Bartels Giant Burgers...Driving South on the last leg of a road trip to Seattle, we were southbound on Interstate 5 near the town of Corning, and getting more hungry by the second. Â I pulled out the iPhone and checked Yelp for a decent, but affordable place to eat, when up popped "Bartels Giant Burgers" with great ratings and a free soft drink E-coupon upon check-in! Â
This sounded like a plan to us and we're so glad that we gave them a try!  Their Corning location (10 miles from the middle of nowhere) is immediately off the Corning Road freeway off-ramp; and appeared to be just as easy to get back on to continue our trip South.  The hubby and I ordered cheeseburgers and fries (with their special fries sauce) and he also had their orange-freeze, which really is a hidden gem!  The restaurant is actually a re-purposed  gas station, with plenty of seating outside if the inside is full.  Restrooms are located outside and to the rear of the building (be sure to pick up the funny looking and rather large keys and key paddles to gain entry...try sneaking away with those babies in your pocket!).  Food is easily ordered but takes a little longer to prepare since it is all made to order and not kept warm under lights, like so many fast food establishments. Â
I enjoyed their cheeseburger and fries much more than my last outing to In-and-Out Burger (which is hard to beat), which is a definite complement to Bartels  Burgers.  That said, we would definitely stop here the next time we're in the area as they are simply that good, tasty; and the service was very friendly as well.  Give them a try and I promise you won't be disappointed!  Happy Days Vintage Food and good service earns a 4 out of 5 from these travelers.  Now just where is Corning again....
First off hair in burger...no thank you.
Second, seeing smokers that don't wash their hands after going to the bathroom, definitely not. Â Yes people, those are the cooks. Â (I know they don't wash their hands because I was waiitng to go the bathroom and you can hear EVERYTHING!)
My parents stopped here awhile back just to use the bathroom and again, confirmed the "no hand washing". Â Comparing stories with them just proved my point.
Flies...I don't think I need to say much more.
Don't eat here.
Bartels is a family owned business and only has a few locations. They are very small but serve really good food. Every location that I've been to has always had a friendly staff where they make you feel at home. The inside has a few tables and a counter that you can sit at along with a few covered tables outside. It's usually decorated with several framed photos of old cars.
You order your burger, fries and drinks separately or you can make your burger a meal with a small fry and drink. Cheese is extra if you want to add cheese to your burger. I usually have them saute my onions for my burger.
If you're looking for a BIG and JUICY burger then this is the place for you. You can have your burger cooked just how you like it, whether you like it medium rare or well done, its up to you. The Double giant cheese burger! Doesn't get much better than this. I love their fry sauce because it's not ketchup based like most other restaurants. I once asked one of the employees how they make their fry sauce and he told me that they use mayonnaise, mustard, seasoned salt, and garlic powder. I love it.
Good place to stop off the 5. Very classic, greasy burger joint feel. Nothing about the food that makes it absolutely stand out. Shakes were pretty good in spite of being chocolate syrup with vanilla for a chocolate shake (not the same as chocolate ice cream bases - don't try to deny it b/c you'd be wrong).
Food takes a little while (probably b/c I ordered my onions grilled) but it's fresh burgers so not complaining. They got my 'medium rare' request just right and the service as really nice.
Wouldn't go out of my way but definitely one of the better options if you're in Corning anyway.
Big sloppy awesome burgers, like they're supposed to be.
Nice people working there, and always a nice crowd eating there.
This makes traveling I-5 worth it. The perfect compliment to a road trip, and you expect to see the girl from American Graffiti pull up in her 'vette.
Lotsa parking room if you've got a trailer or whatever, and outdoor seating.
Dacron Dan on the road again with the band... this time riding along is my buddy Derek 'Banjovi' Bodkin.
...and we are hungry!
Whenever I head to northern California I time my ride to stop by Bartels Giant Burger. Â It's a little stop with a BIG taste! Â Not a shiny fancy masterpiece but this place has history. I work for a music company and I've spoken to Neal Young's engineer who told me 'When Neal and I would go on the road back in the day he would insist on stopping at Bartels for a burger'.
