Habits Cafe

Burger #22: Habits Cafe– Habits Burger + bacon 8.50$ 

Habits Cafe is a well known burger place in Cincy.  Not my picture. 

Happy labor day weekend!  It's a hot weekend so far with about 98 degrees out until late last night.  It seemed like no one was out last night as I went for a jog fairly late in the evening.  It's the second week of class and I am loving my intro to business class.  The subject material is more like behavioral psychology, psychology being my first major I loved.  I like finding out what makes people tick and the books I have read recently have been about social dynamics.  This is the one of the biggest weekends for Cincinnati.  I am looking forward to the fireworks tomorrow night. Luckily, I am only 2 blocks from the levee and can see it all from the comfort of my own home.  How about all of you, any big plans? 

Our review for the week is for Habits Cafe which was number 22 on the list and it was the 21st burger I had this year.  This is one of the best known burger places in the city and they are located in  Oakley Square right across the street from the Oakley Pub which I reviewed earlier this year as having a great burger for a great price.  Habits is a great bar and has a great beer selection until 2:30 am.  It is a fairly large place with plenty of seating and definitely is not a hole in the wall bar.  Plus, there are always some local sports on the flat screens located throughout the place.  I went on a Monday night, 7-11-11, and watched most of the home run Derby.  It wasn't that empty on a Monday so I just sat at the bar.  I think this is my fifth or sixth time going there but it's been about 2 years. 

The menu at habits is pub food with an upscale flavor for a very reasonable price.  Nothing on the menu is over 16$ and that is a sirloin steak and most things are under 10$.  This is a great place to take a cheap date if you are hurting for money in this economy.  The bartender recommended the potato rags which are apparently a "Cincinnati Classic", which I had never heard of after 4 years here so I don't know how much of a classic they are.  I didn't try them this time since I don't think I could handle more grease from the hash browns covered with bacon, cheeses, and ranch.  They also have sandwiches and burritos.  I definitely wasn't expecting the burrito section but I guess they make some of their own ingredients like the black beans and salsas.  I would be interested in knowing if anyone has ever had the tofu in one of these?

Habits burger w/ bacon added, and yes that is apple butter on the right!

The burger list here is impressive to say the least!  Oh, and the burger and sides list is extensive and some of the best sounding I've seen!  I love a place that has takes pride in it's food.  The meat here is delivered daily by a local "prime butcher."  You have several choices of meat to choose including the regular burger, cajun, garden, orstrich, and turkey burger.  Plus, if you are trying to stay extra healthy you can get a chicken breast instead.  You then can choose what you want on your burger.  Some of the styles are the Godzilla (pepper jack, spicy onion straws + jalapeno mayo), Texas (cheeses, Worcestershire mayo, onions, mushrooms), royal Mountie (Canadian bacon, cheese, red onion, honey mustard mayo), and bacon blues (honey pepper bacon, bleu cheese, bbq sauce).  You can add just about anything you can think of to the burger including rice?, sprouts, seasame sticks?,and  avocado.  As for the sides there are tons!  You can get not just fries, but Texas, cajun, or sweet potato fries, red beans and rice, mac & cheese, apple sauce, onion rings and a few more things. 

I started my meal with a bowl of white chicken chili that came with tortilla stripes, which was damn good, but not as seasoned as I would like.  My burger was supposed to be the Godzilla burger but I thought that the onion straws didn't seem like they'd let me really taste the burger, so I opted for the standard Habits burger and added bacon and jalapeno mayo.  The burger here is rated highly in all of the reviews and I'd say it did not disappoint.  The meat was not greasy, cooked pink in the middle and juicy.  It was fresh and well seasoned.  It's always nice when you know when you can tell your burger has not been frozen.  The jalapeno mayo wasn't strong flavored so I wouldn't miss it if I didn't get it again.  The bacon was thin and average, as was the bun, but this was definitely not your average burger.  As for sides I went with a split half and half with the cole slaw, which was recommended by the server, and the sweet potato fries.  The cole slaw was sweet, but white and creamy which isn't my thing, so I wouldn't get it again.  I had no idea but the sweet potato fries come with apple butter.  If you have not had apple butter before you need to get to Habits and try it.  It is not what you are expecting, there is no butter, but it's more like a thicker version of sweetened apple sauce with seasonings including cinnamon that just goes with the sweet flavor of the sweet potato fries. 

Habits knows it's business is in it's burgers and it does it well.  This is also a great bar to hit if you want to hang out with a younger crowd in the Oakley area late night with a cool craft beer selection.  I don't know if this will be in my top 10 just yet, but that is definitely a possibility.  Who knows what the future holds, because the best things in life are always surprises, maybe one of the unknown burger places I still need to go to will outshine Habits.