Renowned Dallas burger spot hosting fundraiser for California fire relief​on January 25, 2025 at 3:44 pm

DALLAS — Dallas burger hotspot Burger Schmurger owner Dave Culwell is from Altadena, California, and this weekend, he’s slinging burgers for California wildfire relief.

The fundraiser from 11:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday at Oak Highlands Brewery at 10484 Brockwood Road in Dallas will feature plenty of burgers from Culwell, John Tesar of Dallas Steakhouse Knife and others, live music and more. Proceeds will go to the Pasadena Education Foundation, which has a fund supporting students, staff and families in the Pasadena Unified School District. There will be a tip jar or people can donate via Venmo or online. Oak Highland Brewery will also donate $1 for every beer sold.

Wildfires in the Palisades and Eaton have destroyed thousands of homes and Culwell, who moved to North Texas about eight years ago from Altadena, said he felt compelled to help his hometown in their time of need.

“It’s absolutely devastating. I don’t even see how they’re going to get anywhere close to what it was before,” Culwell said. “Out of like the 59 friends that I’ve spoken to, 56 of them have had their houses burned, lost everything.”

“Everyone I know is safe and everyone I know is healthy for the most part,” he added. “I just sit here and think, ‘What the heck can I do for them?’ I’m 1,500 miles away and I’m usually the kind of guy that helps people when people are in need of help.”

Culwell started Burger Schmurger as a backyard pop-up burger spot in May of 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. In recent years, the renowned burger spot has made its pop-up home the Henderson Ave. bar High Fives.

“We started…cooking in the backyard, inviting neighbors over so we could kind of keep the village together,” he said. “It seemed kind of fitting, like let’s go ahead and do a fundraiser so we can raise some money and send it over to the people who need it.”