BURGER ANARCHY

Your favourite guide to the best burgers, BBQ, baked goods and more in London, Los Angeles, New York and beyond. ☞ Recalcitrant. ☞ Steadfast. ☞ Intrinsically hypocritical. ➣ A food blog by Simon & Rob. ★ FEATURED POSTS

[burgeranarchy]

Chik'n / Baker Street, London

What with Chick 'n' Sours being one of our top fried chicken places in London, the idea Carl Clarke and the crew opening a fast food version this summer had the backs of our knees sweating with excitement. And the place didn't disappoint, so we'll just wax lyrical about them real quick.

The Straight Up Chik'n sandwich is arguably pound-for-pound the best chicken sandwich in London. A plump, wickedly moist thigh is covered in a really solid, not greasy, craggy, well seasoned coating. There are lashings of a lovely buttermilk and herb mayonnaise, which is creamy and ever-so-slightly tangy. Thick pickles add a great fresh, moist piquant note and the potato bun is perfectly squidgy yet solid with a bit of sweetness, not that dissimilar from a Martin's roll or Chick-fil-A bun, a spot on accompaniment to the fried chicken. Oh, and it is £4.95. That is cheap. That is only sixteen pence more expensive than a fillet burger from KFC. It is a affordable, quality sandwich.

The wings are just as chunky and moist, with a less substantial but just as tasty and crunchy coating on them. The sticky hot sauce that smothers tastes the same as the one they use on the disco wings at Sours and packs a nice heat with a moreish sweet and sour tangy note at the end. They are also great.

Sadly we think they've stopped serving the breakfast muffins they started with in Summer, so in memoriam we'll say: 

Alas, poor Chik'n breakfast muffin! You were pretty good, especially the brilliantly seasoned chicken sausage patty that reminded us of breakfasts in the States.  

With the second branch opening in Islington soon, which is much more easily accessible for us, we'll be going a lot more. And it means Holloway Road onto Upper Street is looking like a potentially very solid wing crawl. 

[burgeranarchy]

Burgerfi / Bloomsbury, London

American fast-casual burger chains continue to encroach upon our fair shores. But as branches of Shake Shack and Five Guys saturate the capital, other chains have decided to become more inventive with their choice of locations: Fatburger went for the tourists in Camden, Smashburger opened their first space in Milton Keynes and the stellar Steak n Shake set up shop in Chester. Who goes to Chester?

For their first site, Floridian chain BurgerFi picked a shopping centre. In Wembley.

Thank fuck their second location was tourist hotel sinkhole Bloomsbury.

BurgerFi is somewhat a fusion of familiar ideas from the other American big hitters: The burgers come as doubles by default, like Five Guys, with a bun not too dissimilar from a Martins roll used by Shake Shack, semi-wrapped up like an In-n-Out. Like the latter, they even have a not-so-secret menu (although the guy at the counter had no idea, and said he'd have to email head office to find out what it was). It is all very comfortingly familiar. 

The cheeseburger looks like a classically American: The huge slice of tomato and sits triumphantly on top of the two American cheese melted patties. Describing the beef origin as 'Natural Angus' seems a little weird, but the beef is decent, not crazy juicy but not dry, and still has flecks of pink. 

The BurgerFi sauce is a classic creamy, sweet, piquant sauce in the vain of In-n-Out spread which was nice, but could have done with having more of. In all, it is a not too bad of an example of a classic American cheeseburger.

Despite bragging of a Wagyu and brisket blend, the patties in the CEO aren't that different from those in the standard burgers. 

The Swiss cheese is gushing in amount but lacks any real nuttiness, more providing a chewy goo. And while you don't really notice the truffle aioli, the 'homemade' candied bacon is crunchy and blends sweet with piggy-savoury nicely and the tomato jam ramps up the sweetness a notch further. Again, not too bad. 

The fries are well solid. Portion sizes are epic, and the parmesan and herb topping is abundant and strong, with drizzles of aioli adding a rich and creamy condiment to balance and blend the flavours. We tried really hard to finish them, they were so good. But just look at the size of the fucking thing. We couldn't.

We have the choice of places to get American burgers in the UK now, you can literally drive around our rainy little island and sample a decent amount of them. Something we could only eat on holiday is now a reality in the Capital. And for us that isn't a bad thing. #RoadTrip 

[burgeranarchy]

Black Bear Burger / Shoreditch, London

Bad planning means that we didn't get to sample the immensely popular Black Bear stall at the school yard market and Broadway Market in tooth-achingly current London Fields. One attempt had us turning up just after they had sold out, having the nerve to arrive at 1pm. On another we arrived to find they weren't even fucking trading that day. Big up to the equally lazy and social media incompetent out there.

The new permanent space at Boxpark in Shoreditch made accessing their goods near enough fail-safe. Although it has been eclipsed by its superior cousin in Croydon, this Boxpark has matured into a half-decent Essex day tripper hang out spot. It houses the excellent Voodoo Ray's, and has come a way since the days of Bukowski and Chop'd. 

The Double Black Bear is the premium archetype Instagram material: The glossy reflection on the patties; perfectly melted yellow dairy; cute curls of crisp bacon; sauce almost impossibly maintaining its structure on the top bun; the unformity of sesame seeds - It is The Fighting Temeraire of burger #FoodPorn. 

It tastes good. The beef slaps your tongue demanding an audience from every bud. It has depth, an inherent beefiness that must come from the ageing of the meat combined with the texture of both the charred outside and incredibly soft inside. 

It is a dominantly savoury experience which pushes the other ingredients into sidekick cameos: There is the occasional hint of garlic in the mayo here and a vague recollection of onion in the jam there, but the beef and it's slick fat-laden juice kick it back into the wings. The bun is great, robustly bread-y and highlighting further the savoury nature of the sandwich. The pancetta bacon is too flimsy and nuanced in flavour to work in this burger for us.

It is a burger that reminds us very strongly of Bleecker, both aesthetically and in it's beefiness. But it has had the jeans rolled up, the beard grown nice and long, and the Patagonia t-shirt draped over it. Just as lattes no longer sate the appetite of the caffeine connoisseur, ketchup and mustard and burger sauce are too pedestrian. No longer just the remit of the 'fancy' restaurant, the new breed of casual burgers such as Black Bear and the Beyond crew infuse their mayos, producing ultra-rich concoctions to dazzle the palate. They are good, but there is still something to be said for the addition of sweet and piquant notes to a cheeseburger. 

It'll be interesting to see how this trend progresses, and what the next one will be...

[burgeranarchy]

OOWEE Diner / Bristol, UK

Most new places we find, scrolling through picture-upon-picture on the varying social medias, get put on a general catalog of Tolstoyan length, sporadically updated and revised. But a small number of places, those that provoke near constant not-visited-yet anxiety, make a separate 'How The Fuck Do We Get Here As Soon As Possible??' shortlist. There is no rhyme or reason as to how places make the list, maybe an inexplicable criteria roughly comprised of Check That Hype + Looks Legit To Me exists, but OOWEE did. A visit to family in Cardiff provided an absolutely legitimate opportunity to take a brief detour through Bristol and tick one off the hallowed index.

We arrived ten minutes after opening time, uncertain that we'd found the right address until we spotted the lights inside the tiny place spilling out, Hopperesque, onto the skinny dark street packed full of cars. The former kebab shop/cafe was just big enough for four stools along the window and a queue of eager customers along the opposite wall. Some people patiently waited for orders outside. The team of three crammed behind the counter were hard at it, the grill boss cheerily chatting to familiar patrons as the patties cooked away. At the counter we were told the wait was already 40 minutes: 'People tend to order and go, then come back when the order is ready.' Fuck it, we were here now.  

