thrillist

Everyone knows the crucial ingredient for true love is hard liquor. Now, a love shack is accepting that beautiful, iron-clad reality, at Love Shack So7, open today.

In the Trinity Park-hugging SoSeven development, Tim Love's second Cowtown burger joint is centered around a loft-y, shabby-mod interior sporting barn-wood siding, blackboard-ringed order & pickup counters, and a small garage-doored dining room, but exceeds the original one crucial way: a square, stone-topped full bar (Shack #1's beer/wine only) grafted into the outside wall to lubricate 2900sqft of stucco-walled patio seating strewn with white marble, red-umbrella'd tables, homey weatherproof sofas, and a stage for live music. The bar slings 15 cocktails that range from stalwarts (Arnold Palmer, Classic Mojito) to custom mixes such as the Milagro Silver/Cointreau "Jalapeno-Cucumber Margarita" and the H20 Melon (Oronoco rum pureed w/ basil/lime/watermelon); hilariously, cheaper, virgin versions of all drinks are available for precociously discriminating kids, and for virgins. The menu's largely the same as at the Stockyards site (ground tenderloin/brisket burgers, dogs/wursts, specialty sodas & shakes, chile parmesan chips, "Crazy Good Onion Rings"), but w/ a few sandwich additions like the grilled chicken Love Bird, the house-made tartar'd Love Fish, and the Lobster Love, a big step up from the Shrimp Really Respects You And Wants To Remain Friends.

On Sunday at 3pm, the new Shack's throwing a free, all-you-can-eat lamb-burger cook-off between Tim Love, several noted area chefs, and Ilan Hall, season-two winner on Top Chef -- where the crucial ingredient for winning over the judges is being a hard licker. Boom.

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RSVP (required) for the lambfest at loveshacklamb@baltzco.com, or whet your appetite by grazing the menu