CYPRESS, Texas – As we headed down the highway into Houston, we looked for a burger getaway and it didn’t take long to find a backyard burger resort in Cypress called The Shack.
Hannah Johnson started off as a busser here when she was 16. Now, she’s the general manager. Hannah is an energetic essential part of this burger business, hence the reason owner Joe Duong named one of his eclectic offerings after her, the Hannah Banana.
“It was actually a present to me,” Hannah explained. “On, I want to say my 19 birthday, the owner was like, ‘Hey take a look at the menu.’ I looked and there’s this burger with bananas on it and I was like no way. This is crazy.”
You heard that right, a burger with bananas! We have traveled miles upon miles in Texas, and I have never seen bananas on a burger. While the shack is known for having great burger staples, their off the wall offerings are just as popular.
“People that experiment with food are either mad geniuses or just mad, so one of those two things,” Matt, a frequent visitor at The Shack, informed us.
So what exactly is the Hannah Banana?
“It’s got banana chips, pepper jack cheese, bacon, onion strings, Tai peanut sauce, bananas themself, and then it’s on a pretzel bun,” Hannah informed us.
We went to the back to see how this monkey business is built. Our new friends BK and Enrique say it’s not that cra cra to crave this crazy concoction.
“It’s a good burger,” BK informed us while chowing down on the Hannah Banana. “It’s different. You get the banana flavor; you get your peanut sauce also. It’s a lot different than a regular burger when you go somewhere and just say get me a burger.”
First up, Enrique gets a half pound pre-seasoned patty on the grill while BK works the pretzel bun. BK slices up fresh bananas that get thrown and the grill and ads the assortment of toppings. Once it’s complete, it’s time to eat.
When you take the Hannah Banana out of the boat, the first thing you get out of this burger is the smell. It’s not bananas or peanut sauce, it’s nice warm pretzel. But you know what we’re interested in, the taste.
It took a while for my taste buds to realize what was bouncing around, and there’s only one way to explain it…. It is interesting!
Perhaps Matt put it best when he said, “People that are adventurous, man, go for it. It’s awesome!”
First you got the fresh bananas, which add a little mushiness and a little sweetness to the burger, but then you have the banana chips, which add the crunchiness. The key is that peanut sauce. It really brings everything together, making this a very unique burger.
“They just decide hey let’s throw something on a burger and see if it works and generally it works,” Matt said.
If I hadn’t met Hannah, I would never have ordered this, and I would have lost out.
“You take a bite in it and it’s just got these unique flavors,” Hannah said. “You don’t even know there’s banana in there. You can’t tell what’s in there at all. It’s just this explosion. It’s so good.”
It is so odd to bite down into a burger and taste bananas, but it works. It really is, B-A-N-A-N-A-S.
“Kind of like whenever you have a buttered popcorn jellybean, it’s like you’re expecting one taste and you get the other,” Matt explains.
The Hannah Banana will definitely make you want to put on your pajamas after stopping at The Shack in Cypress, well worth hanging out for here on The Texas Bucket List.
“Houston’s got great food, and this is one of the places that you’ve got to go just because it tastes wonderful,” Matt said.