The menu is pretty lengthy considering the kitchen is so fucking tiny -  burgers, chicken sandwiches, dressed fries and an array of other sides - it seemed like a gargantuan effort in the space allocated for it. But smash out the orders they did, and ours was ready bang on 40 minutes later.  

The beauty of the Double C is in the simplicity. Two finely seared patties covered in the familiar American-style cheese slices, chunky slices of pickles underneath paddling in a tomato-based relish and American mustard, encased in a simple brioche style bun and all wrapped up to steam and meld everything together into a sticky, saucy soft unit of burger oneness.

"Wow, that's a fucking busy kebab shop"  -- Girl walking past OOWEE Diner

The meat was perfectly cooked and seasoned just enough, the seared edges giving way to a gaping soft, submitting pink middle. The cheese provided that great tacky, gooey mediation between the meat and the sturdy-but-pliant bun, the relish/mustard combination oozed out into mouthfuls giving variations of a tangy and sweet note to every bite. The pickles offered their familiar piquant resistance in every bite. It was in every sense a great example of that classic cheeseburger experience that warms our cockles and gives that prickle of satisfaction. It brought back memories of other great experiences like the Double cheese at Irv's and early incarnations of Yianni's Meatwagon burgers. 

The spirit and atmosphere of the place also brought back pangs of our #MEATeasy reminiscences: A bustling joint with a friendly bunch at the helm, slightly overwhelmed by the ever increasing throngs trying to get a piece of the meaty action, yet maintaining a form of organised chaos and getting proper quality burgers out. That a vibe like this is cracking in Bristol shows there is still life in the old burger yet, and it is much welcomed.   

It is not difficult to see how this enterprise will move on to bigger things, but it'd be nice if they kept this joint going for a good while yet. We'd come back in the spring or summer; to see customers filling up the dinky street and pissing off the traffic, buying cans from the offy next door while they wait, and taking over the little square around the corner to eat their burgers. It'd be pretty sweet.

[burgeranarchy]

Smokestak / Shoreditch, London

For some time Smokestak has been smashing out reliably tasty brisket sandwiches from their big ass locomotive of smokers at the entrance to the now defunct Dalston Street Feast. It was a most impressive open air smoke house that always had an impressive queue. And was always the street food guys that seemed the most obvious for a transition to that bricks and mortar life.

It took a while, but the Smokestak guys have finally opened up a space just off Brick Lane - A smokehouse from a dystopian future, looking like something from the Industrial Zone on the Crystal Maze - a mesh of naked concrete, thick reclaimed wooden tables, pavement tiles on counter sides and seemingly deliberate dirt-frosted windows. The first thing that hits you from walking in is the amazing smell of smoking meat that fills the room, deliciously comforting and so ever-present that it permeates your clothes. It is a nasally pleasingly shelter from the apocalypse. We like it.  

The menu is short, separated into neatly compartmentalised sections explained by the wait staff. The nibbles at the top consist of scratchings, a chicarron-style pork rind, puffed up so that it is super crispy, yet airy, with a coating of spices to give it a bit of a kick. There was also the crispy ox cheek which was fucking great. Impressively neat cubes with a nicely breaded exterior that supplied a satisfying deep crunch while the soft, rich, meat nestled inside - loosely stored with a stew-like intensity of flavour. 

The appetisers that followed were equally pleasing. The pastrami was a photographer's dream, deeply pink meat layered with a thin glisten of fat and topped with a dark seasoned bark. It was soft, moist, with the spice from the coating giving it the familiar flavour. It would no doubt would make a very good pastrami sandwich. But the must-order is the smoked girolles mushrooms on beef dripping toast: a combination of mushrooms garlic and herbs covered in a thick glossy and most outrageously sweet, smoky, beefy sauce piled upon on a slice of charred sourdough. You could have put that sauce in a bowl and we would have mopped it up with bread for ever and ever it was so good. 

The brisket looked brilliant - craggy separations in the ribbons of meat, tissues broken down by hours in the smoker, were surrounded by reassuring outer pink ring and a dark bark. The layers of perfectly rendered fat meandered throughout the meat, adding melty texture to the bite. With all moisture in tact and the more intense taste of the bark in the mix, it created that ever pleasing mouthful of flavoursome smoked meat.

The pork ribs were soft, neatly charred on the grill and covered in a great sticky and rich, vinegary sweet sauce. And the beef rib, again smoked to just right so the meat was both yielding in texture and perfectly juicy. The slices slipped down delightfully with a splash of the sauce that was served with it, which merged savoury and sweet with the great balance. 

Everything we ate was great. Some things were really fucking great.

There is an amazing level of care and attention to the way these guys present their food. From the neatly cut parcel paper, to the way the beef rib is pre-sliced - it is a poshed up form of barbecue, served like smoked meat is the most precious commodity in the food universe. 

Whilst we find SStak very pleasing, it just isn't the same as the barbecue joints visited in the States (and clearly they're not trying to be either). There is something about the rustic charm of getting exceptionally smoked meat at decent prices in an unpretentious setting, with free WonderBread to boot, that adds to the experience of eating the food. The fine dining nuances that places like Smokestak and Pitt Cue use in their presentation and provenance feel like a form of smoke and mirrors to justify charging peak Shoreditch dollar. It seems we are still stuck between the chintzy Americana vibe of places like Red's and Bodean's, and the semi-high end concept of Smokestak, when what we need is an honest smokehouse, slinging by the pound and wrapped in brown paper.

But enough of the contrary humbug, it is doubtful somewhere will ever achieve the thing we're looking for in a barbecue gaff in London, it's an impossible dream. So we'll happily placate ourselves with regular visits here and Pitt Cue instead - they are selling the closest thing to it. 

[burgeranarchy]

How To: Make A Burger Cloche

You want to achieve that spot on melty ooze cheese on your burger? Well try this method out. Cheap and effective. Props have to be given to Mother Flipper, who we saw doing this a whole bunch of time ago and nicked the idea from.

[burgeranarchy]

Randy's Wing Bar / Hackney Wick, London

Despite loving buffalo wings like they are our spicy, delicious offspring we had never had the pleasure of sampling Randy's Wing Bar in their street food or pop up incarnations. But with a birthday to celebrate, wings and booze were the primary objective.

After a few years of sluggishness, the Olympic Park's legacy is finally starting to morph into something useful: The stadium has a soccer team, Anish Kapour's red spaghetti tower has a slide on it, and now the former Press and Broadcast centres have begun an overhaul. 

In an area comically titled Olympicopolis,  the centre is becoming a 'world-class culture hub' that branding experts have dubbed Here East, which is only slightly better than the previous title, iCITY. Hats off to the PR team that orchestrated this naming clusterfuck. On the other side of the canal from the Red Hook-esque hubbub of Queen's yard and the surrounding areas of The Wick, it looks like it is going to be a buxom retail space. The Westfield must be simply trembling.

In this next phase of the hubbening, the first units of 10 in the Canalside space have opened. Of the three units that have gone live, Randy's sits next to the new location for the perennially popular Breakfast club. The low lit, dark distressed wooden panelling, and white-tiled counter is familiar in design zeitgeist, but the added large patio overlooking the canal is the ace in the hole here.

To the wings: 

The Buffalo style are a mild and subdued version of the traditional flavour, these do not have the punch you would hope and expect. There is no blue cheese sauce on the side, instead a truffled blue cheese dressing is drizzled over the wings. Neither the blue cheese nor the truffle is strong enough to be tasted. The result is woefully insipid. Don't even get us started on the frankly baffling and pointless garnish. 

The Gangnam style was an even sadder glaze for the tiny poultry arms, embarrassingly 'Korean inspired'. If you want a decent baseline for solid Korean Fried Wings you could do worse than hitting up Flesh & Buns/Shackfuyu/Bone Daddies - nicely sweet and sticky, packing a spicy and slightly sour kick. Randy's version are incredibly Soy sauce heavy, lacking in distinct sweetness and any nuance of heat. At best these could be described as Chinese-style, and basic Chinese-style at that. Thing is they look quite pretty though - tarted up wings that are, like the new NME, all shiny and glossy on the outside but have no viable content. 

