[revisit] stacked

A few weeks ago I was invited to come back in to Stacked, a restaurant we’ve visited in the past. 

Stacked is located in Fashion Valley and offers up a super customizable menu by letting you order everything yourself via their iPad ordering system. 

Naturally they have “regular” old boring menus in case fiddling with iPads aren’t your thing. You can see that menu right here.

But if it is your thing, you can browse through preselected menu items or make your own items. That’s the great thing about Stacked. If you don’t know what to order, you can easily see their creations and change it around to suit your tastes. Don’t want roma tomatoes on your mac n cheese burger? No problem – it’s easy to drag tomatoes off the screen and add something else if you desire. The only problem is the choices can seem download daunting when you start to browse through which is why I find it helpful to see some of the already made creations that are available to get my brain juices flowing.

[onion strings]

We started our meal off with a small plate of onion strings. I’m glad we only got the small because these onion strings are addicting! They are nice and crunchy and very thin. I got it with a side of ranch dressing and a side of butternut squash aioli. The butternut squash aioli is really interesting – it’s mildly sweet and they put some other spices in it to give it a little zing. 

[customized mac n cheese burger]

Jake went ahead and got a “already on the menu” item for his entree – the Mac n Cheese Burger. Originally the Mac n Cheese Burger comes with Parmesan crumbs, mac n cheese, bacon, roma tomatoes and red onion on a brioche bun. Jake customized it a little bit to make it his own. I was surprised he didn’t bother to take off the tomatoes since he never eats those. Jake added pulled pork to the burger and swapped the bun for a pretzel bun. That fried onion ring on top of the burger really gives it that “I don’t know if this will fit into my mouth” look.

I personally thought this had way too much going on but Jake seemed to really enjoy it, especially his addition of the pulled pork on the burger. 

[customized wake up call burger]

T choose to customize the “Wake Up Call” burger. Originally the Wake Up Call has Swiss cheese, bacon, a fried egg and potato chips on it. T put the chips on the side, swapped the Swiss for Smoked Gouda, and added pulled pork and peanut butter. PEANUT BUTTER. I had a tiny bite of his burger and I couldn’t eat anymore of it. The flavor of peanut butter with pulled pork grossed me out but T loved his own creation. Good for him. 

As for me, I decided to get a pizza. A pizza that looked very Millennium Falcon shaped if you ask me.

I kept my pizza on the simple side and got it topped with garlic sauce, cilantro and green onion, cajun shrimp plus mozzarella and Parmesan cheese. Those little shrimps were on the spicy side – maybe a little bit too spicy for me! I prefer the garlic sauce over the tomato sauce here and I thought the addition of cilantro and green onion gave the slices a nice fresh flavor. 

The crust was really nice too – it had a bit of crispiness on the bottom along with a nice chew. 

My favorite item though was our custom made Macaroni and Cheese. There are TONS of options for Mac n Cheese at Stacked – including gluten free pasta! A few of their creations are Lobster Mac n Cheese, Cheeseburger Mac n Cheese, Rosemary Chicken and a Chicken Pesto Mac n Cheese which sounded delicious with pesto, grilled chicken, mushrooms, tomatoes and roasted garlic. Yum!

We decided to make our own creation for the mac n cheese. The base of the dish uses cheddar, American and pepper jack cheese. We decided to add freshly shaved Parmesan cheese on top along with flat iron steak and fresh basil. I didn’t want to get “too crazy” with it and have it be overwhelming. The fresh basil really added a nice touch to the mac n cheese which kind of lightened up the dish. The basil made it feel not as heavy with that touch of herb mixed in. The flat iron steak was nice and juicy and added a protein kick to otherwise carb heavy dish. I really liked our creation – especially that bit of basil mixed in! 

I wasn’t gonna get dessert… but well, then I saw “peanut butter cups” and it was kind of all over from there. I created my own peanut butter bomb explosion of a dessert which had vanilla ice cream, peanut butter cups, peanut butter sauce, toasted almonds and peanuts with a little chocolate sauce on the side. I was basically trying to recreate a peanut butter cup in ice cream form and I have to say it worked quite well. Jake shared it with me until I starting putting chocolate sauce all over it (which is why I got it on the side so he wouldn’t have to eat it).

T also got a milkshake – the Nutella Banana – which we thought was just “okay”. I immediately got a chunk of banana in the straw when I tried it and that pretty much killed it for me right there. T regretted getting this flavor instead of the Cookie Butter shake. Live and learn. 

We really enjoyed our meal at Stacked. It had been awhile since our last visit. Stacked has been S’s favorite restaurant for a long time though we have always suspected it was because he just likes to use the iPads. Maybe we will take him back to Stacked when he comes back to visit us along with his brother! They can put peanut butter on whatever savory they want as long as I don’t have to eat it. I wouldn’t mind creating a few more menu items from their extensive menu, that’s for sure. 

Stacked
Fashion Valley Mall
7007 Friars Road Suite #356
San Diego, CA 92108
619-225-7900

Disclaimer: I was invited into Stacked to check out their updated menu. Our meal was complimentary. All opinions stated here are my own.