Dining Out: Dodging Spring Showers at Jeffersonville's Burger Barn 

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• Glenn Russell
• The El Alamo burger

Outdoor dining in mud season is risky business. Warm days tempt us with sunshine and premature picnic tables, which are all the more glorious because the bugs aren't yet out for blood. But 70-degree streaks can quickly revert to drizzly 40-degree ones, as I experienced on a recent trip to Jeffersonville's Burger Barn.

This month — rain or shine — the Seven Days food team is heading out before the summer rush to revisit some of our favorite outdoor dining spots around Vermont: snack shacks, seasonal windows, food trucks and fancy patios. Burger Barn's multicolored food trailer on Route 15 is on the way to some of my fair-weather haunts, including Hyde Park's Green River Reservoir State Park and the Lamoille Valley Rail Trail. Its unassuming parking lot is filled with umbrella-covered picnic tables — and, at the height of summer, hungry diners.

"I always tell our counter girls that the first rule is: Don't look at the line," Burger Barn co-owner Kierstin Colaceci said. "You look at that line, you're gonna get nervous. But if you just look at the one person in front of you, everything's gonna be all right."

Now in its 15th season, cash-only Burger Barn has built a reputation for its range: There are currently 33 burger options on the menu, from simple hamburgers to the unexpected Nuts About Thai, which comes topped with cabbage, carrots, sautéed onions and peppers, and spicy Thai peanut sauce. All are made with six-ounce grass-fed beef patties, sourced from Boyden Farm just five minutes up the road.

The menu also offers veggie burgers, seafood, breakfast sandwiches, hot dogs, gluten-free buns and 15 different cheeses, though Cabot Creamery cheddar is the default, Colaceci said.

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• Glenn Russell
• Kateleena Parker taking customers' orders at the Burger Barn

Two years ago, the roadside biz upgraded its longtime trailer — green and yellow with a cow-spotted roof — to a larger one with fresh equipment. The new color scheme is downright tropical, with siding and trim in various shades of periwinkle, yellow, orange, green, pink and teal.

"It's a party barn now," Colaceci said.

Even on a cold, rainy day when I could see my breath — and a snowblower still sat on the deck near the walk-up window, just in case — Burger Barn was a bright spot.

Unknowingly, my dining companion and I ordered two of what Colaceci considers "the big three" most popular menu items: the Ethan Allen ($9) and El Alamo ($11). We split a pint of hand-cut fries ($4.25), which were perfectly crisp until I soaked them with vinegar from one of the condiment station's spray bottles.

Burgers in hand, we rushed to the car. I was happy for a dry seat, and I didn't mind that the Ethan Allen's juicy grilled apples, melty Cabot cheddar and cranberry-garlic mayo were soon dripping all over me. I managed to steal a bite of the impressively large El Alamo, topped with bacon, deep-fried onion rings, banana peppers, Cabot cheddar and barbecue sauce. Thankfully, the burgers came with plenty of napkins.

Burger Barn is now open daily, and the picnic tables are out for nicer days. The season hits full steam when school lets out, Colaceci said, "but I get calls all year long, [asking] whether or not we're closed."

This year, the barn was open all winter. The cars may not spill out onto the roadside or park in a nearby field as they do on prime summer days, but plenty of folks are willing to brave the elements for a burger.