The other annoyance is that these wings simply are not cooked properly - a good chicken wing should be crisp on the outside and juicy inside. The skin on these was soft and rubbery, making teeth go through the uncomfortable process of awkwardly pulling at it to wrench it away from the bone. Even if the sauces had been good they would have been spoilt by the cumbersome elasticity of what you had to chew it with. 

The sides provide some saving graces: The Furious Fries are tossed in a solid Buffalo sauce which has heat and flavour - do they use the same sauce on the wings as they do on the fries, it doesn't fucking taste like it - and the addition of refreshingly sour feta is an interesting and welcome companion. The Buffalo Shrimp were nicely-breaded plump subjects but should have been tossed in the same sauce the fries were. Instead there were accompanied by a side of some strange Buffalo-Blue-Cheese amalgam which was tart bordering on medicinal. 

But. The Chicken Burger. Shit you guys, this burger.

The brioche that accompanies this chicken patty must feel like the woman whose partner insisted on wearing a tracksuit to her best friend's wedding: The chicken has been mashed to death creating an ultra smooth texture, but is formed into a patty so is also weirdly gelatinous. The added herbs morph the already-odd flavour away from anything meat-like so at best description it tastes and feels like a large slice of a gooey Quorn roast joint, but worse. 

It is so pronounced that no other flavours from the buffalo sauce or blue cheese get a look in, you get a hint at the aioli but it doesn't help matters. The brioche is a nice version - shiny, airy and bouncy - but the sandwich is constructed in such a way that the slimy chicken patty slides off the lettuce and tomato on the bottom bun and it takes greco-roman grapple to keep everything together. Oh. Fucking. Dear. 

We were asked if we wanted the food that we had left on our plates boxed-up to take home. We politely declined.

[burgeranarchy]

Hang Fire Southern Kitchen / Barry, Wales

Disappointment is all too common with places that claim to do real American-style barbecue in the UK. You get all excited, you giddily go in on the ribs and the brisket, and are ultimately disappointed by the subpar meat and lack of authenticity. So when we hit up Hang Fire Southern Kitchen, our usual scepticism (and the limited lunchtime menu) dictated that we go for the burger.

This is a classic pub/steakhouse burger. The patty is a plump seven ounces with a loosely packed pink centre. It misses a touch of flavour and could do with a bash more salt but has good texture to it. The fry sauce is a great example of the familiar sweet tangy notes of a classic burger sauce, and ordering the burger with 'the works' adds a great pickle relish punching a piquant sour next to it. 'The Works' also provides the requisite lashings of pub burger-esque salad.

The requested addition of cheese provided a thick slice of pretty strong cheddar, loading up the tangy flavour to high levels in the mix. Place all that in a pretty decent brioche, which had substance but wasn't dry, and what you have is a perfectly fine pub-style offering. 

Oh how we should have gone for the ribs 'n' chicken platter. We managed to snag a couple of ribs off of a fellow diners' plate. Turns out if you stare incessantly at someone's food for long enough it makes them uncomfortable enough to hand over some of it. And they were good. 

The deep, near-treacly, bark revealed a pink insides. The meat was great - it held up enough to be cut into individual ribs but pulled off the bone delightfully easily and was brilliantly soft. The bark to meat ratio meant that there was a great mix of the bite and intensity in flavour of the rub with the subtly smoky insides. It was all over way too soon, but we could have eaten racks of these baby backs.   

Stalwarts of Cardiff's street food scene, Hang Fire have just opened up in the guts of an old hydraulic pumphouse on Barry Docks. This new permanent base means bigger quantities of different Southern-US-style barbecue meats, which the dinner menu showcases. The large place has been kept simplistic in design, with bare brick walls and wooden-slatted pillars housing leather banquettes and simple furnishings. Pictures of the pitmasters' travels adorn the walls giving it a feel similar to the homely barbecue places in the States. Give this place a bit of time and it too could become one of those weathered but reliable places to go grab some decent grub. We'll be heading back as soon as we can to test their smoker mettle on the trickiest of beasts, brisket.

[burgeranarchy]

Le Bun / Clerkenwell, London

Just thought we’d get a quick note out on Le Bun’s residency at the Zetter Hotel, as we’ve only just been and the residency only runs until 20th December - because it is rather worthy of a shout out. 

Getting to take control of the kitchen at a swish place like the Zetter Hotel, which has seen the likes of Bruno Loubet spin the pans, seems like a bit of a coup for street food stall and festival circuit veterans Le Bun. But it turns out their swanky Franco-American offerings quite befit the trendy modernist establishment. And when we say swanky we mean there is a ton of ‘truffle’ and ‘confit’ being bandied about on the menu, and the aptly-titled Truffle Double Double cheeseburger isn’t shy of it.

Just fucking look at it, it is a beautiful specimen – the delightfully uneven patties are seared handsomely with American cheese submissively melted upon them. The sesame-seeded brioche is glossy, a velvety dollop of slowly melting truffle mayo is gently coaxed between top bun and patty and a bed of moist onion sits atop the bottom bun at the other end. 

The taste mimics the appearance. The aged chuck brisket blend is spot on - the meat is soft, almost buttery, with the nicely seasoned seared outside adding a thick, salty hit of flavour. The cheese intermingles with each bite, present but not overpowering in that classic American cheese way. The bun houses everything well, not buckling under lashings of juice and condiment with just enough resistance. This is good guys. And also rather reminiscent of another favourite of ours, Bleecker St.: They don't look that dissimilar, and the way the cheese is melted, the beef having that same delicate softness paired with unique meaty taste, it isn’t miles away in flavour either. It is the addition of ALL the truffle that sets it apart.   

The quantity of the rich, buttery truffle mayo is substantial, and when combined with the richness of the truffled veal jam and the beef it is a bit overwhelming. Like going to the Ambassador’s party, single-handedly ploughing through half of the huge pyramid of Ferrero Rocher, only to end up hiding under the furs in the cloakroom with stomach cramps – overindulgence is not always the way to go. We had ordered some pickles which came in handy to throw in the burger to cut through the richness and add some piquant bite. Saying that this is still a great burger for the more extravagant out there, and well worth trying.

Rob

If you miss the Zetter residency, they are at Winter Wonderland until 3rd January. Hopefully they will find somewhere else to take up residency in the New Year.

[burgeranarchy]

Vegas Miscellany

Apart from the very brief time that we had to stay sober enough to drive a car, our Vegas vacation consisted of a steady stream of grub, light beer and Seagrams 7 interspersed with a regular passing of mid-denomination bills to roulette wheel operators, only to never see them again. No one wants an extensive review of how Red 23 came up every fucking time we didn’t put money on it, or how our ‘strategy’ rapidly deteriorated into asking people what date their birthday was. So we’ll stick to what we consumed instead.

STRIPBURGER

In dire need of Vitamin D and actual real-life air we took a slightly misguided wander outside in the middle of the day to the Fashion Show Mall, the Strip’s shopping centre, mostly for the shade but also to check out Stripburger.   With a circular bar surrounded by a tarp-roofed 'patio', Stripburger seems to be going for a by-the-pool vibe – sitting on the terrace as mist spray lightly attempts to dance over you from above – except instead of a pool you are overlooking the traffic on the Strip if you’re lucky and an abandoned shop unit if not. Grab a couple of huge alcohol-heavy cocktails though and the view quickly becomes less of an issue. 

