Kimchi Cult x Rose & Crown / Walthamstow, London

“We’ll have the lot, please.”

The Rose & Crown is a big boozer nestled in the heart of the ‘Stow. It’s a classic ‘locals’ pub; the booze ‘n food offers sellotaped to the bar on neon card cut into star shapes, the local vagrant a mere drafty waft away and an eclectic music selection that throws Irish jigs followed by ambient jungle followed by Abba at you.

It’s also a celebrated CAMRA venue. We only know this because of the certificates on the wall. We know absolutely toss-all about real ale, but this pub is definitely on the circuit and they have an impressive array of regularly changing casks on offer, if that’s your thing.

It’s here where Kimchi Cult take over the kitchen for their Korean-style menu every Thursday night. We live in the mighty E17, so when we caught wind that someone was selling sliders at a pub a three minute bus ride away, we were straight down to sample everything we could get our hands on.

So, we ordered one of everything on their menu. It’s what we do.

We’ve come across Kimchi Cult before - a few times on Eat Street (where they pop up regularly) and when they were first getting started at Brick Lane Market. We’d not had their sliders or wings, since the street food tends to be geared towards subs. Being LA street food nerds, we’ve long been hankering after someone beefing up the Korean offerings here in London, Kogi BBQ style. There’s no Korean BBQ / Mexican fusion as you see over there, but we’re gradually heading in the right direction.

First out of the traps were the sliders: Kimchi burger, Kimchi Cheeseburger, Kimchi Cult Special (Bacon Cheeseburger), the Kimchi bacon and the Pulled Pork. Now, we won’t bore you right now, because that is for a longer post, but these are less ‘sliders’ than they are mini-burgers, but they are cute, dinky things indeed.

The stand out factor in most of these is, obviously, the namesake kimchi. You could liken it to the sauerkraut of Asia, with chunks of cabbage amongst a spicy red sauce, it provides a gentle, universal heat with a tiny side-pocket of sweetness to everything it covers.

Our recommendation would be the Kimchi Cheeseburger (surely you’d call it a Kimcheeseburger, right?) as it has the best flavour balance of kimchi, drippingly melted cheese and nicely (if only just slightly over-) cooked patty.

The pulled pork is boosted by a totally inspired fresh, zingy ginger coleslaw that got must-find-this-recipe shout outs instantly. If anything, the buns are a tad large and heavy dough-wise, but they don’t overly mask the taste of their contents.

However, Kimchi Cult really level up with their chicken wings.

They are outstanding - sticky, with a familiar base of chinese take away sweet and sour, but with a thump of hotness and extra lemongrass zip at the end. They taste double-fried.

We’d say the wings are worth braving the top end of the Victoria line for. We think they’re on to a real winner here, and get the inkling they do too.

Luckily you don’t have to travel up to the Walthamstow to check these guys out, as they pop up on Eat.st every now and again, and the wonderfully chatty Sarah told us there is more to come. We do hope so.

• Rob and Simon.

Kimchi Cult

Spuntino / Soho, London

But the fiddling is worth it. The patty is intriguing.

We’ve been wanting to go here for ages. Like, since forever.

I’ve lost count of the amount of times I’ve bowled past Spuntino and had a look in, only to see the standard half an hour queue of eager diners-to-be standing behind, and wistfully peering over the shoulders of those who are being fed. It must be in the dozens. It always looks loud, dark and obviously, a bit of a tight squeeze.

Ambling past at 3.15pm on a breezy Tuesday afternoon, I peer in and see it empty. I subdue my Christmas morning face and sit down immediately. Clearly a different vibe during the day; it was bright, with chuggy folk rock bouncing round the room.

It’s immediately perfect; I’m up at the bar, diner-style filter coffee in hand, happy before I’ve eaten anything.

Once a secret menu item, but not now clearly, I ordered the burger with cheese. Everyone around me chose the oft-lauded sliders. If I’d had a bigger appetite, I’d have done the same.

Served similarly to the Joe Allen burger, it’s sauceless with red onion slices and pickle spears on the side. The construction, a chunky round patty that needs skewering to keep in place, makes it a troublesome bugger to add the desired ingredients to and condiment up.

But the fiddling is worth it. The patty is intriguing. With a really deep meatiness, it might actually be a hamburger: I swear I got a hint of chorizo spiciness in the mix of flavours, and on closer inspection there’s some kind of dark red meaty stripe through the middle. This could be wildly incorrect though.

