Photo by James Dickinson
The Dash menu is everything a lunch (and a potentially quick-stop dinner) menu should be: tightly focused, quickly ordered and somehow still carefully prepared. You go in knowing that you’re going to get a burger, a sandwich or a salad. With a milkshake or a float. It’s that simple, and that’s an appreciable strategy when you’re smack in the middle of a college campus — make a limited number of items that appeal to students out of ingredients that appeal to professors. The salmon burger gets a schmear of shallot cream cheese and red-wine gastrique; the chicken burger, an apricot Dijon. And the requisite vegan burger isn’t treated as such at Dash. Instead, it comes out with kimchi mango slaw, cashews and coconut crème.
What you really want, though, is their Reuben. The corned beef brisket that they use is killer; they don’t skimp on sauce, Swiss cheese or sauerkraut; and they know exactly how grilled the sandwich needs to get to blend all the flavors into Katzian perfection. Other perks: The sweet potato tots are exactly right, they have gluten-free sandwich bread, and their massive, extras-studded salads will make that one friend who’s “not really hungry” stop staring at your Reuben.
You’ll go in thinking that you’ll spend $10 — almost every menu main hits that price point — but you’ll actually fork over $15 after you see one of the milkshakes come out. A little pricey, but really no different than any other modern burger spots that care about quality. That said, if you like really simple burgers, you can get a “build-your-own” for $6. (But … seriously. The Reuben.)
900 W. Franklin St.,912-2689 or dashrva.com
Hours: Monday through Sunday,11 a.m to midnight
Prices: $6 to $11.