Still gut-crowded from breakfast we opted for the mini burger sampler, a selection of their best sellers, to get a taster three little version of their full size offerings. The cheddar burger is as simple as it is good - a thick splodge of nicely-rubbery American cheddar sits on a soft, well-seasoned patty with a great meaty spank and a thin fleck of pink. The butter bun is dreamily soft, spongey and sturdy, housing small chopped up shards of tomato, lettuce and red onion providing a juicy crunch. A thin slice of pickle drops in the sweet-sharp, while the mayo spread on the bottom bun adds moisture and a mild creamy tang. It is textbook. It is lovely. 

The Whiskey BBQ burger throws a remarkably subtle Jack Daniels infused barbecue sauce which impacts the tongue with a boozy warm heat and sweet twist without being overpowering in either, and the fried onions strings are thin, perfectly-seasoned-and-battered savoury crunch fragments making each bite that more interesting. But the winner was the 'famous' blue cheese pieces which, with the onion strings, had an impossbily cream-cheesy with a dollop of blue sourness flavour that laid a smoothness across the burger. Obviously being Lilyputian in size we weren't getting the true 'adult' experience, but these were great well-proportioned numbers. 

Shout out to the fries, onion strings and pickles fries combo -The onions were more of the same from the burgers but the pickles were great crusty, smoothly sharp breadcrumbs discs, and the fries were moreish as hell. 

WHITE CASTLE

Did we pick our hotel due to its proximity to White Castle? We did. The knowledge such a noshery was a short stagger across the road for sustenance after a long night of Miller Lights. Built in to the $1 Michelob Light serving Casino Royale, the little castle façade looks adorable dwarfed by the Walgreens and Denny’s next door, perfectly placed on a little stretch of pavement perma-rammed due to the cheap beers and frozen margs.   

Considering the amount of business this Castle must get, the production line is honed to a majestic slickness: Two massive steel grills work in perfect staggered timing - one heats onions while the other steams the patties on top. The wait time is super short. 

What can we say that we haven't said before? The petite, pillowy bun moist from the intensely savoury assimilations of the percolated meat and onion juices - it is an actual-proper slider, joyously flavourfully chewy fun in all three of its bites. We went several times. We wished we had gone more.  

SHAKE SHACK

So you all know that the Shack like to have a local nod to new locations, often with a concrete or sausage to localise things a bit. In Vegas, it's concrete. It wasn't very good compared to the Paul A. Young masterpiece we have in London. Chewy bits of stale deep fried waffle batter sit atop a sickly red puke sauce. Gross. Onward.

ANCHOR BAR                            SECRET PIZZA

As timing goes, arriving the day that the originators of the buffalo wing opened in the Venetian is spot-the-fuck-on. We will always make a detour where wings are involved, and a slot machine is never far away. 

Anchor Bar have camped out in the Food Court of the grandiously named Grand Canal Shoppes, where you can take a ride in a gondola more ornate than you actually get in Venice. Proper ridiculous. We ordered a mild portion of the classic buffalo wings and they did not disappoint - the skin was perfectly crisped whilst the meat was moist and juicy inside, and they were covering with a decent sloshing of the most perfectly piquant, buttery-sweet, hot bufflo sauce. And even at mild, it still brought on an ample amount of under-eye sweat. Classic, archetypal, very good indeed.

The oh-so-hip Cosmopolitan isn't really our bag: It is all glassy and angular, shiny surfaces with extravagant light fixtures, like a giant fancy bathroom - but then we aren't the modish spray-on slacks crowd they are shooting for.  

But within it, down a hallway lined with framed vinyl album covers, lives Secret Pizza - a small (by Vegas standards) New York-style pizzeria. They do by-the-slice or whole pies of just-crispy-but-pliably-floppy based pizza with a good selection of toppings accompained by a vibrantly sharp sweet tomato sauce and rippably chewable cheese. If you are nearby, it is worth hitting up. But be warned, seating in the place is very limited and the options immediately outside it are laughably inappropriate for sloppy slice comsumption. Stand, eat, move on. 

DOWNTOWN

Downtown has always been wonderful for cheaper minimum bet tables and super fast waitress service at them. But recently some multi-millionaire has poured a fuck ton of dollar into the area, turning it into a kind of polished, Stepford Wives' proto-Williamsburg. Artisanal doughnut shops and markets aside, the top of Fremont Street has both dive bars and hip drinking spots lining both sides of the road - We hit up the Griffin (a dive bar in what looks like a monastry wine cellar) and had a wonderful time drinking slightly overpriced Olympias. 

And you can't miss the Container Park, a shopping and dining center made of (you guessed it) shipping containers, with a kids' park in the middle that hosts open air movie nights and has a giant fire-breathing metallic praying mantis procured from Burning Man at it's entrance. It makes Boxpark look like the dodgy extension with the leaky corrugated PVC roof that you had on your first student house. And in it are some super solid places to eat. 

Pinches Tacos dishes up some simple but effective Mexican food - their pescado taco interfaces super fresh crisply battered fish with an equally fresh crunchy slaw; well marinated asada is rich, soft hunks of beef with fresh onion chunks, coriander and a punchy green tomatillo salsa throwing just enough heat; and the best of the trio, the slow broiled Al Pastor, a flavour-packed soft saucy spicy pork with a pert salsa - all in supple, chewy, and freshly made tortillas. Decent.      

Big Ern's have turned a couple of containers into a proper unassuming little barbecue shack, complete with wooden fixins and a dude with a deep, booming Southern drawl delivering the food. Now, the more barbecue you eat in the UK (and the longer it has been since you've had it in the States), the more you believe that what you are eating is true American barbecue. A nanosecond after the Big Ern's brisket had brushed our tongues we realised that such thinking is fucking delusional - it was moist, pull-apart soft with a great flavour and rich, intense bark. It kicked the shit out of pretty much most  of the stuff you get in London. And it wasn't even Ern's best offering, the meat on the ribs clung on just enough before succumbing to little coaxing and was bang on, with great bark and a super smokey sweetness. Makes us think we should save all our barbecue eating for future holidays. 

Simon & Rob

[burgeranarchy]

Back To The Birthday Cake

This is what happens when Back To The Future Day and a birthday coincide. Epic cheeseburger cupcakes courtesy of our nearest and dearest. Scones? Where we're going we don't need scones.

And some of the making of.. 

Rob

[burgeranarchy]

The Manchester Digression

It is not often we get up North. When we do it is usually for someone's stag, as if the cities above Watford are only good for getting shitfaced in. Don't get us wrong, Liverpool is a lovely place to get shitfaced in. But there is more to the North than cheap shots and endless plays of the Beatles and Oasis. Surely. Luckily, the first ever helpful embedded ad on the interwebs and a couple of twenty quid return train tickets later and we were winging our way up to Granadaland to eat much of the food.

NORTHERN SOUL GRILLED CHEESE

Whilst trying not to be lost in Manchester, we blundered across this pop up stall-like unit just off the high street. When we saw that their grilled cheese manifest extended to a patty melt we realised we had found breakfast. And people, it was ruddy great. 

The sourdough had been perfectly grilled, with a crisp maple-brown edge. The thin, well-seasoned, pink patty inside was paired with a rich, warmly sharp cheese triple-blend and a couple of slices of brilliantly sticky American all wonderfully melted down. Soft savoury sautéed onions and a cracking spicy-creamy chipotle mayo included, it all connected to make texturally ace, tasty sandwich worthy of owning some cat pyjamas. 

The menu changes weekly, so it might not be on when you visit. But if it is, do it. 

HOME SWEET HOME

Bearings found we headed down to the Northern Quarter, a business gentrifi-regeneration construct of the 90s which seems to have been a bonkers success as it is now the craziest concentration of trendy food and drink establishments in the city. With a befuddling number of places on the list to try in the area we decided on the one that was still selling breakfast, as a toastie doesn't technically count as such. 

