‘SF Burger Inspector’ Spreads Praise Over Ingleside Mainstay Beep’s Burgers

The SF Burger Inspector’s visit to Ocean Avenue confirms a fact known to the entire neighborhood: Beep’s Burgers makes a tasty hamburger.

Jeremy Fish, author of SFGate’s new bi-weekly Burger Inspector column wasted no time in contextualizing Beep’s Burgers within San Francisco’s hamburger pantheon for his second “case.”

“If burger spots were pants, Beep’s would be Ben Davis,” Fish, a San Francisco-based visual artist, wrote. “If burger spots were comedians, Beep’s would be Robin Williams. If burger spots were jackets, Beep’s would be a Derby. If burger spots were bridges, Beep’s would be The Golden Gate. If burger spots were sports teams, Beep’s would be the 49ers.”

Beep’s Burgers has clearly done well under the stewardship of Samantha Wong, who bought the Old School Burger Joint in 2014.

“I was actually shocked,” Wong told The Light of the inspection. “I had no idea he was going to write a piece on Beep’s. I thought it was a good article.”

In addition to ensuring that the basics of burgers and fries meet a high standard, the restaurant under Wong’s ownership has retained its classic character, starting with its characteristic sign.

As Fish states in his article, “In the mid ’90s I used to mess around on my skateboard in a schoolyard out near Ocean Avenue. Afterwards we would grab a burger at a crazy-looking O.S.B.J. (old school burger joint) with a bizarre neon rocket sign. Tons of students filled the place, with muscle cars and lowered rides packing the drive-in parking lot. Back then, the sign was honestly more memorable than the burger.”

The Beep’s Burgers sign is mentioned in the restaurant’s application for Legacy Business status, which was granted on June 12, 2017. (Disclosure: the author of this article wrote the application.)

“The grand neon sign of Beep’s Burgers is one of the neighborhood’s best visual assets,” the application states. “A little known fact about Beep’s is that its name derives from the characteristic “beep” of satellite rockets, dating from the Space Age aesthetics of the early 1960s. The neon “Beep’s Burgers” sign features a spacecraft that old-timers and historians will recognize as the USSR’s Vostok One rocket. (It is no small irony that an icon of Soviet interstellar dominion could be emblazoned in neon to sell burgers and shakes to red-blooded American motorists.)”

In the Ingleside fog, you need food that sticks to your ribs, and burgers are just the ticket. Maybe the Burger Inspector will dip into Ocean Ale House the next time he comes to Ocean Avenue for chef Daniel Silberman’s popular smash burger.

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