Stop #25: Copia

Tony's Review: For our 25th anniversary Tim and I decided to go somewhere fancy and very romantic. No we didn't go to Pasta House but we did have a very private lunch at Copia on Washington. This place oozes class from only offering their slinger during lunch, accommodating wait staff and only cloth towels in the bathroom. Whoa. Our friend Greg has been bugging the hell out of us to check this place out and claiming it's the best slinger he's had...well Greg now you can leave us alone.

This baby pulled out all the stops on it's way to Flavorville, USA and adding real bacon strips to the mix was top notch, Market Pub House should take note how a classy place does bacon. The slinger was surprisingly traditional offering two cheeseburger patties, over easy eggs, home fries, homemade chili, cheese and the previously mentioned bacon. No onions on this one, you probably have an important meeting if you're eating at this place for lunch. The burgers may be some of the best we've had so far, they somehow captured the taste of a diner burger but made it 1,000% better and they were full of awesome cheesy bites. Bonus points were added when I started cutting up the bacon and adding them to my burger bites, aka bacon chee. Really all of the ingredients were great, potatoes were well cooked and seasoned, eggs were good and the chili had a really nice taste though it would have been nice if there were more chili on that big plate.

We debated if this was the coveted new number one, which is high praise already, after some debate it comes close but won't grab the crown. First, this thing costs $13 which is good for a restaurant like Copia but fucking insane for a slinger. And there was something missing from the slinger it could of been the onions but I think it was how it was served with all of the ingredients on their own only joined by the chili, maybe if they stacked it and let all the bold flavors get to know each other it could of been even better. Without a doubt this was one of the best we've eaten and there were only picky things about this one so if you're a millionaire you should check this one out.

Tim's Review: I've had a couple people tell me that Tony and I are kind of mean in this blog. My only defense for that is: “hey, we've choked down a lot of shitty slingers!” They do make me a little angry sometimes (I'm looking at you Market pub house). Luckily, that's not always the case. Every once in a while, we eat something great. Copia was definitely a high point on the tour and I left happy.

I'm pretty much on board with everything Tony said on this one so I'll be quick. Every ingredient on this plate was top notch. I still feel like I could have used a little more chili, but this thing was probably a perfect size. I really don't need to stuff my face with crazy amounts of chili in the middle of the day, then go back to work and pretend like I'm not a piggy. Shhhhhhh. I actually didn't even notice the missing onions until I read Tony's review, so obviously they weren't really needed anyway. I do need to emphasize how awesome that burger was though. This is one of the very few burgers we've had that I would actually love to eat outside of the slinger. On a bun, melted cheese, lettuce, tomato, and if that bacon was there, I'd be in heaven.

So the line bottom line: Copia delivers a great slinger and a solid contender, but you got to pay for this masterpiece. It's definitely worth a try, but when someone else can serve up a comparable plate for close to half the price, I can't say I will choose Copia on a regular basis.  After some serious thought, Copia is the third best slinger around.