Hey Hey my my...if it's good enough for Neal it's got to be good enough for little ole me. Â And Neal is right! Â When the cook asks 'How do you want it' you know this place is not gonna be a cookie cutter experience. Â
I ordered my burger medium ( as usual ) with a side of fries and chocolate shake. All came quickly to the little bar ( we ate in ). Â The place is not fancy... Pictures of hot rods evoke a feel of an earlier era and we happily slammed down the juicy burgers. Fresh ingredients and a nice fresh bun...nice. Â Fries crispy and hot...nice.
Ok... if you NOT hungry then you gotta stop just to have a shake! Â SUPER NICE! Â
Folks... This is not fancy shmancy food. This is food for regular people with regular dreams. Â And my dreams are filled as well as my belly!
Bartels gets two thumbs up. Â both mine. Â My buddy Bodkin is still too busy eating his burger. But from his smile I think he'd agree with me.
I'm not gonna lie... this place is kind of grimy looking from the outside. But maaaaaan they can make a mean burger! My sister and I were coming back down from a trip to Seattle when we stumbled across this little place. Lots of locals swing by and it has kind of a homey feel inside. Their burgers are fresh and juicy. Definitely a better choice than McDonalds or some other fast food joint. The kids were nervous at first, but loved it as soon as they sunk their teeth into their burgers. I'm glad we decided to stay and try it out! Definitely a bang for your buck!
Review Source:Bartels is quite possibly the biggest, most delicious burger you will ever eat. Â Don't be put off by the look of the place, they know exactly what they're doing. I've been coming here for 20 years, and the place has always been quality. Â I've been to several lauded So-Cal places (Father's Office, Umami Burger, The Counter, etc.). For my money the giant burger trumps them all. Â However, be warned. This isn't some 6oz gourmet burger like you'll find in the city. Â It's a big, greasy, delectable monstrosity made for locals and truckers. Â It's the burger your grandpa would eat. Â Quality ingredients, friendly staff, bomb shakes, and decent fries. Â Get the Giant Burger not the regular one if you have any sort of appetite. Â
As for the complaints below: if you want a fast food burger made to the blandest, lowest common denominator, this isn't it. Â Alternatively, if you want Gruyere cheese, a side of asparagus or organic gluten-free ketchup, you're not getting that either. Â This is a straight-up, old-school burger joint. Â And for the love of God, order the burger how you want it. Â Don't like mayo? Â You should probably tell them to hold it. Â Sheesh. Â Bartels rocks (rant over).
I've driven by this exit a lot, and even turned off to go to some joints on the other side of the freeway, but never stopped at Bartel's. Â My loss!
It is indeed an old-fashioned burger joint, tasty food, and great service - prompt and efficient, very helpful.
The owner thanked us for our business - a rare treat these days. Â I'd say I'll stop there much more often now. Â A nice break on a long drive between Oregon and the Bay Area!
(Updated) 12/6/12
We received a very nice invitation from the owners of Bartels Giant Burger to come back and give them a second chance, on them.  My wife, daughter and I went in there today.  I must say that the service was out of this world.  Everyone was friendly, and polite.  The service shinned through so much that at that moment I knew that we would be putting this place on our regular rotation of places to dine.  The food was so good this trip! my burger was cooked perfectly to my order as well as my wife's.  It was juicy and didn't come drowned in condiments, I asked for mayo only this trip and it was just perfect.  the fries were really good. They are what you  would expect to find at an old fashioned Burger place.  But the sauce that they served up on the side of the fries was in my opinion the crown jewel.  it looked like your run of the mill thousand island dressing, but it wasn't thousand island dressing at all it was a wonderful secret sauce had notes of garlic and I believe it was mayo based but beyond that I haven't got a clue what was in it.  I will go back to this establishment and am actually looking forward to it.  I also have to give a huge thank you to the owners for readying my comment about their place and corrected the issues I had during my last visit.  If your in Corning and looking for a good place to grab a great burger then Bartels should be the first place you visit.
My wife and I recently visited this place.  The burgers were under-seasoned and over dressed, they put mayo, ketchup mustard and mass quantities of them.  when it comes to the perfect burger or at least a good one I am a firm believer in less is more when it comes to condiments.  Let the flavor of the meat and seasonings be complimented by condiments. When you scoop large amounts of  mayo, and drowned in mustard and ketchup your covering something up, if you have to cover your burger up and mask the gross qualities of your food then you shouldn't even serve it up.  I will never go here again.
