burger when we come here again I may still branch out and get the chicken, but I'm not sure I'll try this particular one again.
The value overall isn't world beating, you can certainly get a good burger around the city for cheaper, but it's still worth it to come by. Burgers (with fries included) range from around $11-$13, which puts them lower than some of the "premium" burger spots around, like H&F, but higher than some of the cheaper places like Grindhouse Killer Burgers. The burgers are tasty and despite the weird service fluctuations we still find ourselves coming back every couples months.
Dylan's Final Review:
Food: 4.5/5
It's hard to say much else here, the burgers are delicious. I've never tried any of the other entrees or sandwiches but with burgers this good I don't need to. The pimento cheese bites are unbelievable and really all of the appetizers we've tried have been tasty. I'll take one half point for the fries not being as crispy as I would like, but that's simply nitpicking.
Service: 3.5/5
Let me reiterate here, the service is not bad. Don't let that be a reason to not eat here. We've generally had pretty decent servers and never had one that truly detracted from the experience.
Value: 3.5/5
Again, the value here is good, but not great. There are definitely better priced burgers in town, but I certainly don't feel bad eating here. It's a very tasty burger at a reasonable price.
Overall: 4.25/5
I love this restaurant. It is one of my favorite burger places in town. The decor is amazing and it's always grade A dog-watching as well. The burger is so good, and its absolutely worth a drive to any of three locations.
Kaitlynn's Final Review:
Food: 4.5/5
Even with the not so great chicken sandwich I had today, I still give it a 4.5. The burgers of past experience are enough to keep me going! Plus I dream about those damn pimento cheese balls.
Service: 3/5
Okay, I know, hear me out. So the service varies from pretty fantastic, to on the frustrating side, and while more often than not we have good waitresses I still have to lower the score because when you walk in you never know what you're going to get! Are you going to really enjoy the service or have to flag down the waitress constantly?
Value: 4/5
You can find better burgers around. You can find cheaper burgers around, but right now from the places we've been and where most of our readers are (Cumming/Gainesville/North OTP) I'd say this is your best place to trek to for a great burger on a night out.
Overall: 4/5
While the food is great and the drinks are great and the puppies are even greater, that service knocks it. If they could work on consistency I'm sure they could really make this restaurant even better than it is.
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