Home Sweet Home is a 'Milk Bar', a perplexingly vague term that is increasingly bandied around to mean either coffee shop, bakery or cafe. Blame David Chang. This one serves benedicts, hash, large slices of cake and burgers all at once so we're instantly in. It is a cute place vibing the homely feel of a little wooden-panelled village cafe around idiosyncratic touches of Tiffany lamp shades and artwork-strewn walls, with the reassuring modern-touch familiarity of mismatched wooden chairs. Quaint but modish, the name matches the drapes.

We were tempted by the cheeseburger toasty (a Manchester trait of #cheeseburgering things that would become more apparent as the day wore on), but plumped for a breakfast muffin and cheeseburger. 

Below a splendidly domed buttered brioche of the cheeseburger were two thin, a touch overcooked but decently seasoned patties with nice crust, topped by some classic American-style cheese slices. Reams of tangy-sweet mayo-based house sauce flows over the top like tasty condiment lava whilst the thick slices of onion, tomato and dill pickle dump fresh, crispness and sharpness against the soft bun and beef. Solid effort.         

The 777 Muffin was much less successful:  Despite being pincered by two slices of American cheese the huge puck of black pudding was comparatively way too thick and dry, overpowering the flavour of the sausage patty (which by itself wasn't all that) and bacon, with the red sauce a less than impressive condiment addition donating little in the way of taste.  

But let's feedback sandwich the shit out of this by saying that the Nutella and toasted marshmallow milkshake was fucking herculean, subtle-yet-moreish-as-hell. Looking around, practically every table had order a milkshake of some description so they must be a thing here. Maybe they should call themselves a milkshake bar. Or Yard. 

ALMOST FAMOUS

We have been all over these dudes since we first had their grub merch at the NFL event in London last year, but the zero-shits-given Twitter, bathroom decor controversy and batshit crazy-sounding menu items had their Northern restaurants tagged as a must-go. We really to wanted to check out where it all started in the original, and recently phoenix-ed, Northern Quarter base.  

But not being able to wait until 5 for it to open we thought we'd patronise their newer gaff nuzzled in the old Great Northern warehouse in Deansgate. In the cold light of day the entrance is muted, the neon BurgerWings logo masked by sunlight. But it's the gizzards of the place delivering the bombastic - a food theme park with wall art designed by a graffiti artist with a Disney fetish in a cavernous room that felt like it should also house a Quasar. Like MEATliquor, but if you like your deviance baptised in the church of cartoons and pop culture and no sense of restraint whatsoever.

The menu continues the motif: the names of celebs deceased by way of drug overdoses christen burgers, fries are 'winning', and 'wonderdust' and 'bacon rain' are toppings . The fast food manifestation of an acid house party. The revamped menu had literally dropped the day before, so as well as the 'I'm Crack-ed Baby', we opted for the pretzel-bunned noob 'Vinnie Chase'.  

Below a smooth, polished and lightly freckled bun globules of blue cheese sauce trickled over the starchy-crunch double team of salt and vinegar crisps and shoestring fries. The red of the cholula danced and mingled with the sauce over the two patties bedecked with smelted American cheese slices. Glorious sloppiness awaited. It looked pretty in that proud-hangover-creation way.

The insane ingredient combinations going on felt like being face-fucked by a Flavour Shaker, bombarding even our aged taste buds into paroxysms of confusion. It was all at once the creamy tang over tangy heat over an ultra-vinegary-salt hit over the intense sweet meatiness of chorizo slices. Everything pinballed over the tongue vying for dominance, so the sour-heat-salt-creaminess was good at times and way too overpowering at others - which meant that the beef was effectively disappeared, all flavour lost in the haze, reduced it to its basest chewy fibrous protein.       

The Vinnie Chase nudged the levels down a bit: The pretzel bun was chewy and savoury as you would like, the applewood provided a sweet smokiness to compliment the streaky bacon, soft onions mayo and ketchup intertwined into a nice thick-sweet condiment. Then there was the marmite butter which was hard to decide if it added a creamy umami hit over everything, or just made everything taste a bit like marmite. Such is Marmite. Regardless, the flavour of meat was again snuffed out by the profound accompaniments.

We wanted to order a cheeseburger just to sample it, but it was time to move on since to be honest we were a little bit disappointed.

LUST LUCK LIQUOR & BURN

This is another creation of the Almost Famous clan, focussed on amped-up tex-mex cuisine inspired by a Fear and Loathing-esque drive from Vegas to Mexico via California which is referred to again and again and again.

Darkened shack-like wood panels line walls while sunset vistas of the Mexican plains are painted on others, the serving hatch even looks like the side of a shipping container. Add some mis-matched chairs and thick wooden topped tables and you have yourself a concept, a very low budget version of Mexico at Epcot Center. The menu is crammed with all manner of versions of quesadilla, burrito and tacos, looking like ransom note from a bunch of starving kidnappers. 

When in #cheeseburgering Rome, we ordered the bacon cheeseburger quesadilla - mince beef with seasoning combined well with chopped onion, nacho cheese with ketchup and mustard to produce a convincing cheeseburger taste, even if the lumps of pickle were too big and overpowering in mouthfuls. 

The Baja fish tacos, served on a custom license plate (take note @wewantplates), paired delightfully fresh, clean white fish encased in a robust but light batter which balanced each other well with avocado providing the creaminess, chopped iceberg with thin slices of radish providing good crunch while a hot sauce gave everything a firm kick in the rear. The boneless chicken Blasts were hunky strips of meat covered in a thick still-crispy coating and some buffalo sauce that was flavourful but also induced some solid under-eye sweats, let down a little by a thin, yogurt heavy dip. The seven layer dip was a visual treasure and tasted like everything we remember from having it the States. 

And the Frozen margaritas were awesome, bar the missing salt on the rim that had to be added manually.  

SOLITA

We were aware that Solita was known for two things: #cheeseburgering the humble spring roll and the Big Manc, the not-so-subtle tribute to Ronald's classic, emblazoned in neon in the window of the otherwise unassuming facade of their Northern Quarter base.

The interior is a confusing contrariety of comic strip illustrations and Vegasian bulb signs merged with

simple white colour schemes, dark pseudo-posh furnishings next to a leather-cladded bar, and industrial lighting.

It feels odd for the small space it is, especially with a menu catering heavily to burgers, wings and hot dogs, in a 'should I wear my posh frock or sweatpants?' way. As it was starting to busy up, and only semi-Arctic outside, we figured to sit in their beer garden area across the road. 

Chock full and half-aware distant whistle of our carriage home was forthcoming we promptly ordered a Big Manc, which in kind promptly arrived; a majestic elephantine monument of tucker housing twelve ounces of beef. The bun looked great, the Monterey Jack was flirtatiously melted and the paprika-flecked Big Manc sauce was bounteous.

The two patties were a handsome pink and decently moist, if under seasoned. The light yellow-hued brioche was slightly hard, more than likely over-toasted than stale, but was softened by the juices exuding from the meat. The Big Manc sauce did a sterling job of emulating that of the golden arches, with a sweetness that was cut through by the tartness of the accompanying pickle slices. And the iceberg, well the Big Mac has it so this does too, although the amount was negligible in contrast to the size of the fucking thing. A fairly competent attempt at pimping a classic.

EPILOGUE

You have to applaud the city that tries to cheeseburger everythin. And we only played with the tip of Manchester's burgeoning food scene. Our M&S G&Ts slipped down delightfully as we discussed our hopefully imminent return on the nauseating pendolino journey home. Those trains are tough to do a standing up wee on. 

Simon & Rob

[burgeranarchy]

BoomTing @ The Lamb / Surbiton, Surrey, UK

While the station technically sneaks in to the Greater London boundary by a whopping 700 metres, Surbiton isn't really London. The postcode isn't right, the name looks like someone hastily mashed 'Suburb''Town' together when asked what they were going to call the place. But mostly it is just too fucking nice: The roads are leafy and quiet, cars to stop let you cross the road when there isn't even a proper crossing, the Thames is actually quaint and not a wide, unflushed festival toilet.