The impeccably melted cheese is slathered all over, its gummy, elastic greatness, giving just the right amount of cheesy-goo-chew. And the bun wraps it all in a substantial, squishy, chew. It was great.

There is loads of great looking stuff on the menu that I want to try, so more late lunches here will be on the cards. I’m just hoping that late lunches don’t become a thing with everyone, because I think quiet, thoughtful Spuntino time is brilliant.

• Rob.

MEATliquor / London

He’s selling something we all really missed without knowing it: a proper hamburger.

If you haven’t been yet, you’ve read about it, or been told about MEATliquor.

It’s become synonymous with the new wave of London eating, and this widespread recognition has been hadron-collider-fast.

We’d had a few chats with co-founder Yianni on our many, many visits through the /wagon and /easy days, so when we heard that MEATliquor would be coming soon, we altercated at length about what it would be, and what we hoped it would be: a place having the hallmarks of a proper American dive bar (darkness, redness, occasionally shirty service and loud music), but in London, that served all the meticulously researched and recreated Americana of the previous MEATporiums.

The food

The Meatwagon / Meateasy classics are there, and they are, for the most part, sublime: The Bacon Cheeseburger is an art form in itself, and a must-order on a first visit. These are take ‘em as they come, greasy, juicy, messy beasts. Likewise with the saucy, tacky chilli cheese fries, which balance the not too saucy chilli with the gloopy cheese, made in such a way that they coat the fries without making them soggy. Cheesy alchemy.

The Mac ‘n cheese has had a revamp and the new model is now saucier, and dirty-cheesier than before; exceptional. Forks will clash.

And some new dishes are stealing the limelight too, like the fried pickles, which are a tangy-crunch slap in the face, or the buffalo chicken burger which is flat-out phenomenal - like a mahoosive boneless buffalo wing, in a bun.

Timing is Everything

Consistency, or indeed the lack of it, appears to be putting first-timers off a bit (if the twittersphere is anything to go by).

We have to admit, it has happened to us too.

Our first experience of the newly added Mushroom Swiss was disappointing - the meat had not been seasoned and the mildness of the Swiss cheese and mushrooms resulted in a blandness that not even the red onions and extra pickle could save. But on second tasting a much better job had been done and it tasted pretty decent, although it’s still one of the lesser burgers in their ever increasing repertoire. A friend of B/A shared a similar experience, where a Dead Hippie was missing key ingredients.

The Queue

It’s fucking long, it starts early and it’s a clear deterrent. But let’s get some perspective.

If you’ve been to San Francisco in the last few years and tried to visit any of the popular restaurants, then you’ll know first hand what queues can be. You queue for brunch, for coffee, for sandwiches, hell, even for ice cream. The same thing happens in Foursquare paradise New York City. Just take Shake Shack in Madison Square Park. It’s the new cultural barometer for good chow: if there’s a queue outside, it’s probably worth queuing for. Remember the Long Table Market in Dalston before Christmas? Yeah.

ML takes the same approach. The only genuine gripe is the setup doesn’t suit it. Were it a classic fast food joint then things would work better; more covers would be in and out and the overall atmosphere would be less flustered. The choice of it being like a dive bar, but in reality being a restaurant, makes for a culture clash that makes it neither. You can’t finish up your food and while away the evening working your way down the impressive cocktail list without feeling a bit guilty for all those queued up in the cold outside.

It doesn’t bother us too much, since we’ve always taken an ‘eat and get the hell out’ approach with ML and the #MEATEASY before it. A quick scan around the room though and you can tell that Londoners want to linger, or at least spend as much time inside as they did in the queue.

But what does it all mean?

MEATliquor is a compilation restaurant. A greatest hits.

It imitates the best of what Yianni has had in America and recreates it for London. He is the ultimate English fanboy of American food. The crusader that actually does his fucking research, goes in the kitchen and reproduces what he liked over there as best he can.

There aren’t any original dishes here. The bacon cheeseburger’s roots are from Hodad’s in San Diego (see our review). The deep fried pickles are a mainstay in diners across the West coast. The chilli burger is an interpretation of the Bobcat Burger from Bobcat Bite in New Mexico. The buffalo wings are, well, buffalo wings. There’s even talk of jalapeño poppers - another classic bar food being tested for the recently confirmed second venue, MEATmarket, in Covent Garden.

