The Counter

Cant believe this place shut down, it was always busy and delicious

Disappointed to hear this location is closing!
We were treated very well when we paid a visit to the Counter in Roseville. We’re big fans of this chain, and even bigger fans of the typically top-​notch service at their restaurants.
Oh well. That’s life. That makes for the second Counter location I know of that’s closed this year (Seattle-​Ballard closed in March). I hope that’s a sign of consolidation and streamlining rather than a harbinger of bad news for this company.

The food here is pretty good, but the prices were a bit on the high side and the service has been absolutely horrible the last two times I was there!
I’m not surprised at all that The Counter is closing up shop — to be totally frank, it’s deserved.
The last time I attempted to enjoy a burger at this location, we were told that there would be a 15 to 20 minute wait — no problem, the place seemed a little busy and we were there at 6PM on a Thursday night. After 15 minutes, when I checked back at the hostess counter, I was told that it would be about 15 to 20 minutes before my party would be seated. No… that’s not a typo… I didn’t type that twice… I was told it would be ANOTHER 15 to 20 minutes!
Fine…the kids were fairly entertained by the «dancing water» show at the fountain nearby.
After 10 minutes, I hopped back over to see how much longer the wait would be — as amusing as the water show was, the kids were getting a bit antsy and I was starting to get a bit hungry… so…guess what? ANOTHER 20 minute wait!!! ARE YOU KIDDING ME!!!
Yes, I actually said that out loud to the hostess. She apologized for the delay, but it was too late. There was no way that we were going to wait any longer. Come on… seriously now… the burger was good, but not THAT good!
We left there and headed over to Islands Grill down the road and… oddly enough… got a table after only a 5 minute wait. The burgers there? Very good. Was the Islands burger as customizable (build your own)? No, but there were enough options on the menu to satisfy our group.
I look forward to dining at Jacks Urban Eats, which I understand will be taking over this location.

I’m sad to hear the The Counter in Roseville will be closing, but have to say not surprising. My husband and I have never personally had a bad experience at The Counter, in fact we have always had a great experience.
I’m not too surprised about the closing though. One evening my husband and I were having dinner and it was probably around 8:15pm with a closing time of 8:30pm and the host turned customers away because it was getting close to closing time. There was only one other couple in the restaurant beside us and I just thought it was odd they turned customers away. It wasn’t just one group of customers turned away, but two. We sat there and were quite surprised. Maybe if they didn’t turn customers away they would have been able to remain open.
Sad to see it go.

You know what I love about this place? It’s that you can customize your burger… so everytime you go back, it can either be the same or different. The sauces and variety of toppings they offer are perfect for any BURGER LOVER! We’ll be back!!!

Come hungry!
The build-​your-​own-​burger concept is one that I love, and have been lucky enough to have enjoyed at quite a few places. But never have I seen so many options. My mind was blown! So many combinations, so little time to decide. But decide we did.
I went with bleu cheese, onions, mayo and tomatoes this time. Burger was cooked perfect. The smallest burger (1/​3lb if I recall) plus sharing the half-​and-​half sweet potato /​regular fries with my friend were more than enough to leave completely satisfied, if not a little over stuffed.
The fries and dipping sauces were fantastic. Super thin sliced fries, which I’m not usually a fan of, but they were pretty good. Nice and crispy. Especially with all the sauces.
The wait staff seemed a little disorganized. Some patrons had their names on the waiting list, others did not. They tried seating us before another couple that I KNOW had been waiting longer, so I told the host he needed to seat them first.
Every time we needed more water, instead of pouring out of a pitcher like most restaurants, they would bring out brand new glasses. Seems like a lot of extra dishes to be washed and running back and forth to the kitchen, in my opinion. Especially as much water as I drink.
Lastly, I understand that its a sign of the times, and maybe I’m just getting old, but I don’t think it’s appropriate to be waiting tables with your pants hanging way below your waist, barely being held up by your butt. Pull them up and try to be somewhat professional.
Food: good. Service: so-​so.
Look forward to coming back to try something new next time!