But who bigs up the food there? No one. Until recently when one Friday, during a friend's birthday, we were informed of a guy selling exceptional burgers in a pub down the road. No fucking way, not in Surbiton. But a good few beers down we realised we could probably eat. Is it rude to leave a birthday party in a pub to go and eat a burger in another pub? Yes, it is. Did we? Yes, we did.

The Lamb is a proper ale drinkers pub with knick-knacks plastered over the walls with a quirky beatnik feel and a no-fuss-get-to-the-drinking spirit. The beer garden is big and the decor could be described as ramshackle, but there is a fucking amazing homemade adult-size Hungry Hippos at the back that just begs to be played with. Boom Ting is a simple one-man operation set up out there, with a table for ingredients and another for a small grill - so small that it has to be cleaned to make the veggie option before being set back into meat mode.   

The patty in the Green Chilli Cheese is a good size of a coarse grind mix, squashed into shape on the grill giving it a scraggy edge. 

Cooked to a decent medium, juice effortlessly seeps out of quality meat nicely seasoned with a great crust piling together to give a deep beefy base to the burger.  The melted Gruyere merged to patty surface is savoury but buttery, accentuated by a thick layer of mayo on the bottom bun, and the pickled red onions snaps some piquancy through.  

The green chilli relish though. Fuck yes. Sourced from Vadsaz deli it punches with an instant heat that levels out perfectly, matching a warm sharpness with a mild sweetness that lingers plesantly. Then there is the candied bacon - chewy, smokey with an intense sweetness - that rivals the infamous Flipper's version. Boshed into a bun cloched to sweaty succumbed softness with red cabbage for bite, this is one pretty fucking on fleek burger. 

A great deal of this reminds us of the origins of one Yianni of MEATLiquor fame: A passionate dude running a tiny scale operation serving to a loyal customer base, with a tiny menu and a statement green chilli cheese. And even if not quite as mind blowing (doubtful anything else will ever be) it is still one of the better burgers we've tasted in town for a while, and all because of that pesky Greater London boundary.

Rob

[burgeranarchy]

Smashed Triple Tour / Las Vegas, Nevada

Las Vegas. Las fucking Vegas. What a ruddy delightful place. A ginormous sparkly seaside arcade in the middle of a huge desert where all-you-can-eat buffets are everywhere, alcoholic slushies in oversized containers are in almost every hand, and waitresses offer you free drinks while you throw dollar bills with joyful abandon attempting to guess where a tiny ball is going to land on a spinning wheel.

It is also the only city in the US where pretty much all of the big, hip burger chains have locations. The land of infinite neon and big screens has facilitated the tearing down of meaty walls as chains from the East and West co-exist: White Castle, In-N-Out, Shake Shack, Umami - they are all here. It is an oasis of seared beef with condiment waterfalls.   

Not baller enough to get them delivered to the roulette table, and with a bit of time left before we had to return the hire car, we figured we’d get out into the sweaty nethers of Sin City to hit up some expert curators of the smashed patty. Plus, it is always advisable to provide some comestible cushioning before the onslaught of gallons of light beer.

STEAK ‘N SHAKE

The proclaimed originator of the ‘Steakburger’, the octogenarian chain from the Midwest has been slowly creeping further West and finally set up shop in Santa Monica late last year. Having crushed on the place so hard in New York a few years ago, it was top of the list to return to.   Their Vegas location sits in the South Point hotel and casino a few miles South of the Strip. It is positively breezy compared to the frenetic Strip locations, as families and the latter-yeared meander around serenely. The casino is airy, it has a 16 screen cinema, and a mental 64 lane bowling alley. Having had the senses pounded on by likes of the Mirage and Caesar’s, in comparison it is full-on Center Parcs relaxing.

Unlike New York’s ‘Signature’ counter-service and paired down menu format, the South Point location is a proper sit down family restaurant - a Hopper-esque beacon shining out into the low-lit casino floor. It’s a classic booths-in-the-window-tables-in-the-round diner peppered with their strong red and white motif. The grill line is open which means you can watch the dude squishing meat as you pay your bill. And the menu is hella long: there are all manner of decision-impairing specials to choose from.   In proper restaurant style the burgers arrive on plates accompanied by a dune of shoe-string fries, included in the delightfully cheap price. The patties on the Original Double with cheese are a visual rapture: Two dark, flat, crisp brown crusts sandwich some American cheese, giving a deep well-seasoned meaty flavour as crunch gives way to soft meat and dairy. As satisfying a combination as you imagine it to be.The classic accompaniments of crunchy onion, juicy tomato and lettuce with the condimetrinity (ketchup / mustard / mayo) all adding their creamy, sweet and tangy flavours subtly behind the beef while generous thick slabs of pickle level up the tang and crunch.   

The discrepancy with the Big Apple location comes down to the way it is served: The signature store in New York wraps it’s burgers in the same way In-N-Out does, and with the majority or orders being take out the burger gets to intermingle in it’s own heat while you transit it for consumption – so the bun is soft and swirled with meshed flavours. The diner version comes fresh off the grill with a domed toasted bun placed on top so the presentation is dry and the sandwich is missing that satisfying oneness, the presence of the bun is almost off-putting.     The Cheesy Cheddar added to our slight disappointment. The 'loads' of Wisconsin cheddar seen oozing out on the menu ended up being small ball of barely melted orange plonked on the patties, and missing the pickles and some condiments made it a drier and not really enjoyable experience.

FREDDY'S

When scrutinising Vegas’s burgers (read: placing large fuck-you crosses by every Ramsey establishment) Freddy’s piqued our interest because it served not only Steakburgers, a la Steak ‘n Shake, but also the frozen custard that we are so familiar with at Shake Shack. It sounded like a solid mash up so we cranked our sweet Nissan into the only gear it had and headed a bit further out to Southfork.        The parallels are abound. It could be Shake Shack’s brother - the two came into existence around the same time - and it was founded in the Midwest like the grandpappy Steak ‘n Shake. And the place mixes the fast casual order-buzzer-collect service style of the Shack with the quaint retro diner ornamentation of the Steak down the road. It has a family diner feel: the booths are super booth-y, the colours are vibrant (classic red and whites merge with warm creams), it manages to feel homely and throwback-y whilst still having a modern nudge.

And their wares are awesome. The Original Double plays out much like Steak ‘n Shakes - the patties are expertly smash-crusted but with more crispy craggy edges and yet impossibly pink juicy insides. The rest is simplicity: the cheese is gooey-merged onto both patties and are topped with crazily mild and tender fresh sliced onions, Thick crinkle-cut pickles and mustard. Yup, that is it. The beefy salty crunch of the meat mixed with the tart bite of pickles, mustard and onion is perfect, as is it's juicy consistency soaking the bottom part of the bun just enough. 

The California style adds Freddy's sauce - a nicely sweet, piquant and mayo-based burger sauce - some lettuce and tomato. Their Animal Style if you will. The sauce and tomato adds an extra sweetness to contrast the savoury hit of beef and makes it nicely sloppy. It is the whole slice of onions, which should be glaringly overbearing, but is so fucking mild with the perfect chomp that finishes it off. Both are fucking awesome burgers.  

They are good and playful with their concretes too. The Oreo blended ice cream with gummy worms and cream on top was spot on 

SMASHBURGER

And so round the corner to another chain we lost a bit of our shit over whilst in New York. Smashburger is challenging Five Guys in the fastest expanding chain awards, and is now targeting US airports in their tireless quest. They are everyfuckingwhere, and planning at least one UK site by the end of this year. These guys are not fucking messing around, with a business model that unashamedly flogs salads along side burgers to cater to as many as possible. With a fast-casual method that merges counter ordering with table service, like the decor, it feels clunky but charming. 

