Fusion Restaurant and Lounge

RIP

This is an awesome little place.
Went to a friends birthday party here awhile back and throughly enjoyed myself. They have excellent food, great drinks, good service, a smooth atmosphere, and a stellar location right in old town!
They have a nice little bar here to grab a cocktail and check it out. I hear happy hour rocks…

The beautiful Carin and I decided to go dinner last night and wanted something burger, within walking distance.
I had seen a review of Fusion and the burger looked pretty good so we decided to try it.
WOW!!! I have had most of the burgers in the greater Phoenix area and around the USA, and this is in the top 5 of any burger, anywhere (I am including Taylor’s Refresher in St. Helena, CA and the BigAss at Roaring Fork, among others).
This thing was more than I could eat (admittedly after the more than delicious Panko breaded Calamari appetizer and a really good vodka martini).
The caramelized onions and jalapenos are the perfect sweet counterpoint to the meat, bacon and cheese and chili/​cheese sauce on the burger.
I brought about ¼ of the burger home and I think it will be lunch today. Carin had the same thing (we both just wanted a good burger and wanted to try something different… we have been to Stax, etc., and they are good, but this was decadent).
The prices were good ($ 48 for 2 burgers, an appetizer and the marti), and I understand they have ½ price happy hour during the week, so we will be going back soon!!!
The service was also terrific, our waiter was attentive without being intrusive, the elements of the meal showed up exactly on time, and we had chance to have really nice chat with one of the owners, Jen Lynn (I hope I spelled that somewhat correctly).
I recoomend that you give this place try, esp. if you are burger fan.

Am I enough of a Unilocaler to tell you my guilty pleasures? I love Kitchen Nightmares — that reality show with the angry British chef. It’s part business case study, part peek behind the scenes of restaurant glamour. I know its tough running a restaurant, but can the people on the show really not see what’s wrong!!!
So why do I think of Kitchen Nightmares when I sit at the bar of Fusion on a Saturday night? Not because it’s a candidate for the show, but because it’s the complete and total opposite. Fusion owners Matt and JenLynn Long have the essentials of the restaurant business down: great food, great service.
Fusion is the most humble restaurant in downtown Scottsdale. Tucked behind the too-​cool-​for-​school W Hotel and Axis/​Radius, this is the kind of neighborhood restaurant you’d expect in downtown Phoenix.
Walk in and JenLynn will greet you like an old friend — even if it’s your first time. She’ll help you pick out the perfect martini — a pomegranate, orange vodka blend for me that night — and make sure your entrée is just to order. A curtain separates the bar from the main dining where families and couples enjoy their meals.
Sometimes Fusion can be a expensive — $ 30 – 40 for dinner. But it’s worth it for a dinner you’ll remember like a dream — not a nightmare.

This restaurant is a hidden gem, literally, as it’s hidden & lost amongst the construction at the new W hotel. If you’re looking for a JUICY hamburger with all the fixins, and you are in the oldtown area, give Fusion a try!
We went for lunch and wasn’t expecting much. One look at the menu and I decided on the Kobe Beef Burger and what was nice is that you can choose between 2 patty sizes. I chose the larger (believe it was ½ pound) and that also included a side of fries. My brother got the same but he got the regular fries and I got the sweet potato fries.
For around $ 10, the burgers were huge, the meat patties were very moist, and it was just delicious overall. Best thing was that the fries were also DELICIOUS and included in the meal! IMHO, their burgers and fries definitely tasted better than the ones at Delux and like I said before, they don’t charge you extra for it. Maybe they will give you half regular and half sweet potato fries if you ask because both tasted SO good!
Oh yeah, and they have a PUNCH card! I think if you buy 5 or six lunches, they will give you 1 bonus. I haven’t heard of other restaurants offering this, so my advice is to try it out if you are a regular in the area. You can accumulate points and enjoy a really good burger at the same time.

I had seen a review for this place in a local magazine and it looked tasty, so I checked it out. They do a great job taking traditional American food like mac and cheese, or pot pies, and adding their own subtle flavors.
They also have an intimate bar area where you can watch the sporting event du jour while you munch on some of your old favorites.