Rodney Richey: Who’s your king now, huh?

By Rodney Richey, Herald Bulletin Feature Writer

July 04, 2009 07:42 pm

— Adventures in Fine Dining, Chapter 1
SANTA CLARITA Calif. — The sun pounded the L.A. area like a cheap steak as my friend Al (short for “Aloysius”) and I stumbled into the blessedly air-conditioned Fatburger in Valencia.
For my Hoosier friends, Fatburger is a chain in the western U.S. According to legend, it was named thusly because each sandwich is “fat” with toppings. Sure.
Fatburger is only one of several L.A. eateries I miss. You got your Hamburger Hamlet, The Habit, The Shack, In-n-Out Burger, Pink’s Hot Dogs, Bob’s Big Boy, Cantor’s Deli, Musso and Frank’s ...
Al and I had been told of a little-known competition going on almost continuously at the Fat. Anyone who could eat one of its sandwiches, plus fries and a drink, would get his picture on “The Wall of Shame.”
The sandwich was called “The Triple King.” The Fat’s regular burger was the King, with a half-pound patty and cheese. So The Triple King was, of course, THREE half-pound patties, plus three slices of cheese, plus toppings, plus a half-pound of fries and an extra-large soda.
That’s all.
Now, Al and I were both big lads. We had done the circuit: franks at Tail O’ the Pup in Beverly Hills, burgers at the oldest surviving McDonald’s in Downey, and that thing they served at Tommy’s Original (supposedly, it’s the first chili-cheeseburger, but it eats like a gallon bag of steak).
No novices to this “living large” concept, we still sat for a moment, not so much out of reverence, but merely to stop perspiring like Lindsay Lohan in a confessional.
“You got The Triple King here?” Al asked the girl at the counter.
“Yes, we do, sir,” she said with all the feigned enthusiasm of a ride worker at Six Flags.
“Load us up,” I said.
We both struggled to carry our trays to the table.
The mound of fries and keg of beverage were daunting enough, but the “sandwich” (such an inadequate word) appeared to be breathing on its own, sweating beef fat and laughing like Jabba the Hutt.
And I was Princess Leia.
“Soon ... you will learn to appreciate me,” it muttered gutturally.
“You ready?” I asked Al, who was fretting over The Triple King as if it were a worrisome philosophical dilemma. Or a pit viper.
Our stubby fingers compressed the sandwiches, to allow that all-important first bite, as Al and I dug into our King Burgers like Vikings sacking a coastal village.
A half hour later, none of that would matter.
A half hour later ...
The insanity of competitive eating was now obvious. It’s gluttonous, we admitted, wasteful and pointless, a sad remnant of our youth and stupidity.
“I was fairly confident, maybe cocky, that I was going to finish it,” Al remembered years later. “Of course, as I do, I ate the fries first. That turned out to be a problematic strategery.”
As for me, I waddled out to the car like a cow strolling into a slaughterhouse, thankful to live through this beef encounter.
Cheeseburgers had lost their appeal. I could smell beef oozing from my pores. I needed a stack of napkins, plus a hot shower. And a couple of handfuls of Lipitor.
Contact Rodney Richey, 640-4861, rodney.richey@heraldbulletin.com. He’s so glad that Lea & Perrins makes a thick Worcestershire sauce now.

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