The Classic Smash always arrives open, with the cheese looking the kind of moist we do when we turn up somewhere ten minutes late having run most of the way. But put it together and it doesn't matter: The patty is smashed onto a buttered grill using a shaped press, so it isn't crispy-edged and irregular like the previous two, but still has a good solid crust aided (no doubt by that glorious butter) and a touch of pink inside. It doesn't punch you like the others, but the beefy knock is there. 

Add the salty squish of American cheese, thick sharp pickle nuggets and red onion, with two tomato slices and a top-bottom sweet-creamy ketchup-Smash sauce combination and you get a nicely balanced burger. The egg bun in the one though. It is robust whilst delightfully chewy and still bouncing soft with a buttery yet savoury flavour.

The signature Vegas burger is typically next level: the haystack onions are deep fried strings, covered in crisp, well-seasoned batter, that inexplicably lack any grease at all. Grilled onions bring a sweet warm flavour release, and the smoked bacon is chewy and smokey and great. Even the fried egg, which we are generally against in burgers, cuts a buttery richness though the smokey crunch fest. Even after eating as much as we have it is a pleasure to consume. 

Crusty smashed goodness satisfactorily consumed, we trundled the car back up the I-15 to its final resting place at the rental return lot and walked into the dimly-lit dinging casino distance to lose dollars instead of gaining pounds. Good times. 

Simon & Rob

P.S. Here is the video we made of our smash journey in case you missed it.

[burgeranarchy]

Fatburger / London, UK

Understatement alert: Americans have something of a bad rep when it comes to invasions. But you cannot deny that the latest influx of American burger chains has added even more depth to the already burgeoning scene in London and the rest of these beloved Isles, regardless of how enthusiastic or maligned your opinion of them may be.

KNOWLEDGE BOMB - The UK has almost as many Five Guys per square mile as the US (UK - one per 3,243mi², US - one per 3.193mi²)

Five Guys and Shake Shack led the first wave of the invasion with the former executing a meaty Manifest Destiny approach to expansion by opening a noggin-boggling 29 stores in two years, gracing such obviously auspicious locations as Ashton-under-Lyne. And Harlow.

And the second wave is beginning: With Smashburger heading over soon spearheaded by a dude called Tim*, in the mean time L.A. chain Fatburger has just opened the glass portal at its first store. And this lot have some big fucking stones too, as it is in Camden - next door to Byron, two doors down from whiners The Diner, and around the corner from Honesty B's. There are so many places to eat a beef bun you could rename this place 'Burgden Town', AMIRITE? If you wanted a more ballsy inaugural location you'd be hard pressed to find it (unless you opened next to Five Guys in Harlow).

Fatburger works in the Look-like-McDonald's-but-act-slightly-like-a-restaurant places where you order up at the counter and then your food is brought to you, or 'fast-casual' if you want to use the official moniker. This looks exactly like all the ones in the States we have been to: one wall showcased all the exotic places they are located, red and yellow panels line the ceiling, seating is basic fast food stuff with a couple of booths at the back. Standard.

A double with 'The Works' is reassuring in its classic American-ness. The condimental triplet of American mustard, mayo and relish contribute the sharp-sweet-rich amalgam that is fondly familiar. The shards of onions, masses of lettuce and thick lumps of pickle dispense that mouthful of crunch, rawness and piquant tang around the soft, unremarkable smashed patties there more as savoury texture than something to flavour focus on. 

You'll need a double. There is no point ordering the single here as the meat easily gets swallowed amongst a colossus of toppings and bun, which is soft, sweet and shiny but a tad too substantial. And you need to add cheese, the gooey sticky binding of ingredients it provides is always more satisfying. And thus you achieve a competent effort with a familiar make up. 

There will be inevitable comparisons with Five Guys, and fair enough, they do similar things: You order in the same way; 'The Works' here is 'All The Way' there and the flavour profile is largely identical; you can add and subtract pretty much any ingredient you want, some of which are free and some extra. In a contest it is close, with Five Guys edging it with better patties and foil-steamed messiness. 

Franchise doubledown

In an embrace of the American way of combining fast food places, because who doesn't want to have Taco Bell and KFC in the same place (one bite Double Down to one bite Crunchwrap Supreme - the dream), this unit shares the space with wingslinger Buffalo's Cafe. So of course we tried some. 

The frankly insane number of sauces is off-putting, but the 'hot' is the go to classic buffalo - with decent heat and sweet piquant flavour, but lack of quantity. The accompanying blue cheese sauce had a strange Ranchy-like sweetness to it . The wings themselves were fucking embarrassing though - tiny, malnourished tiddle-fingers with more bone than meat that made the accompanying carrots more protein-laden. The boneless were more gratifying, not massive but a solid coating with moist meat.

The disappointment continued with the miniature portion of curly fries which was undercooked, and not in the awesome floppy, squishy way. The thorough cajun covering on another portion improved them no end. 

Comedy of errors

The biggest let down, uncharacteristic of an imported American chain, was the comical mismanagement. Only one server slowly took orders for an ever lengthening queue, and other staff were experts at ignoring it. The trademark hollering of the orders from server to kitchen were there, but they were recited back with the vigour and memory retention of an indifferent classroom. Every order was questioned, leaving cooked burgers languishing in front of the dressing station while the dressers tried to figure out what the fuck had to be put on them. Even after the server took our buddy's receipt back to the kitchen to show what toppings his order needed, his burger still came out missing one. And that was after time too.

Training had not, it seems, been rigorous.  

Five Guys and its subsequent success has seemingly laid the benchmark for dollar/pound equivalence in pricing of The American burger in London, and the ensuing unhappiness amongst some. But this is the new era in which we live, and we must embrace it. It comes with the crushing realisation that the two chains we really want to come over the most, In-n-Out and White Castle, just aren't going to. And so our out-of-nowhere uncontrollable bouts of sobbing will continue. 

Rob

*Coincidentally, this is the guy who had a hand in bringing both Shack Shack and Five Guys over here and, if his Twitter account is anything to go by, was employed for a time last year by Midwestern burgermakers Steak n Shake in an effort to launch them in the UK market. Conspiracy, or just lucky dude?

[burgeranarchy]

The Brighton Digression

London is the best. It has awesome parks. It has a massive brown river bowling through the middle of it that you can drink next to. It has proper old buildings to ogle as well as proper new buildings to ogle. And harboured in some of those are some fucking awesome places to eat.

But occasionally you have to get away, and we like nothing better than heading to the sea to take in the brisk, salty air, stroll along the vast stretches of coastline, and play mini golf and Time Crisis whilst absorbing double-coned 99s like bosses.

So naturally we thought we’d head to London-On-Sea, occasionally referred to as ‘Brighton’, to go and eat some of the burgeoning selection of burgers on offer. Brightoneers bang on and on about their quality of life and suchlike we had to see whether we could become one of them for the day.

Timetabled at a mere hour away, once we’d navigated the absolute tag-team shitshow that is London Bridge and the Southern rail network, an enchantingly gloomy Brighton greeted us. But fuck it, we could see the beach, and it was brunch time.

Billie’s

On the corner of a couple of ordinary roads, away from all the bustle of Main Street Brighton, sits a pretty nondescript cafe; blue gingham vinyl tablecloths, a mixture of sturdy and fold-away wooden chairs borne out of necessity and not design, with simple vases containing a few blooms for colour. Occasionally, excitingly, simple facades oft belie something special within and Billie’s is one of these, serving American-style dishes and speciality hashes with a distinct English bent.

The Egg Swiss Hash, which we improved by adding bacon to, was a colossal plate of soft homestyle crispy-fried potato hash with rashers of back bacon and perfectly poached eggs almost consumed by the sheer volume of melty-supple grilled cheddar and swiss atop it. It was a proper tasty dairy carb avalanche that, even when twos-ing it, left us stuffed. Whilst it must win awards for being the best hangover cure in this town, we may have made an error by making it a precursor to an entire day of burgers.

