Rocket Your Calorie Count at Johnny Rockets

If you ever want to develop an eating disorder, go to Johnny Rockets. I can’t understand why Johnny Rockets would voluntarily provide the calorie count of every artery-clogging item on their menu, so you can be sure to leave sweating grease and hating yourself just a little bit more for your lack of resolve, crumbling at the suggestion—again—of the waitress’s innocent, “Anything else?” Yet, despite all the self-respect that you will lose there—and, oh yes, it will be forever lost in the Johnny Rockets space void—the restaurant strives for a cheery décor achieved through a stylized fifties flare. This Johnny Rockets, located on E. 8th St. and Greene, seriously lacks in the flare department. Other than a couple of anachronistic posters in flimsy frames and dingy “vintage” booths, it seems like any other ill-lit and slightly depressing diner. (Although that could be the monstrous 1,940 calories calories talking; I am convinced they spawned a second drearier me.) Empty stools lined the speckled counter, and the whole place echoes of a contrived kitsch that has long since been ignored by its hipper surroundings. Still, this nearly abandoned and city-grimed Johnny Rockets is preferred to one in strip-mall suburbia.


One other point of interest, not directly calorie related: When our waitress brought us our burgers, she placed a paper plate by each of our dishes. Why this second paper plate? She pulled the paper plate closest to her, Roger’s, and using the red plastic ketchup bottle, squirted a smiley face onto his plate. Genuinely surprised, we all exclaimed in delight. But she did not stop there. She leaned across the table and squirted a second smiley face onto Bex’s plate, although this proved more challenging because of the angle and reach. Now no longer surprised, we were not sure how to respond. And so we rotated between “wow,” and “thank you,” followed by mandatory periods of uneasy chuckling, each awkward ketchup-smiley-facing time around the table. Inwardly, I urged her to rebel against this policy. She did not.


The burgers (820-1420 calories) taste much like the ambiance, processed nostalgia. Bun to burger ratio was weird because the buns were much larger than the burgers but dissolved so much in the burger juice that they lost a quarter of their size. (The buns' size change was like the reverse of those expanding sponge-toys that you put in the bathtub when you were a kid, or not. Basically, they started out golf ball size but when placed in the tub, quadrupled in size and turned into fun shapes like dinosaurs, cars, etc.) On Johnny Rockets’s website, they claim “100% beef,” and only once, they added to this claim that the beef is not frozen. Regardless, the beef did not taste fresh. In fact, the whole meal tasted on par with fast-food but at double the price. Even the sundae (830 calories), tasted exactly like a McDonald’s one, chocolate syrup and all. Counter-intuitively this made me want to order more, so that we could have one good thing. Overall a disappointing burger, despite already low expectations. So Anna rates:


One cow and an undelicious 1,940 calories that just ate the additional calf I would have given Johnny Rockets




Roger:

From the first second I walked in I wasn't happy. The place was hotter than outside. Granted its summer in NY and you can't get away from sweating wherever you go. But if I am going to a diner, and a chain restaurant for that matter, I expect the AC to be working. It was so hot that the ice in my drink was melted after 10 min. Even the waitress agreed but she said that's how it always is. So right there I knew I was never going back, at least not in the summer. Oh the burger? Um, I dunno. One cow and a calf. Get me out of here. Roger rates:





Bex:

I'm not going to say the burger was delicious and not overcooked or that the place was clean and sparkling, or that the A/C was working perfectly. I will say that our waitress was very nice. Yeah, that's about all I can say about Johnny Rockets. I'll give it a one cow rating, mostly because I feel sorry for the waitress.
Bex rates:




Johnny Rockets
42 East 8th Street
New York, NY 10003
212-253-8175
www.johnnyrockets.com