This review is based purely on their side salad and french fries (Not burgers!)
Service was somewhat slow for one employee out on the front yet we waited for 10 minutes to get our order taken down. I wasn’t too hungry so I ordered the side salad with garlic aioli sauce while we got the ⁵⁰⁄₅₀ french fries (garlic aioli and sweet potato fries)
The burgers looked appetizing but I can’t tell you much on that =(
But the salad was too plain for me. I basically got all the leftover lettuce that you find at the bottom of a salad bag! It was light green, white, and had too much of the stalk. My mistake was using a thick creamy sauce as the dressing.
The fries were super good! Sweet potato yum, roasted garlic aioli yum! but i think they put too much garlic cause my breath STANKKKKKKKED (and also cause you can taste the garlic haha)
Ill try their burgers next time for sure!
BUT TELL ME WHY THEIR CHAIRS ARE HELLA LOW?! You sit down and you think you’ll be sitting by now but squat a few more inches and PLOP! You’re shorter than all of your friends. I’m hella short so I was considered a midget compared to all of my friends.

A solid 3.5 star joint — and we dug the Brothers Johnson pic shining down on the patrons. Thanks to the fanfare generated on Unilocal,the honey and I visited this place armed with the information from their online nutritional values.
The service was friendly and prompt, complete with a list a patron must complete for their burger of choice. I topped my turkey burger with Swiss cheese, grilled pineapple, roasted red peppers, dried cranberries and baby spinach drizzled with apricot sauce, which I (albeit strangely) dubbed the «Hawaiian Thanksgiving» burger, and the honey topped his beef with Swiss cheese, sprouts, avocado, grilled onions and mushrooms.
Unless you have a big appetite, the ¹⁄₃ pound will be fine for most. We were convinced we could have a lower-​sodium experience. However, we were not convinced that the cooks really heard the request for «NO SALT» on our burgers and fries. Especially since our fries had the beautiful little crystals that look so much like NaCl (that’s the extent of my chemistry people).
Like the joint, not the salt, will visit again. Juicy yummy burgers!

The Counter is not overly aesthetically pleasing. It has a counter and scattered tables in a fairly boxed in area with high ceilings and exposed ductwork. There is nothing fancy about the walls, floors, or the tables yet it is a little on the pricey side. So what do you get for your money?
You get a gourmet hamburger made with quality beef. You get just about anything you could ever want on it, everything comes with a separate price tag of course, but they do have a ton of ingredients to choose from.
I chose a ¹⁄₃ pound patty on a ciabatta roll with bacon, grilled pineapple, grilled onions, gruyère cheese, and a sweet aioli spread.
The hamburger was perfectly cooked and the ¹⁄₃ pound weight is the weight after it is cooked rather than before so you get plenty of burger. With all of my choices of extras on my burger, I could barely get it in my mouth. I chose well, it was one of the most delicious hamburgers I have ever had and, upon completion, I felt over stuffed for hours.
The price of my burger and fries was probably comparable to a moderately priced steak but there are times when only a gourmet burger will do.
The Wizard says; rent an SUV, put on your best designer Jeans, and head to the counter for a burger worth dying for.

The Counter has a snazzy interior. It’s modern look is cool, with walls lined with skate decks and snowboarding pictures as well as a couple widescreen TVs. There’s even a couple parking spaces out front reserved for take-​out customers and a nice area outside where you can enjoy your food.
Upon walking in I was handed a paper to choose what I wanted on my burger, since I was taking out. I chose a ¹⁄₃ lb. beef burger with swiss cheese, grilled onions, tomatoes, and lettuce blend along with a single serving of sweet potato fries.
The burger was decent and the fries were really good, but the bottom line is I doubt I would come here very often because I can find a better burger for the price I paid somewhere else.

They have SWEET POTATO FRIES!!! That alone gets 4 stars. We sat outside and watched the little children play in the water fountain area. It was entertaining while we chose our burger build. I got the ¹⁄₃ lb beef burger with mixed greens, grilled onion, bacon and sharp provolone on a honey wheat bread with chipotle aioli. When our food came, it was complete silence for at least 2 minutes! You know the food is good! that fills the 5 stars.
We also order 2 fifty-​fifty, fries with sweet fries and fries with fried onions. I really like the shoestring fries and sweet potato fries, so both plates got cleaned off. There were also 6 of us =D

This is a burger place. In Roseville. That means tanned people in aloha shirts. And frosted hair. And lots and lots and lots of Jimmy Buffet fans.
I enjoyed their veggie burger on a bed of lettuce w/​sprouts, bacon, avo & maters, served with a side of sundried tomato vinegarette. The burger was made of rice, the occasional black bean, and various other veggies. It was charred on the outside & flavorful on the inside. Be sure to order the Sweet Potato Fries — they’re quite good.
I found myself walking out the door singing… I’m just a Veggie Burgah in Paradise!

