Bourdain is correct in his judgement of Red's Java House.

Reading on Yelp for San Francisco I noticed many of the comments about Red's Java House  are either unfair or uniformed, if not both.  The hamburgers here are made and served in the old local style, on a sliced slab of sourdough bread.  As a native of SF I should remind younger readers that before the rise of national burger chains each region had its style.  Red's is true to the local style of Burgers that developed in the Bay Area long before there were national chains and locals felt any need to conform to some outsiders standards.

In the San Francisco Bay Area most places popular when I was in College in the the early 1960’s served large hamburgers on slabs of a sourdough  loaf or on a sour dough roll.  They were not “dressed” to use the New Orleans term with a lot of toppings and garnishes but often served with only the meat in the sourdough and any condiments left to the buyer to add or they were served with maybe fresh or grilled onions, perhaps a hint of mayo and even more rarely with a few dill pickle slices.  

For those who can remember, all the various “Joe’s” restaurants which go back to the early years of the the twentith century made burgers this way as did many other restaurants like the beloved Larry Blake's on Telegraph in Berkeley which served their big burger with a side of very very garlicky Caesar Salad not fries.  The burgers in the bay area were made like Italian style sandwiches and only cheap hamburger stands and some diners and cafeterias used the common small hamburger bun in one form or another.

Even family owned pizza joints and small local chains like Round Table Pizza made their burgers this way, on French rolls just like their other sandwiches.  The choice was a hamburger with or without cheese or  a sausage split and grilled with your choice of a Polish kilbasa, a Louisiana Hot link or Linguiça served in the same dressed french roll.

In LA hamburgers were served fully dressed with thousand island dressing, onions, tomato slices, whole lettuce leaves and pickles or relish and a dab of mustard and catsup. In LA this system of “dressed” hamburgers applied even if they were  covered in a generous glob of chili or if sliced avocado or a thick guacamole was added.  Midwestern and East Coast folks still disparage these California "salad in bun" Southern California hamburgers, but that is and was the authentic local style and it remains so.

The burger at Red’s Java House is very authentic old time Frisco, not something odd nor a national standard burger or one of the hyped “gourmet” super burgers that are popular and go for something between ten and twenty bucks.  Anthony Bourdain was correct in his judgment, favoring as he often does a strong authentic local tradition while at the same time also recognizing innovations that build on it.  That he dings some of the more extravagant or mystical contemporary trends is OK with me.  Perhaps he realized that may of the new local and organic savants are in fact going back to what  my grandmothers and other women who learned to cook before WW I knew and did.

My comment is this, before you stick you nose up at something old and authentic, get your facts straight and learn the local traditions and customs.  San Francisco and the Bay Area had good cooks and a special authentic style long before  the mystical organic folks arrived and rediscovered good and local ingredients.  In many ways it was the old authentic local traditions that allowed this movement to grow up and flourish.  However, as Bourdain makes clear it is only one of many schools of cooking and one that exists on the higher levels of restaurants and cooks.