To be clear, these greasy facsimiles are No Bad Thing. In fact, it’s not been done successfully before, which is a large part of explaining their success. Every ‘American’ burger joint has been a parody run by people who don’t seem to have ever eaten a sandwich in America. And then there’s your stubbornly English burgers, doled out by the likes of Byron, Giraffe and gastropubs up and down the Northern line. But they are still stiff-upper-lipped versions of a Yankee Doodle archetype. Unlike its rivals, Meatliquor is not designed to please everyone. Yianni is a master craftsman of some of the most iconic dishes America has to offer, and judging by our experience on both sides of the pond, it’s not preposterous to say he would be considered that in America too. He’s selling something we all really missed without knowing it: a proper hamburger.

The Future

MEATmarket’s announcement confirms they’ve proven their market and can keep going from here. All of the MEATenterprises have benefited from a hyper-connected, drooling, price conscious fanbase, and their slow but sure approach to growth will stand them in good stead.

The implications for the London restaurant scene are already unfolding: the queues at Pitt Cue down the road, residencies from foodtrucks in pubs (like Lucky Chip at the Sebright Arms, or Kimchi Cult at the Rose & Crown in Walthamstow). The long-established faux diners are desperately trying to change their menus to resemble something similar (and actually authentic) so they can compete - they didn’t pull their tube socks up quickly enough. Nobody is talking about The Diner, or Ed’s Easy Diner. Byron continue to expand aggressively into every corner of London they possibly can and risk becoming the Pizza Express poster-child of burgers.

The restaurant groups must be scratching their heads still; the buzz Yianni and Scott can generate without expensive PR agencies fudging it for them must be annoying for the well-funded big guns. It’s not a big secret though: all you need is a good product.

But what of the ‘wagon?

The big difference between us and America is the upgrade path. The dream here is different. Compare the successful foodtrucks of Los Angeles and you get a different picture - they’re proud of their mobility. If anything, their strategy is more trucks in more locations. Kogi BBQ is the shining example of this. Their daily matrix of serving locations covers the entire LA Metro area. It’s quite the operation.

London is not blessed with the same mercifully laid back food trading laws. And that’s why a proper home makes sense. But we’re sad the ‘wagon has disappeared from view. Here’s hoping it reappears again this summer.

We bloody love what they’re doing. Shocker, huh? Had we the time, money and inclination, it’s exactly what we would do too. It’s having a domino effect on the quality of American food across the South East, and it’ll be interesting to see if the influence reaches beyond the M25.

The name of this very blog means we’re inherently biased, but we don’t think burgers are a trend. We’ve always loved burgers; since we were tiny, and we always will. It’s just that the good ones were something you’d only ever get on holiday. To use marketing wonk-speak, that’s the gamechanger here. Timing is everything, and Yianni continues to get his freakishly right.

MEATliquor is our version of Arnold’s - the first port of call whenever a meeting place is required anywhere in the vicinity of Central London. We’ll go there for ALL of the food, some of the food, or only for drinks - even if it means having to buy the cheapest thing on the menu to meet their have-to-order-food-to-drink license. The only bone of contention is who gets to be the Fonz…

We like it, you might not. We’ll see you in there.

• Simon & Rob.

Kua 'Aina / Soho, London

“As a certified US import we were pretty darn excited.”

Despite looking like a cafe that an eccentric old Londoner had decorated after being inspired on a recent ‘Polynesian Dreams’ cruise, Kua’ Aina is a renowned chain that’s been banging out burgers in Hawaii since 1975.

What Kua ‘Aina nicely summarises is the multitude of problems the American export has to face. Since we’re a scarcity-fuelled bunch, you can look at the list of chains that have jumped the pond and draw a few conclusions. To pull out a few examples:

• TGI Fridays. Not really any different to how it is in the States, but we’d much prefer it to be a Cheesecake Factory. Or a Bennigan’s (RIP).
• Taco Bell. The few franchisees who have taken the risk have stuck to the out of town locations (ie. Lakeside), and all they have to do is rehydrate some stuff that comes in boxes anyway.
• Wendy’s. Tried in the 90s, failed, then left. Arguably they’d probably be doing quite well if they came back now.
• Carl’s Jr. Oft-rumoured. Zero brand recognition on this side of the pond. Why bother?
• In-n-Out / Shake Shack / Five Guys - breathless tweets from those in the know often fuel speculation that they’re ‘looking for sites in Soho’ or some other horseshit. Whatever.

