Rusty’s Roadside Grill

This is my third time to Rusty’s. I had the skyline double burger today and it was fantastic. A little pricy for a burger but well worth it. The only way to make this burger better would be to have a ice cold beer.

First time in the new place so giving it time to get things going. Some suggestions of things to change. Get rid of some of the plastic! Black plastic utensils all individually wrapped in plastic. Plastic cups for the milkshakes and drinks. Paper plates, better than plastic but still going into the landfill. The cheese and sausage pizza was pretty good but the veggie was just a pile of cold cut up veggies, not good. For what we got it was a little too expensive, even for PV. Shakes were very good, salad was fine. Keep improving and we’ll come back.

Pizza is pretty good. Plenty of sauce. When the cheese is cooked a little more it’s better. Unfortunately the prices were raised from opening. $ 21 pre-​tax and tip for a 16″ cheese pizza is expensive, even for Portola Valley. It’s not that special.

We have eaten at Rusty’s twice now, once as adults and the second with the kids. We tried a third time, but it was randomly closed on a Sunday due to having to change out the Chef (staff told us).
On the food, we felt it was pretty good and because the restaurant is new, it will only get better and refined over time. The prices are Portola Valley level, so it would be good to know more about the quality of the ingredients, what is fresh vs frozen and what is prepared in the restaurant daily. We like the lobster shack which I hear are the same owners, so when it gets to that level of execution, it will do even better. We have tried both the burgers and the pizza and liked them.
The biggest question we ask is does this beat a Gott’s burger drive to Town Square in PA or Portola Kitchen and our neighborhood is in desperate need of some better food options, so our bar was high.
We met the chef and talked to him about making fresh French fries vs frozen, he said they would so we have even more faith. He (chef) also gave us some great samples of a new combo kale-​cranberry-​chevre pizza, which was great and is what I ordered! The staff was friendly and you can clearly tell they are still new. The front counter lady was also trying to handle the phones, which is tough with a long line and a new restaurant. First impressions are being made now, so the investment to make sure everyone has a good first-​impression should be paramount, it can get more efficient in time.
The theme is cool and simple automotive, but it works and feels spacious for a pretty small footprint. The tables are clean but slippery from the material that make it feel like the surface of a freshly waxed car. That is nice, but the table side metal bars you put the hot pizza on should have rubber padding so they don’t slide all over the table and in one case drop off the bars.
The three biggest things that are holding us back from a higher rating are mostly related to execution issues being new and expect they will get resolved. I will revise my review in due time, but wanted to get initial impressions out there.
1. The fly-​control is poor and there are so many flies inside the restaurant and in the food area. This is a tough issue in ladera, but keeping the outside ceiling fans on should help. I would look at what other restaurants are doing and work hard on this where possible.
2. The ice-​cream should be a hot attraction item for this place (and we expect that it will!), but the biggest turn off from getting all our kids ice-​cream after was that scoop is sitting in some non-​flowing water with chunks of ice-​cream and debris just floating on top. This is a food-​safety issue and every scoop from that has the potential to contaminate the rest of the ice-​cream. I immediately let the Chef know and he agreed, so let’s hope they fix that fast.
3. Kid’s Menu: They would do well with kid’s menu or just a third size of kid’s version of the pizza and burgers. This will help and be such a great combo to have adult and kid items.

I was pleasantly surprised with the food, nice clean atmosphere and friendly service! Will definitely be bringing my family back, thankful to have a pizza/​hamburger place in Portola Valley!