Wow 8 Bucks for the regular little burger, a small drink and frys that tasted like grease. Â Nothing out of this world, but liked the fresh iceberg lettuce, and healthy amount of mayo on the fresh bun. Â
Hmm, ok if you want a little hole in the wall burger place and support Ma and Pa, then go here! Â Just do not be terribly hungry if you order the small meal!
Great old-school burger joint right off I-5, like a time machine to the early 1960s. Five stars for the giant burger and malt, three stars for the fries, four stars for the divey diner ambience. Service is friendly but it can get noisy inside, so if it's not too hot you might want to sit on the patio. Especially if that one waitress won't shut up about her Avon business. But overall, the burgers make it worthwhile.
Review Source:Barrels Giant Burgers! #food
Fantastic. This place is everything one wants in a burger joint/ road trip stop. They "accidentally" made an extra chocolate shake when we ordered vanillas. I think they wanted to have us try both flavors! Then the owner brought out our food (and he was the typical country man: black curly hair with shreds of salt, wrangler jeans and a pressed black button up long sleeve, oh, nice boots too of course, and it was 100 degrees!) and said, " we got a little heavy on the fries, hope ya don't mind". *smiles*
shakes are awesome; think, creamy, real ice cream and huge. Burgers are big, thick meats, cooked perfectly.
They have a digram/list explaining how the meat will look with each temperature.
The bathroom is clean.
They all smile, it's family run.
Outside seating and inside.
Lots of parking, turn around space for trucks and trailers.
So good, we are going back now.
Must stop!
I ordered the large cheeseburger (they use American cheese) prepared medium, and they did a great job on it.
We ate at the counter, and plates are not provided, not even paper plates. Â Green?
They just slid paper-wrapped burgers in front of us.
OooooK.
Kinda weird, but whatever.
Minor complaint, but this kind of stuff bugs me..... Â The BBQ sauce bottle was sticky. Â They should at least wipe it down. Â That was gross.
So, a very good burger, served in a sheet of paper with no frills. Â Prices were also good.
4 for the burger - done medium as desired, and great taste.
1 for the lack of service, or conversation beyond taking the order and the money and sticky stuff on BBQ sauce container.
It had been an insane drive and I hadn't had a meal in over 24 hours. Burgers sounded good and there was no way I was visiting a big chain.
The fries and malt were passable but the burger was pretty darn good. Much better than I expected. And they had more self serve condiments than I expected too. Need some mustard, or some hot sauce or a few jalapenos on that burger? Dig in!
Properly fortified and pleasantly stuffed I pulled back onto the road for the 8 hour drive back home.
It is important to recognize when you pull up here that it is a dive. That is its charm. I read a lot of reviews for this place and see what is ultimately the ugly side of yelp, which is reviewer's lack of perspective.
My visit here was just last week. I was very happy with the burger, fries, and soda. the inside was very clean, comfortable, and the staff was friendly. we ate outside where it was impeccably clean and the provided shade was pleasant. Â
The highlight of the meal were the fries. piping hot and perfectly salted. old school. The low of the meal was the cheese on the burger was not melted through. I would suggest to them to lay the cheese on the patty as it finishes cooking and steam it down with a lid. other than that the patty was just as ordered and the garnish fresh and crisp. couldnt ask for more from a dive except for an ice cold beer!
I read the reviews and with a wary eye decided to try this place out on road trip today and make up my own mind.
Positives: Â My fiance got her order exactly as desired, ordered the burger medium well. Â Chocolate malt was pretty good.
Negatives: I ordered a burger with cheese, medium, everything and grilled onions. Â I got a larger burger, medium-rare (mushy, warmed over), no grilled onions. Â The gal at the grill was on the surly side so I didn't feel like complaining and just pulled off the non-grilled onion and ate it.
No fries available, fryer on the fritz. Â Potato chips made do.
Flies mentioned previously were in attendence.
This joint doesn't stand up to places like the Red Onion in the East Bay, which has a similar menu. Â Nor In-N-Out, though I was going for the no-chain thing.
I was hoping for roadside charm and while I didn't experience any Texas chainsaw, the lunch was, on the whole, not worth the stop.
I have no idea why some reviewers are comparing this place to Burger King. If hamburgers are a commodity food item for you, stick to BK and McD's.
This place is for those who appreciate a little throwback to yesteryear, when drive-ins were more common than drive-thru's.