And the problems they face if and when they do come over are plentiful. First of all there’s a totally different type of consumer with their own idea of what a burger should be. Then you’ve got a different set of supply chain hurdles: price, quality and geography can ruin you. The sheer thought of, say, the Cheesecake Factory invading us with their pricing and portioning strategies and somehow keeping it profitable is enough to make your head spin.

Those that rely on actual cooking could be in a bit of trouble.

So on to Kua ‘Aina. As a certified US import we were pretty darn excited. Seating upstairs is a tight squeeze, like Ryanair overhead compartment tight. But hey, it’s got seating, and a downstairs area too, and the staff were delivering food quickly despite the lack of space.

The 1/2lb Bacon Cheese and 1/3lb Ortega Chili Burger arrived promptly, but were sorry looking specimens indeed - the cheese that presented itself had barely melted, was pale, and sweatier than The Rock in Fast Five1. The peppers atop the Chili burger appeared deflated and apologetic.

And they were small. So very small.

Also, you’ll notice, they had been served open. Mayo generously slathered on the top bun. Now, Rob is immediately confused. He’s been served an open burger, with one condiment added, but other condiments placed suggestively on the table. We know what a pedant he is.

No hesitation, the Heinz and French’s went straight on. Even then, they’re not particularly attractive. The dusty black char look ominous, and the tightly seeded buns are tough to cut.

But looks aren’t everything, so we persevered. It didn’t get much better. Whilst the 1/2lb patty was okay, the 1/3 pounder was covered with a thick gnarly crust that left an all-consuming burnt taste. Possibly a victim of the two-different-sizes-but-same-grilling-time issue, we pontificate. The bacon was rock solid and near on impossible to bite through, with whole chunks forcibly removing themselves in the first mouthful. The bun is too dense and the seeds go straight between your teeth, where they will then stay for for the rest of the afternoon.

The word ‘chili’ in the description of the other offering takes you down a bit of a false alley, as there was not an ounce of heat in the burger at all. However, having read up on Ortega chilis now that’s not surprising. The lack of any flavour from the pepper was just as disappointing, as its only purpose was as an unnecessary layer of squish. No cheese either.

The liberal mayo smothering tries to cover many of the sins going on here, much in the same way a cheap fast food burger does from Sonic or Wendy’s or Carl’s Jr. The problem is the overall package doesn’t deliver the same salty, stodgy, satisfying hit.

We don’t revel in being negative, but there were few redeeming features to what we ate at Kua ‘Aina. As we looked around though, the club sandwiches we spied looked immense. Intrigue alone (OK, and greed) will probably get us back here to sample those.

The other conclusion is that maybe we just ordered badly. Perhaps if you roll your own instead of opting for a pre-packaged menu option, your experience may vary.

• Simon & Rob.

1. You should see it. It’s actually great. The Rock spends all his screen time dripping everywhere. ↩

Foxcroft and Ginger / London

Sandwiches rule.

Bang all kinds of shit between two slabs of cooked dough and then eat it. Simple.

Everyone’s got a favourite but, in this guy’s humble opinion, the greatest sandwich of all time is the Monte Cristo - usually a ham and Swiss cheese sandwich dipped in egg and grilled like French Toast, sprinkled with sugar, drizzled with maple syrup and served with a side of blueberry jam.

Yeah, sounds ridic doesn’t it? Done right, I fucking love this sandwich.

Regretfully, I’ve only found one place that sells a Monte Cristo in London town, the Diner, and it was piss poor.

Foxcroft & Ginger’s effort, to all intents and purposes, is a low-key, anglicised bastard child of the Monte Cristo, but it’s close enough. It’s all rather petite, polite and user friendly, much like the establishment producing it.

A Monte Cristo lite, if you will. And it’s rather pleasant.

While it had soaked in the sweet, slightly nutmeggy egg mixture, the bread was still light and fluffy, the way good French Toast should be. The melty cheese mixture over the ham was mild and a touch nutty, and the honey and mustard drizzled over the top, whilst tear-jerkingly sparse, added a spicy sweetness to it all. And it was cheap as! No blueberry dip, but then again, it’s not a Monte Cristo, is it?

