Who is the Foodie? It doesn’t really matter. Bacon is god. Wine cures anything. If you believe those two facts, then we’re going to get on fine. This means you have discovered the power of food to make life better. This knowledge is imperative to the art of living well.The Hamburger: New York vs Cape Town.
Posted in Bacon, Eats, Restaurants, Side orders on 20. May, 2010
Burgers. Not much can get foodies debating as much as burgers. Sushi, yes, and maybe pizza, but burgers may just be the most debated. They’re also perhaps the most sought after. I would drive (and have) two hours just to visit a renowned burger joint. I will wait 45-minutes in a queue (and have) to eat a great burger. I would pay $18 (and have) to eat a burger made from real Kobe beef. So the question is always asked in Cape Town: who serves the best burger? Well, I don’t think there’s a definitive answer to that. Everyone prefers their burgers differently. I enjoy an original burger, grilled medium-rare with maybe with some lettuce, cheese and bacon at most. Splash a bit of tomato sauce and some mustard on and I’m happy. Some people like the ‘gourmet’ creations: patties stuffed with stinky cheese, laden with onion rings, chilies, sauces or sweet jams. Not for me. Hence there’s never an agreement.
If the burger is American, then New York is its hometown. No city elsewhere can claim the mass demand and cult-like status the burger gets in the Big Apple. The place is teeming with outposts focused exclusively on the meat-between-the-bun favourite. There’s Pop Burger, DB Burger, BLT Burger, Bare Burger, Rare Burger, Better Burger, Blue 9 Burger, Burger Heaven, NY Burger. Put a word before ‘burger’ and it exists. There’s even a place called Burger Burger. Seriously. And they’re of all types, from big steakhouse-like restaurants to secret hole-in-the-wall joints. Take Burger Joint for example. You walk into a five-star hotel lobby, head into the corner and slide through a nondescript door into tacky little room where behind the counter two cooks crank out great burgers for $4 a pop. And it’s always packed. Or the Shake Shack, where the queue at lunchtime through summer is about 40-minutes. And that’s just the queue to order. They even have a webcam so you ca check the queue! Or the Corner Bistro, where you can get a (really good) 250g burger served on a paper plate till 4am. There really is no end to it.
When it comes to Cape Town burgers joints though, there aren’t many. And I’m talking burger joints, as in devoted to the burger. Hudsons is my favourite. The new guy on the scene edges out Royale (which has the ‘cutest’ interior in town), mainly because across the menu, Hudsons burgers are just better. I am keeping a keen eye on what’s happening at Gourmet Burger though, recently taken over by the Caveau & HQ team, but currently they’re not in the running. Royale makes one or two goodies, but overall their menu is awash with diluted patties and over-sauced burgers. Their saving grace: Uncle Morris (pictured below). I’ve gone with this burger for a comparison, since it’s billed as a ‘New York burger.’ A 250g burger with cheddar and bacon, it’s big, meaty and delicious. This is their best burger by a margin, and it’s really good. Cooked medium-rare, the meat is flavourful and really dominates, as it should.
From New York: the BLT (pictured top of post) from, well, BLT Burger, a small outpost in the West Village. BLT stands here not for the holy trinity of ‘bacon, lettuce and tomato,’ but for Bistro Laurent Tourondel, a fine-dining chef who’s turned his hand to low-brow fare at a few outposts (BLT Fish, BLT Steak, etc), and has done so very successfully. His BLT is a 200g patty with double-smoked bacon and BLT sauce, which seemed pretty much like bacon-flavoured mayonnaise. The thing tasted pretty amazing, not to mention being presented well. Do you see that neat little pink cow on the bun? That’s the Medium Rare marking pin. They have different ones for each temperatures, so no confusion come table-side. Clever.
What the BLT Burger had that doesn’t happen often here, was pickles. Or gherkins, as we know it. And these little sliced suckers gave it the winning touch. Most burgers in NYC have ‘em, and I think half the burgers in Cape Town could be improved with them. Salty and flavourful, they really add to the burger experience. In reality, while we do have a few burger joints in Cape Town and a handful of restaurants that can serve up a decent burger, we are a century behind when it comes to our devotion to this great item. We can compare one or two directly, but Cape Town doesn’t even hold a tiny birthday candle to the indomitable New York burger scene. Our craze for the braai is their craze for the burger, and we’ll never have it the same here. So we’ll just have to do with the few good ones we have for now. Or make several trips abroad each year to get a serious burger fix.