Nevermind. Onward.

Lucky Beach

As the whimsical name would suggest this gaff, doling out burgers to the daytime/early evening crowd, is stationed in one of the arches right on the beachfront so you can grab a table practically in amongst the pebbles if you so desire. Nine degrees Celsius in early March could not stop us supping some alfresco beers and taking in the view.

Their potentially trademark-infringing Double Double is a delightfully colourful brute, layered like a savoury trifle: fresh pink, pickled onions give a solid sour hit with hairline sweetness, a double layer of yellow cheese slices is melted to a yielding gloop with the two full-nelson-ing some exceptional crisp smokey bacon chunks.

This is all placed on a patty seared with a good inky crust and a pink middle of some really flavourful aged beef, encased within the lesser spotted poppy seed bun. Interesting choice. But the bun itself is bouncy with a solid bagel-like chew. This sets a pretty high standard for the rest of the day.

The stilton and bacon fries were strong in the fry and bacon constituent, just lacked enough blue cheesiness in an overly mayo-like dressing.

NEXT

Brighton Burger

Their opening times are LIES. Closed.

NEXT

Burger Kult

The Mash Tun seems a good fit for these guys, as it is the Brighton equivalent of a Scream pub - regular student haunt for us way back when all we wanted was cheap beer and multi-multiple shots of apple Sourz. The bike chain artwork painted on the walls, the Einstein-in-Kiss-make-up portrait, we bet they get through a fuck ton of Fireball here.

The Kult like their burgers named crazy shit like Supermonstertruck and Swamp Thing, and each one is an epic poem of ingredients - they must have one hell of a kitchen to deal with all the different stuff they pile into these guys. We went with a Whiplash, their version of a cheeseburger.

Hang on, this seems a touch familiar. Another poppy seeded bun? Brighton must really like poppy seeds, or have some crazy surplus. And pink pickled onions too.

The patty is very competently cooked, with a pink middle oozing meat syrup. The classic mayo-ketchup-French’s combi-ment mixes sweet/sharp/creaminess topped off with added tangy piquant from the pink onions and pickles. The spattering of veg is probably for show mostly, and the bun is a little dry but handles the task of holding all the sauce. It is a decent burger. With more time it would have been cool to try some of the more bolshy combos.

Brighton, you are spoiling us.

ADVANCE.

Troll’s Pantry

The Pantry bosses are admirable in their desire to create a thoroughly ethical burger, everything is ‘sustainable’, ‘non-GMO’ and ‘seasonal’. A far cry from the ever-last cheese slices we are so fond of, almost makes us feel guilty. You get the feeling when these guys are not searing high welfare meat they are up in a tree protesting about potential new bypasses destroying the green belt.

The Hobgoblin is that atypical ale-centric gig pub where your mates who have that obscurely-named prog doom band can probably get a gig on a Tuesday. And it feels like there was a particularly big one the night before, such was the drifting perfume of heavy disinfectant. We decided to take advantage of the enormous garden out the back with benches and booths aplenty.

The two burgers we tried were high impact flavour composites: The Sussex Cheese had a thick layer of impeccably melted-chewy St. Giles, sweet yellow mustard with a layer of pickled onion sitting on top of the patty and a rough chopped red cabbage-based slaw below it. It was a fresh, savoury combination that tasted, for want of a better description, a bit like a kebab. A strange but not-unpleasant surprise.

The much-lauded, almost ‘signature’, Stinky Breath is like throwing an umami bomb down your gullet. The potent blue cheese, beer and anchovy mix provides the thick ultra-savoury hit, the garlic mayo and onion add that raw, warm heat and the St Giles covers it with a smooth touch-of sweet blanket. The rocket adds colour more than anything else, the intense flavour of everything else nulling the potential peppery addition. It is fucking hardcore, but in a may-have-over-egged-the-pudding way, like a punch in the face where a stiff slap would suffice.

The buns are brilliant - glossy and good-squeeze soft, with a good airy texture and the ability to entertain all ingredients. The coarse grind patties are tickled to a soft pink and in places are lovely. But the grind results in gristly mouthfuls just a little too frequently, with one including a tooth-curdling air rifle pellet-sized lump, otherwise spoiling solid burgers.

No doubt the Pantry are doing something interesting though that not a lot of others are and straying from the well-treaded path of classic-style burgers that is worth a visit for that alone.

Ok, now we’re getting full. We need some home comforts.

FORTHWITH TO

MEATliquor

We could not come to Brighton without hitting the first MEAT location founded outside of London. It has a pseudo Liquor feel to it, with little pods and booths making inventive use of the space, just dialled down a few notches: the music is lower, and thus so is the raucous bierhall feel. Like, couples are on romantic dates here. It is really, really clean. And well-lit. The staff are bizarrely friendly and attentive. The specially made wallpaper suggests a slightly more clinical approach to prettying up the place. It's interesting to us to see what a 'model' build for a liquor empire might look like.

The MEAT staples are all here. So full were we from everything else we stuck with buffalo’d items: the wings were fucking amazing as always, the crunchy-crisp skin giving way to slip off the bone meat slooshed with the plentiful just-enough-heat ridden buffalo sauce. We also tried the shrimp; plump little lumps with their succumb-to-the-teeth texture covered in the light crunchy batter (the stuff that covers the pickles) then doused with that sauce - the combination works well. A splendid end to a food-filled day.

So to conclude.

Were we to only visit one venue on a return visit, it would have to be Lucky Beach. It has the right mix of good prep, friendly service and that all-important beachfront location.

We'll be back, London-on-Sea.

P.S. The mini-golf course is a very good one. The local bowling alley is also better kempt than any in London. Proper AMF lanes. Well oiled.

P.P.S. There are not enough Time Crisis machines in Brighton.

[burgeranarchy]

Steak & Honour / Cambridge, UK

Very occasionally we venture out to see what the Sticks look like. Having followed Steak & Honour on the Twitters for a while, there were only so many pictures of cheeseburgers in the wilds we could look at before we figured 'Cambridge is nice, right? That would be a bit of a jolly, eh?' Cut to a windy car park in a science park to chow down with the technological intelligentsia of Cambridge and check out the city's mobile burger vendor pacesetters.

The foodPark, nestled in a small lot within the Science Park site, is a diminutive affair on the day we arrive: Only a coffee cart and falafel van join the two dapper-aproned gentlemen calmly churning out burgers from their beautifully rendered white Citroen H Van. It is adorable. There are a handful of seats around a table for those brave enough to take on the fierce winds. There is also a VW van converted into a teeny tiny indoor picnic area for the lucky few to take solace. 

The double cheese served up has a Motherflipper-ish character in both presentation and design: cragged-edged patties are covered with sticky outpourings of cheese on a familiar cushion of chopped lettuce, pickles and red onion, all Jackson Pollocked with ketchup and mustard.

The bun is an ace balance between a great chewiness whilst still being light with a soft potato roll-like consistency. It is a super hull supporting beef that is a touch under seasoned and has been slightly overcooked so the meat has firmed up just that little bit more than you want. It is still pleasingly juicy though and pepped up by a decent crust from a well used grill helping to add a thick savoury hit.  

The recognisable cheese slices are doubled up and abundantly melted over the meat adding loads of pleasing gooey stickiness. The pickle is also bountiful, throwing a nice piquant stab into each bite, and the lettuce plus onion do their classic crunchy jobs whilst the condiments do there classic saucy ones. Familiar tastes from a conventional burger set up. 

But conventional and similar in composition though it is, it doesn't reach the stellar levels that Flipper achieves. Less life-changing, more a respectable go to if you are ever in Cambridge. A decent punt one would say. 

Rob