If you’re up for a coffee and fancy a bit of a snack as well, you won’t go far wrong with a visit to F&G. Just don’t confuse them with the deceptively similar Fernandez & Wells. No Monte Cristo there.

• Rob.

Ben's Canteen / Clapham, London

“…it’s the second instance of DOUBLE BEEF we’ve encountered this year.”

South West London.

No, I don’t like it either since I am neither of Australiasian descent nor did I grow up in Surrey. However, sometimes we have to go there, crossing the length of the TFL network tolerating trains that stop at “Bookham” and “Berrylands” and other places that probably don’t actually exist.

But Clapham-gripes aside (and I could go on), we’re there to visit Ben’s Canteen.

Now Ben’s, with its stripped floor aesthetic and dog-and-pram wielding clientele feels much more like South West Goes East. It’s very relaxed and we arrive at midday on a Sunday so they have a full brunch menu as well as Roasts on the go. Things could be worse.

And so to the burger. It’s a fancypants take on a cheeseburger, and it’s the second instance of DOUBLE BEEF we’ve encountered this year (the first being the Ad Cod’s delightfully deranged Ox Cheek Chilli burger). A fine thick Angus patty sits atop tomato and lettuce, with a slice of homemade corned beef on top (not the tinned one you had at school) a violently orange secret sauce and a slice of smoked cheddar.

The genius of the double beefing on this occasion is that the cheese has melted into the corned beef. Dave the Chef preps his own corned beef by trimming and rolling a nicely aged topside of Orkney beef, brining it for 24 hours and then cooking it with stock and vegetables. Once the burgers are ready, it’s sliced and popped under the grill with the smoked cheese on top. The melted cheese warms the beef from the top, and then once it’s part of the burger, the freshly grilled patty warms it from the bottom. This gives the whole sandwich a nice consistent texture and temperature, and the bun which is considerable but soft manages to keep it all together somehow.

A quick Google of previous reviews of Ben’s Canteen and you’ll see the BC Burger has been under much revisioning in the few short months it’s been open. I think Dave has cracked it: different enough to stand out from the crowd, gourmet enough to please the locals and appease the price point and well constructed enough for geeks like me to walk away happy.

Looking down the length of the menu at Ben’s and you can really appreciate the wealth of choice on offer. We got to try the brisket sliders (which weren’t reeeeally sliders), the deep fried pork cheeks (totally excellent, especially the dip) as well as a few bonus hunks of their Sunday roast beef (flawlessly cooked and you really can taste its pedigree). On top of that, they do a mean eggs benny.

If there was only one flaw, it would be the comedically poor service from the French waiter. Long waits, borderline aggression and impossible to attract his attention, it was fortunate we didn’t have to be anywhere in a great hurry. We didn’t experience bad service from any of the other staff, but this guy is so bad it was almost a joke. Other folks I know have come across him too, and we’ve verified the OMG-Is-That-Guy-For-Real sentiment. So they should sort that really because he’s certainly not ‘on brand’, so to speak.

Go for the burger. Go for brunch. Go for Sunday roast. They’ve got it all.

Oh and the Scotch Egg is great.

• Simon.

Luardo's / Brockley Market, London

[REVIEW] Fish Tacos / Luardo’s / Brockley Market, London

The only other London burrito slingers to our knowledge that serve a fish taco are Wahaca.

Much as I love Wahaca, they have a tendency of being a bit snooty toward Californian Mexican fare, then putting it on their menu and botching it.

The Luardo’s version is far closer to tacos we’ve had in SoCal. The Coley is nicely cooked but the liberal amount of lime juice, mango, coriander and wonderful creamy guacamole brings a little piece of the west coast to a wet car park in Brockley. Without any local point of comparison then, we can say quite conclusively that these are the best fish tacos in London.

Sadly, the fish taco is only available on Saturday lunchtimes at the moment, and not during their more popular Whitecross Market or Eat Street residencies. This is because it’s nowhere near as popular as their standard meaty burrito options, which is a massive shame.

Fish tacos are a great differentiator for Luardo’s now that the London burrito scene has become so shamelessly identikit. Let’s hope they roll them out more regularly. And that people buy them. Please buy them. Supply and demand and all that.

• Simon.

Honest Burgers / Brixton, London

We’d like to say it’s a refreshingly British take on a burger.

