[Intro Excerpt]

On August 19, 2006, a few friends and I went to check out this new burger place called The Counter in Palo Alto. Their whole pitch is that you get to build your own burger: pick your meat, size, cheese, toppings, sauce, and bun type, and you're good to go. And a bunch of their options aren't too shabby either. For example, cheese options include gruyere, herb goat cheese spread, danish blue cheese, and tillamook cheddar. And toppings range from fried onion strings to hard boiled eggs to dried cranberries. Pretty much, there's something for everyone here.

Their website claims that there are over 312,120 different burger combinations. But as you'll soon see, as far as I'm now concerned, there's only one combination worth getting. Here's the story...