Don’t Let the Name Bug You: The Weevil Burger Offers Messy Delight

The first time we drove by the strip mall on Fletcher Parkway, just north of Dallas Street, my friend and I had some misconceptions. Businesses named Curves and Red Hot Momma’s sounded like adult-entertainment shops. Only during a second glance did we realize they are a fitness center and salon, respectively.

We had to overcome a similar mental block regarding The Weevil Burger, the restaurant on the south end of the mall. “Really? Weevil Burger? That sounds so .. unappetizing! Why would anybody want to associate their cuisine with a crop-destroying snout beetle?”

Even phonetically, “weevil” is a strange word: It rhymes with “evil,” which can’t be good —unless you change it to Evel Knievel, rendering it cool. It also reminds me of a childhood toy called Weebles, known for the slogan Weebles wobble but they don’t fall down.

The name also reminds me of an old country tune called “Bo Weevil” by Teresa Brewer. I own a modest and highly eclectic collection of vintage 45 rpm records, and this song is among my favorites (see the last photo). Once you hear the melody, it gets stuck in your head like a bit of beef in the back of your bicuspids.

Eventually I remembered: San Diego used to have a very popular homespun chain of restaurants called Boll Weevil. Maybe there’s a connection?

So on a Tuesday afternoon, we pulled into the mall, dodged some pre-teens walking home from nearby Parkway Middle School, and approached The Weevil Burger. We had expected a dark, truckstop-style bar and grill.

Instead, when the doors swung wide, we found an invitingly open-spaced, clean-looking, and incredibly red interior. We’re talking RED. The carpet, walls, tables and booth cushions are all brick red, or possibly more of an Indian red if you want to get art-school technical about this particular hue.

At the entrance, the restaurant’s name and logo are emblazoned on two gigantic red wagon wheels (ceiling lighting also uses wagon wheels). The logo is a round, cartoonish figure that looks like Pac-Man with a cowboy hat. Actually, it’s a cute lil’ ol’ weevil. Awwww, weevils. Don’t you just want one for a pet?

We were greeted by Ashli, one of the most enthusiastic and communicative foodservers I’ve met in any La Mesa restaurant. From age 17 to 24, Ashli worked at both the Miramar Road and the Lemon Grove locations, eventually paying her way through Grossmont College. She clearly enjoys her workplace and thinks highly of the way its managers, John Shorees and Maddie Sylliaasen, have rejuvenated the restaurant since the demise of the Boll Weevil chain in December 2008.

Long story short: Boll Weevil once had as many as 19 restaurants in San Diego, beginning with the location on Midway Drive north of Barnett Street in Point Loma. They go back to 1947, when a steak restaurant named Cotton Patch became popular enough to earn such patrons as John Wayne.

In 1967, the late Fred Halleman opened a Boll Weevil burger joint next to the Cotton Patch. At that time, the playful name was probably quite humorous, since the massive infestation of Anthonomus grandis (boll weevils) throughout the Cotton Belt was still fresh in the cultural memory.

Fast-forward 40 years: Employees at the remaining seven Boll Weevil company stores arrive to find the doors chained shut. Their holiday cheer gets squished further when they find out they won’t receive paychecks. Ashli attributes the bankruptcy to company mismanagement: “We would constantly run out of basics like ice, or onion rings. The owners didn’t care.”

Ashli was very happy when the Lemon Grove franchise’s owner, John Shorees, decided to resurrect the 30-year-old Fletcher Parkway location as a better, fresher Weevil-based establishment. The doors opened July 3, 2010, attracting both old-timers and newcomers.

Visually the place is retro-awesome. There’s something for everybody: four TVs, pool tables, arcade games, a gaggle of vending machines full of toys and candy, a bar, and enough tables to seat an entire crop’s worth of cotton-pickin’ workers.

A remote control is floating around if you want to change one of the TV’s channels, but because the food is messy, it’s encased in plastic. During my meal, an older, milkshake-slurping gentleman switched the nearby television to Fox News, which unfortunately isn’t good for digestion.

Speaking of digestion: The burgers are fantastic, but be warned: They’re huge. Whether a half-pound or a quarter-pound, these are the kinds of burgers that actually do look like the photograph in the advertisement. I skipped breakfast in anticipation of the lunch meal, and I ended up skipping dinner that evening, too.

I ordered the A-One-Derful Burger, for $8.25. This was recommended as Ashli’s favorite, and it has three cheeses, A-1 sauce, ortega chiles and sour cream. Needless to say, it’s a bit messy, but plenty of napkins are nearby. (Ashli also recommended the Philly Cheese Steak, which also is $8.25.)

The hamburger meat is lean, with nary any noticeable fat or oil. The thick patty was cooked nicely, though it had just tiny hints of pink in the middle, so you might want to order it medium-well or well done.

It’s held in a sizable bun that’s fresh and firm enough not to break into pieces, which is essential with a large burger. The foodserver brings a full tray of condiments and sides to your table, which includes plastic containers of crisply cut onions, pickles, thousand-island dressing and other ingredients to help make a sloppy, tasty meal even sloppier and tastier.

On the side, I split an order of half onion rings, half curly fries. The latter’s bouncy, springy spirals looked like what would happen if Goldilocks or Cindy Brady’s hair of curls fell into a deep-fat fryer.

My friend opted for one of The Weevil Burger’s most popular lunches, the Weekly Special of a half-pound Steerburger with Fries for $4.99. Splurge and add one dollar if you want cheese, lettuce and tomatoes. Pretty good deal considering this single order could probably feed a small village. He also ordered a schooner of Michelob AmberBock beer for $3.59.

The Weevil Burger has some cool specials, including 99-cent gyros on Friday and 99-cent hotdogs and nachos on Saturday. During the daily 4 to 9 p.m. happy hour, a pint of beer is $1.99 and a 48-ounce domestic pitcher is $5.99. In addition to burgers, the menu has various chicken baskets, salads, fish-and-chips offerings, hotdogs, kid plates, and various ice-cream desserts and shakes.

For a place with its roots in the post-WWII years, consider The Weevil Burger both a formidable site for a calorie-bombing run and an appealing air-raid shelter. To paraphrase the toy slogan: Weevil Burgers make you wobble, and you will swallow down.