Honest Burgers is part of the expanding mini-restaurant movement in Brixton Village (aka Brixton Market). You know immediately from the zeitgeisty ‘Inspired by Great British Produce’ sign on the window the kind of burger experience you’re going to get at Honest - none of your processed twaddle here.

It’s also super tiny, similar to Franco Manca, but there’s room outside and they provide blankets if you’re al fresco and it’s a bit nippy out.

We cracked into the cheeseburger first. The meat was cooked spot on medium but was (oddly for Ginger Pig fare) gristly, causing one tooth-shuddering bite. We chalked that down to bad luck.

What wasn’t luck-based, however, were the other ingredients.

The red onion relish mainlines a very strong balsamic flavour which was lip-curlingly sweet, dominating the mouthful and rendering what ‘pickled cucumber’ was there as redundant. You’d think a relish like this would compliment a full-bodied cheese, but paired with a rather sour red leicester, the two tasted uncomfortable together.

It’s worth noting this is the first time we’ve seen Red Leicester as a cheese option. Seeing how it melts, we’re hoping it doesn’t get trendy.

The Honest burger next, and it’s the most successful incarnation; the bacon being the real deal: crunchy and sweet whilst maintaining a soft chewiness. Again though, the relish makes an appearance, and the mature cheddar, whilst less offensive than the Leicester, is still unsuitable.

The fries are moreish as hell, doused in what looks and tastes exactly like Aromat, the low-grade crack of the seasoning world, with some rosemary lobbed in for good measure. They taste good, artifically-manipulated-good. (Seriously though, buy Aromat, you can throw that shit on anything and it tastes better, ain’t bad when you rubs it on your gums either).

We’d like to say it’s a refreshingly British take on a burger. What we will say is it’s a British take on the burger. Sadly, what it isn’t is refreshing. Or even novel. Much of what saddens us about the trend of the British burger can be read on our review of Byron’s short-lived Uncle Sam.

It’s question of taste at the end of the day. While we understand what Honest Burgers are trying to achieve here, it feels a teensy bit pretentious.

We wanted to love it. We just can’t.

And while the well-dressed South London urbanite crowd waiting outside suggests it’s pretty successful, as does the 100% score on Urbanspoon and bullshit takedowns on contrarian write-ups, it’s just not for us.

It’s all a bit too Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall.

One more thing: being in the market, HB has to open and close alongside everything else. This sucks really, especially when I go to Brixton regularly on Tuesday nights. It’s not open on Tuesday nights. Or Wednesday night. Or all of Monday. Or Sunday night.

In fact, if you are planning on going, then you’d better check if they’re open; otherwise the shutters to the market will be down and you’ll have to console yourself with some KFC and the fishy stench that pervades Atlantic Road after dark.

• Rob.
• Simon.

Mother Flipper / Brockley, London

We’ve finally got proper American cheeseburgers being sold by multiple vendors in the capital at reasonable prices.

It’s Friday night, and we’re lamenting the lack of excitement our last few burgers have delivered. We wanted something fucking good. Little did we know we only had to wait 12 measly hours…

In a car park, at the rather lovely Brockley market, you’ll find three youthful dudes with a grill banging out some pretty buzzworthy burgers.

They look like they’re in their early twenties, wearing obscure hardcore band tees and American Apparel hoodies. And honestly, we were kind of jealous. Why the hell weren’t we this proactive when we were their age?? We ordered all three of the burgers on offer, and then impatiently watched the impressively slick cooking from the grill boss and efficient construction from his buddies.

And, well, the burgers are excellent. Let’s have a closer look at a three course burger lunch:

Starter - The Mother Flipper

Their take on a classic cheeseburger, and our standard ‘control’ burger.

The first bite of the smashed, well-seasoned patty hits with a salty, deep meatiness from the concentrated juices pressed into the crust on the grill. It’s brilliant. The cheese is substantial, two slices thickly melted perfectly over the patty with a rather ingenious homemade cloche. A lattice of ketchup just takes the line over a spiral of French’s in the mix. Finished with some shredded iceberg and a beefy slice of pickle in the middle, it’s a very accomplished take on a classic.

And the brioche bun, from an undisclosed ‘artisan bakery in North London’ (we all need a secret ingredient or two) is impressive - solid, substantial and just soft enough, it contains everything without struggling from all the juice.

Mains: Double Candy Bacon Flipper

Two slightly smaller cheese-covered patties contained in a similiar set up to the Motherflipper, except with sweet, sticky candied bacon (which had a similar smokiness to Oscar Mayer). Nice to see a double patty bacon option here.

