Pick Quick Drive-In

Review by: Michael Stern

We’ve been fans of Pick Quick for decades and assure you that nothing about this happy snack shack has changed except the prices. It remains a bargain – feasting on a double bacon cheeseburger, French fries, and a marshmallow hot fudge milk shake costs about $10, the cost of a meal also buying access to an extraordinarily pleasant dining area in a grassy grove of picnic tables with beds of colorful petunias all around.

Frankly, I would like this food even if it was served in a warehouse. Here you find perfect renditions of roadside quick eats, including hamburgers grilled to crisp-edged, glistening succulence along with freshly-cut French fries just moments out of the fry kettle, and a huge repertoire of milk shakes, including many summertime ones loaded with sunny fruits and berries. The burgers are fairly small, so a double makes sense; even a triple is good, although if you get it piled with cheese, grilled onions (a must!), and bacon, slippage and drippage are inevitable. While I am not saying that these are great gourmet burgers, they are truly great drive-in burgers: American classics.

Pick Quick is a minuscule establishment that originally served as the canteen for a long-gone drive-in movie. Its kitchen is ridiculously small, and on busy weekends, expect to wait in line. But the wait usually isn’t too long, and once you get to the head of the line, service is genuinely friendly. The tiny kitchen where milk shakes are made using a double-wanded blender and burgers come off the grill with lightning speed is all about efficiency. Orders are delivered within moments of their being placed.

Business is cash-only. No indoor seating is available.

What To Eat

Summer Fruit Milkshake

DISH
French Fries

DISH
Double Bacon Cheeseburger

DISH
Coney

DISH
Chili Fritos

DISH
Marshmallow Milk Shake with Hot Fudge

DISH

Pick Quick Drive-In Recipes

Discuss

What do you think of Pick Quick Drive-In?

One Response to “Pick Quick Drive-In”

Jim Scheppke

June 28th, 2003

If you are traveling on I-5 between Tacoma and Seattle, this place makes a great stop right off the freeway just north of Tacoma in Fife. It’s on old Highway 99 and is a relic of the past when this was the main highway between Seattle and Tacoma. All the food is great and inexpensive, and there is a very pleasant outdoor eating area with picnic tables. The milkshakes are a standout, made with fresh fruit in season and fresh frozen fruit off season. Strawberries were in season when I was there last, but the frozen blackberries made a wonderful shake too.

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