Corporate shopping mall tenant, build-​it-​from-​the-​ingredients-​list, burger — centric money generator. Another Roseville slick, franchise chain outfit to feed the upwardly mobile local masses.
If your life long burger experences have been In/​Out, McDonnies and Burger King, you’ll think that this place is great. However, if you know where to purchase good quality beef and bread, know how to cook, you’ll realize that The Counter serves just average chow. French fries are undercooked and oily. We opted for salad.
2 burgers, one salad, 2 sodas = $ 30. Not a bargain.

Decision, decisions… I didn’t know what to choose for my burger. There were so many choices! After careful consideration I decided to order my burger with soft ripened brie, dilled pickle chips, hard boiled eggs, jalapenos, roasted corn & black bean salsa, chipotle aioli sauce on a rustic ciabatta bun. I wasn’t sure if my combination of ingredients would complement each other, but it turned out ok. A mistake that my friends and I made was the rustic ciabatta bread. We all agreed that the bread wasn’t that great. I wish it was grilled or toasted. If I was to eat here again I would like to pile on the different cheeses to my burger, but that will get expensive because it’s $ 1 for each additional cheese.
The Sweet Potato Fries were good but you can get them anywhere. I liked the Parmesan French Fries much better! They were mixed with parsley, rosemary, & garlic aioli. I like how they were skinny and crispy.
While it was fun customizing my own burger, there are better burgers elsewhere.

I went here the other day with my boyfriend. I had the make your own burger. I had ²⁄₃ lb beef on a ciabatta with sharp provolone, grilled onion, lettuce blend, tomatoes, sprouts, avocado, mayo, and honey mustard. We also ordered chili cheese fries as a starter.
The chili cheese fries were amazing! I really enjoyed it. And I was not expecting to get so much. It is definitely really messy to eat so we used the forks provided. There was a lot of chili so the boyfriend ordered more fries to eat with his burger and to put in the chili.
When my burger came, it was huge! And I was already getting full from the fries. But the burger was larger than the bun, and when I picked it up, everything was starting the fall out. I couldn’t even figure out how to put the entire thing in my mouth. I proceeded to cut the burger in half so that I could hold it better. But the difficulty was still eating it. I eventually just took as big of a bite as I could ad kept going. What I didn’t like about the burger was that the bun was absolutely way too small. You would think that they’d use a bigger bun for a bigger slab of meat. I also didn’t like the lettuce blend, which is basically chopped up lettuce. What happened to a nice slice of lettuce? And the beef. I thought I was eating a giant unseasoned meatball. Now me and my boyfriend can’t even think about eating another burger.
I’m not too sure about all the complaints of the music. It wasn’t loud to me, but I think we all have different preferences on the volume button. But I just really liked this place for the fries. Other than that, I don’t think I would come here for a burger.

Yes. Something is Roseville is worth 5 stars! Yippie, you finally did it suburbia, you made something worthwhile that I’m not going to be depressed about in five years.
I enjoyed the customization, the build your own burger with all the flavorful options. Herbed goat cheese spread, yes please. Roasted garlic aioli, sure, I’ll take it. Plasticy waiters with perfect hair, yeahhhh, I’ll take that too. If only he learned how to master algebra and could split up our check correctly, bygones, right? Ahhh well. The burger was fantastic, piled high with all the accouterments and juicy with beefy goodness.
Thumbs up Roseville. Way to bot be the usual boring track home restaurant.

3.5 stars, but I like the idea and concept so upgraded to a 4.
Food: Burgers are cool as long as you don’t choose a combination of things that suck. They are fairly large in size, definitely enough to fulfill your hunger. Onion strings are good. I would recommend the ¹⁄₃ lb burger. Anything bigger it’s hard for them to cook and the meat ends up being too dry and crispy on the outside.
Ambiance: Nice design and open layout. Plus the patio seating is a bonus.
Service: Very friendly and did a good job.
Price: Burgers start at $ 7.50 and go up depending on the size and decadence of your order.
Overall: If you want a different burger that is custom to you, Counter is worth a try.

My first time here, (and I live 5 friggen min away. I KNOW I KNOW). Came here for a cousin’s 21^st bday. They had no problem seating a party of 13 on the fly. MAJOR BONUS POINTS!
I saw that everyone suggested the sweet potato fries, and now I know why. HOLY WOW they are uh maze ing! Someone else ordered the parm fries, which were equally as delish.
I got a ¹⁄₃ lb burger, custom… sooo delish, and way bigger than I thought. I don’t even mind that it took a while for the burger to come out, as it was built perfectly.
There are so many damn options on their menu for burger combinations, I want to go try a different one every week, but I don’t need a ¹⁄₃ lb of burger on my thighs every week.
They have a huge bar, which seemed to only serve beer and wine (liquor license thing?). We had a 9 year old and 4 year old with us, and they loved their mini burgers, and the casual atmosphere was perfect for the kidlets.
My personal favorite touch was the graffiti’d skate decks hung on the wall. I want to do that in my house!