My family likes to go off the beaten track a little bit, and this place certainly qualifies, even though it serves a very traditional burger. The service here doesn't try to treat you like Their Most Important Very Important Customer with cheer and Pleasant Smiles and Is There Anything Else I Can Get For You, ad nauseum. Instead, they just do their job and it well: get your order, fill your order efficiently, and then move on to the next customer. If you want to be pampered, go to some other apostrophe S restaurant (Red Robin's, Applebee's, Chili's, ... you get the point).
My wife finds that few restaurants can remember to remove the tomato from her burger; but these guys did. She loved the Ortega chili on the burger.
I ordered my burger cooked to medium, she order hers well-done. Her order and my order were quickly delivered to us, cooked exactly as we had ordered them, and both were hot with crisp lettuce inside. The order of fries we shared were still fresh-from-the-fryer hot. And I had a chocolate malted that still had the chocolate syrup and vanilla ice cream imperfectly but sufficiently mixed; that thing was made by real hand, not by a machine.
I gave this place five stars, but it's important to note that I'm comparing it to other similar burger joints, not to just any place which serves a burger, or even just restaurants in general. If you want to go back to the year 1975, and get a great burger freshly made exactly like it would have been back then, with fries and a shake or a soda, then this is the place where you should go.
It was like something out of a roadtrip horror movie. Well, ok, thats an exaggeration...But it was awful.
My dad and I stopped here on our way home from Lake Shasta a couple days ago. We had been on the road for a while, our butts were sore and our tummies were growling. He suggested Quiznos, but did I listen? No! Â I wanted to try something new, I thought it would be cool.
First off, the place was full of flies. That pretty much grossed me out. Second the girl behind the counter couldn't seem to get our orders right when she finally did come over to take them. In a town full of what seemed to be quite personable people, it seemed we'd met the unpersonable side of Corning. They have all these stickers in their window of recognition from the city, I don't know why.
They didn't have any fries. At first when she said this, I thought they didn't make fries there, which seemed odd since those normally go hand in hand with burgers. Finally I figured out they were out. A burger joint without fries? Really? Yes.
I asked her if they had any other sides, then proceeded to spend the next few miniutes trying to explain to her what I meant by a side, untill finally she said they had potato chips. By potato chips she meant some of those tiny elementary schooler lunch sized packs of Lays potato chips. Uh, no thanks.
Finally when the burger was cooked, we said we wanted them for here. She promptly tossed them onto the counter wrapped entirely in a peice of paper. No plate, not even folded differently so you could start eating it. I wanted to go, but I had a burger to finish. Thank god we only got the normal burgers cuz I wouldn't have wanted to finish the giant burger; it was dripping in grease, quite literally. I had a stream running down my arm, it was disgusting. I just kept thinking of Elvis, and how he died on the toilet, and his fondness for burgers that would send grease running down his arms.
The grease aside, the normal burger is really small. It seems you can either have a snack, or destroy your stomach here with the size of the portions. They don't have any other sizes. Only two.
Finally we were able to leave, my dad finished with a grimace.
On the way out, in the parking lot, him and I agreed this place was not worth the gas it took to take the off ramp.
I almost blew past this place on my way back from the Pit River, but I'm glad I managed to make the exit. I-5 is liberally strewn with fast-food burger joints, but Bartel's is a definite stand-out. I had the giant burger with cheese and some fries, and both were quite tasty. Burger was cooked as ordered, and everything was nice, hot and fresh. Very friendly service from  the folks there. I heard other diners who, like myself, had stumbled across Bartel's by accident saying that they loved the burgers. A good experience overall!
Review Source:We stopped here on the way back from a Ladies retreat and we enjoyed the fresh burgers, fries and milk shake.  So when we were on  a recent road trip to Ashland, OR, we stopped here.
Food was ok..Service was not.
They had opened at 10:00 and it was 10:30, they didn't have any milkshakes because they just had turned on the machines. She said it would take an hour for them to warm up. 15 mins later I heard them running. The lady was not friendly at all. It was just my husband and I and our two year old, so it wasn't like there was a lunch rush hour. No smiles, no how are you today, gosh not even a hello. We ate quitely inside afraid to talk much because she was hovering over the counter like she was waiting for us to leave. Also, we finished our sodas, but didn't ask for refills beacuse just had that feeling she would say no. Â Wish I could say I had a better experience.
