The Clause

First you take the bun, and then you take the patty. Oh, and don’t forget the cheese! When you put them together, what do you get? The cheeseburger.

When combined, these simple ingredients create one of the most popular foods in America. So much so that it had Pasadena burger joints dedicating a week to its celebration.

APU Broadcast COURTESY

Cheeseburger Week in Pasadena, Jan. 15-20, is the celebration of Lionel Sternberger’s “accident” in the early 1920s when he followed his curiosity of what cheese might be like atop a hamburger patty. According to Don Sternberger, Lionel’s nephew, everyone loved this not-yet-named hamburger with cheese.

“Lionel was a big eater,” Don said. “One day he just decided he wanted a hamburger with cheese on it and started serving it to the Rite Spot customers. That’s how my dad described it to me.”

As Don was eating a cheeseburger he made at home, he mentioned In-N-Out makes his favorite burger — a Double-Double with both grilled and regular onions.

“I’m a big fan of In-N-Out,” Don said. “They do a good job with their burgers. I tried to get my dad to go with me once but he wouldn’t. He would tell me, ‘No, we make a real cheeseburger.’”

The discussion of Cheeseburger Week brought together some of his family members since they are part of the history that made one of the most popular food items in America today.

“It’s important to celebrate the man who invented the cheeseburger because cheese made the burger way better,” Don “T” Flores, employee at the Dog Haus, located on 104 N. Hill St., said. “Cheese makes everything better, right?”

The Pasadena Chamber of Commerce hosted Cheeseburger Week as a part of Pasadena Restaurant Week.

In an effort to amp up foot traffic, certain local burger joints offered various promotions for customers including discounted burgers. Not only did the restaurants show pride for their burgers, but so did customers.

A regular at the Pie N’ Burger, Jerry Kohl, offered to buy an APU student a cheeseburger because they “just had to try it.” For Kohl, the Pie N’ Burger is “the real deal.”

The Pie N’ Burger, located at 913 E. California Blvd., maintains its old, 1960s diner look, still wrapping the burgers in paper liners since 1963. The special ingredients for their cheeseburger are prime beef and Thousand Island dressing.

The ambiance changed after stepping out of the American-style diner into a Mediterranean-style restaurant, The Burger Continental, located at 535 S. Lake Ave. The indoor/outdoor setting is “mystically eclectic” as described by Harry Hindoyan, one of the family owners.

The restaurant had live music and sing-alongs, indoor trees surrounded by various countries’ flags, a buffet of desserts including baklava, open-faced cheeseburgers with waffle fries and a salad bar. And to put to rest the question you might be asking — yes, of course, there was a belly dancer.

While Hindoyan described the atmosphere as a celebration of tradition, he said it is not simply for one type of person, but for everyone.

“[The celebration of the cheeseburger] is all Americana so you definitely have to celebrate that because we take pride in it, and I’m sure [Sternberger] did too,” Hindoyan said. “The tradition has to continue on. And we just want to maintain the best for our guests.”