One of my closest friends was raving like crazy about this place. He told me that he has never tasted a better turkey burger in his life and that he always orders one and is super satisfied. So it was inevitable for me to check this place out and see if it was the real deal. I’m going to fast forward and tell you my experience in two words: All Hype.
Now for what happened. Don’t get me wrong, The Counter is a very nicer upscale burger joint. Comparing it to McDonald’s is like comparing a 1992 Ford Focus to a 2011 Lexus IS. But with all its bells and whistles I was hoping for something more memorable, something that really stuck with me.
We were seated outside and it may have been a little cold. It was busy and packed because it was a Friday. They hand you these menus you have to fill out and pick what kind of burger you want, how you want it prepared, what you want on it, and if you want any additional sides.
I got a ¹⁄₃ Pound Turkey Burger with roasted red peppers, avocado, and grilled onions with a pesto sauce, I know it sounds delicious. My friend may have ordered fires, I don’t recall. Our food came out and it looked pretty good. I started eating it and I remember that the turkey was not as great as my friend made it out to be. It just didn’t taste like a burger and it may have been a little bit drier. It was a little wet and juicy from all the toppings I got on it. My buddy asked me how it was and I think I told him it was «pretty good,» but I recall lying about that statement. I was still hungry after I finished eating my burger.
The bill came out to be like $ 13 or something absurd. I actually like Big Macs and Big N’ Tasty’s so burgers simply may not be my thing. I haven’t given this place much thought since I’ve eaten here. Burger lovers, come here, everyone else, go eat what you love, not this forgettable luxury.

I’m very torn for my scoring of this place. I think it deserves more then 3 stars but I wouldn’t go as far to say that I’m a fan. 3.5? Oh well until Unilocal invents the half star, I will give it four, because I really did enjoy my lunch and catching up with old friends.
I needed to pick a place close to my buddies work for lunch and while searching, I realized that The Counter was right around the corner, not to mention one of the places on my bookmarks list that I could cross off. Nothing better then killing two birds with one stone!
I liked the appeal of building your own burger. It made me think of the Seinfeld episode where Kramer wants to create a build your own pizza joint, just swap pizza dough for burger buns and wallah… The Counter is born.
So many different items to choose from. Then you have to pick which ones would complement each other. Its a big job, so they also provide some pre-​made burgers for those of you who are indecisive or maybe just don’t have the patience to think of what condiments compliment each other correctly.
I went for the build your own burger experience. I created a delicious bison burger (¹⁄₃ pound) with soft ripened brie, organic mixed greens, grilled onions, tomato, dill pickles, basil pesto sauce to top it all off with, laid out on a onion bun. Don’t forget the huge side order of Parmesan fries (to split of course)
While waiting, I tried to steal a woman’s shade, literally, but got called out on it. Damn patio with no shade. I would appreciate my own umbrella. Yes, I could have sat inside, but the mixture of the kitchen cooks, the people conversing, and the music, was a bit loud, so I opted for the patio. A woman walking by stole our napkins without asking, not The Counters fault at all, but I didn’t appreciate it. I would have given her some if she asked. How would you like it if someone just came to your table and snatched up your napkins? In the words of Stephanie Tanner «How RUDE!»
Parmesan fries arrived, they are quite possibly the best flavored fries ever! Tons of flavor without being too overwhelming. Good portions too. Our table of three didn’t even finish them. I thought $ 4.50 was a very reasonable price. +1 star
When our burgers arrived, we all had silly grins on our faces, finally getting to see our own little creations. I really enjoyed mine. They cooked it perfectly, just a hint of pink in the middle. +1star
My friend said that her chicken was a bit on the dry side but good. She also got the multi-​grain bun which kept falling apart on her, it may be her death grip or it may be a bad bun choice, not sure.
Our server was good, no one ran out of water and had to wait, we got our check before we were even finished with lunch, and she offered to do split checks when she noticed me calculating all of our bills on the receipt. She wasn’t the most friendliest, but she did her job without missing a beat.+1star
My bill for burger, fries and water with lemon was $ 17.50 and that’s not including tip. If they brought down their prices a touch, and possibly wheeled the store closer to me, I would definitely be a fan of this place. Until then, it will remain in the back of my mind till the next time I’m in the area and craving a pricey burger.