It's a bad sign for a place to compare poorly to Burger King...
My burger was topped with two huge discs of red onion (together I think they were larger than the burger patty) and a lake of mustard - standard; I'm glad I had them hold the mayo. My milkshake was so thick as to be undrinkable and was made from syrup and soft-serve, so the quality wasn't very high either. Â (The silver lining is that since I didn't drink it all, I saved myself several hundred calories.) Prices were above-average for generally below-average food.
The atmosphere and decor are rather distressed, and the staff made notable errors in several orders around me. It's nice you can request your burger cooked-to-order; too bad that didn't seem to affect whether you got "well-done" or "well-done". Still, it was nice to see a bulletin board with local events (misspelled) and business cards on it.
Sadly, Bartels demonstrated why there's a niche for national franchise burger chains.
We needed a place for lunch on our way to San Diego. If Giant Burger was any closer to I-5 it would be on the hard shoulder.
It was an atmospheric joint with a small menu and an emphasis on the burgers and an explanation of the different cooking temperatures.
I asked about the veggie burger and was told that it was a bunch of vegetables smashed together and frozen and that if you wanted a burger go for the meat. I think it was there just to appease any vegetarians who are stupid enough to walk into a place with a 100 foot tall Giant Burger sign.
The burgers came out quickly and were pretty good. Nice and juicy. The chicken breast sandwich, despite being previously frozen was also very good.
We took a chocolate malt to go and it was excellent. Nice and cold on a hot day with great malty flavor.
Fun, quick, and easy stop of the I-5 with good burgers.
Wow, talk about a yummy burger. Â My husband and I stopped for olives and ended up at Bartels like so many before us. Â People were friendly and the food was delicious. Â We had a couple burgers, fries, and a shake. Â They even do lettuce wraps. Â My husband especially appreciates that since he has a wheat allergy. Â I will definitely stop again and again.
Review Source:I stumbled across this place a few years ago on the way home from visiting some family friends in Redding. I was just with my dad, and we stopped in and had burgers. Last year, we were going to be passing through Redding again, this time with my mom and brother, and I wanted to find this palce. I couldn't remember the name, just that it had a bulletin board with local fliers inside and it was by all the olive trees on the way home from Redding. As we were passing through the olive area, which I learned was Corning, we too saw all the billboards advertising the Olive Pit and naturaly assumed that it was the mystery place. As we got off the freeway, we saw a giant flashing sign, and realized that it was too conspicuous to be the mystery burger place from years before. Luckily, Bartels is strategically off the same highway exit as the Olive Pit, and as we drove by it, my dad and I realized it was the mystery place. We stopped in for a burger, and thoroughly enoyed it. Come here. It's cool.
Review Source:I'm not generally a "burgermeister", but the burgers here could make me change my ways. Â Like Stacy, we were drawn off I-5 by the lure of anchovy-, jalapeno- and (believe it or not) olive-stuffed olives at the Olive Pit. Â However, the place was undergoing renovation and the restaurant was closed, so rather than give in to the major-chain fast-food imperative we decided to try the giant burger. Â This was at noon on a Sunday, and a great proportion of the folks there seemed to be locals. Â
While the menu is limited (two sizes of burgers and a grilled chicken sandwich), in-n-out manages to be amazing with even less choice, so I'm not concerned as long as they deliver. Â What can I say -- the beef tasted fresh, the buns were soft, the toppings were top-drawer, the price was right and the service was friendly. Â From now on, I think this may become a normal stop for us when we're on the move along I-5. Â Highly recommended!
It was by sheer coincidence that I stumbled across this place. Â I was actually heading south on I-5 and exited intending to head over to the Olive Pit because of their 327 billboard ads I had seen in the last 3 miles. Â But who can pass up an inconspicuous roadside burger joint? Â Not this biatch.
I could tell this place is probably packed at lunch time and on weekends. Â No-nonsense burgers, fries and shakes. Â They asked me how I wanted my burger (rare when it comes to $3.95 burgers)...and when I said "still mooing", they obliged.
Crisp lettuce and extra onions and tomatoes topped with a bloody patty, just like I asked. Â This is my new favorite place! Â I'll be coming here every time I pass through Corning, wherever the F that was anyway...
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