Pudding: Chilli Flipper

A really awesome and original take on a chilli burger, the pepper and onion mixture on the patty packs the heat of a kebab shop chilli sauce on one level, with a fragrant chinese-style lemongrass finish. It’s a complex and memorable kick, which lingers nicely.

Boom. Three superb courses.

These are really solid sandwiches prepared with startup, haphazard love: from the grill that occasionally teases hot and cold to the cunningly homemade cloches, by a guy you might bump into at the Turtle.

One final thing to say. It would be very feasible for someone to just order a cheeseburger and write it off as a competent Meatwagon rip-off. We recall this happening to the Lucky Chip guys last year and it saddens us enormously.

To those people we’d just like to say the following:

• Christ guys, it’s OK for there to be more than one Proper American Cheeseburger in London. FFS.
• If they’re similar then that’s because they’ve both Done It Right.

We’ve finally got proper American cheeseburgers being sold by multiple vendors in the capital at reasonable prices. Party times.

So this is a must return for us, and a must venture south for all you lot.1

Get down there. This Saturday. GO ON.

• Rob.
• Simon.

Mother Flipper

1. It would also be great to see these guys join the ranks of the Eat Street collective. Nudge, nudge. ↩

Bread Street Kitchen / St Paul's, London

We’re trying to figure out who is supplying London’s caterers with all these low wattage filament lightbulbs.

Mr Ramsay. Before we begin.

Christmas Cookalong.1

What the fuck were you thinking?

It was like being visually water-boarded with liquid inane awkwardness. If it wasn’t the awful Channel 4 fodder guests that ‘visited’, or Gordon’s frankly appalling repetitive small-talk, then it was the time-delayed cuts to That Guy That Played The Bongos In Jamiroquai while his dad tried unsuccessfully to hide the fact he was drinking poor quality lager at 10am on live television. Oh, and the small issue that huge chunks of the show were repeats of the previous nights’ Come Dine With Me, confusing the baubles out of people flicking on to it. Christ, I hope the pay check came in a dump truck that could fill up the father in law’s swimming pool.

Looking for the entrance to Ramsay’s newest restaurant Bread Street Kitchen, we barrel through One New Change, which sounds like a cross between a rejected boyband and an aspirational government policy.

It being at least a year since visiting Barbecoa, we realise it’s opposite. Next to a Nando’s. Just up the alley from a Byron. Round the corner from the Wasabi. Across the way from EAT.

Being on the rear end of the building, on Bread Street (hence the name), it doesn’t share the same quality views of St Paul’s that Jamie’s Barbecoa enjoys. In fact the view you do get is of the rather dull offices of the people that you’re sitting in there with.

But we are in. A sea of twill-shirted windsor knots scattered about the cavernous space faces us. The receptionist eyes us up and down, wondering to herself whether we missed Nando’s completely and fell through the wrong door.

We are a little bit uncomfortable.

The service from the get-go was super-slick. From the small-talk of the maitre d’ (“Oh you guys look like you’ve been working so hard today, try our cocktails!”) to ordering from the waiter - the food was out faster than a frisky greyhound. We went for two short rib burgers, some chips and a portion of macaroni cheese.

The burger is pretty. The burger is big. The short rib patties could hardly be faulted, if for a tad of sporadic underseasoning on one. The bouncy, brioche buns had been brushed with butter to double-team the mouth with rich butteriness. It was dripping butter before we even picked it up. The ketchup on the top bun half had the look and taste of a creamy-sweet tomato mascarpone mix. And the bottom bun was laced with shredded lettuce covered with mayonnaise and some barely-distinguishable mustard.

The result was a decadent sweet richness. So decadent in fact, that our crisp white napkins could barely protect us from the butter onslaught. The mustard was way too low in the mix to add the contrasting kick. The Bermondsey Frier cheese does a pretty good job at cloning mozzarella and halloumi, but doesn’t add the layer of salty slickness that we always look for. Similar to the carefully curated surroundings, it had an aftertaste of over-thought and design by committee.

After we’ve finished our burger, we look up to see that the entire room has filled up. We really can’t stress just how enormous BSK is. Vast. And by 8pm, after they’ve all finished their last billable 15 minutes of the day from across the road, the place is heaving. We realise a few things after agreeing that the macaroni cheese was ