Nation's Giant Hamburgers & Great Pies — Restaurant in Berkeley

Depending on WHEN you visit will determine your experience. First things first, the burgers are Giant. The flavor is home-made with a commercial spin. They serve more than burgers and the menu is DEFINITELY worth exploring! Their breakfast menu is hearty, traditional and delicious. They are also known for their pies. My favorite is Custard. The crust is light and flaky paired with a light, fresh and delicately sweet custard that demands finish every last drop. The portions from Pie slice to Burger, Fries to Hot dog everything is sized pretty well enough to feed even the biggest appetite.

The atmosphere: It can make you apprehensive sometimes because of the homeless that linger out front asking for change and meals...But I kindly say "I'm sorry, not today" and continue inside. Upon entry delicious smells ranging from burgers on the griddle to sweet buttermilk pancakes slap you in the face.

Parking: It can sometimes be daunting depending on time of day. Mornings seem to yield the easiest experience, while after-work evenings tend to prove challenging. however, if you're just picking up a phone order - I always just pull out front next to the HUGE planters for all of 7 minutes it takes to retrieve my order. Be careful though....parking patrol is vigilant in these parts.

Clientele: The people who eat here run the gamut of couples, singles, families, homeless, tourists and night owls.

Is the food worth the visit? Yes. Its a good eat. The whole menu! I encourage you try the different types of burgers Salmon, chicken, etc...and on a Sunday Morning...The breakfast is the best.

And the staff is AMAZINGLY efficient, courteous and in I have witnessed them treat EVERYONE equally nice no matter if you appear homeless or successful. That to me makes me feel all...

Nations is like a staple food here. All that greasy heavy lumpy American Cuisine. Pancakes, waffles, eggs, potatoes and of course........!!PIES!!* ! Nations is a great concept, and you can actually leave one sometimes mildly satified, but I just wish someone, someday would teach them how to cook. The pancakes taste like rancid bacon grease, the sugar leaked out of the sausages and forma crispy yet nasty black bond with the flat grill, and the very likely deadly designer oil they use* to cook the eggs which does not allow you to burn the eggs, or something like that. They take different oils that have differing smoking points and they blend them in such a way that your pan and the ingredients in the pan don't get hot too fast and the eggs don't brown beyond an appealing light goooolden brown. It leads to cooks who think they are as good as it gets. No, that lovely golden brown is not you, it was provided to you by chemists in New Jersey. All you need do is take the food off the heat and serve it faster. Leaving it in the pan or on the grill just makes it taste lame and confirms for me that I really do not like Nations because they dont give a crumb about quality. But then there are those pies of which I could eat every night but I do not want to know what they are really made of. So having said that I cant give them the one star but must at least give them a two, maybe climbing as high as a three butt then again if the custard pie filling is just some powdered trans fat to which you just add water, they do not deserve a three but just a two, and seeing the likelihood of it being some preix schlop rise evermore I say two. * Not certain they use it but it tastes like it and I have...

I haven't tried many different Nation's, but this one has quickly become my favorite. The wait is never that long in my experience, the food is always juicy and not overcooked - wow, there was even salt on the French fries a recent time I went, and just the right amount - selfish of me perhaps, but a delightful aberration that once. Old-school comfort food, and plenty of it; ground beef, eggs, chorizo, and potatoes on the menu. If you like this food and you can burn through something like 3000 or 4000 calories a day in the course of your life then a menu like this can be just the ticket for restoring your weary bones - or if your body could use a burst of fuel to cope with a bout of stress or an episode of fabulous exertion. A "slice of pie" here is a quarter of the pie, if I'm reading the menu right - but mercifully, it may be a seven-inch pie. Caveats: far, far from vegan. Do not come here if you still believe everything you read years ago about saturated fat, or if you think sugar alone is responsible for destroying the health of Western Civilization. I may have to ask them to put a little less mayo on my bacon cheeseburger and I'm pretty sure that won't be a problem at all. Also I did notice they had something up as a footnote on the menu saying they would grill the onions for my burger upon request. Even bigger plus in my mind: on the last visit I was remarking to the staff member behind the counter how much I liked the food, and he got a big smile and "Oh, yeah! I used to eat here all the time before I started working...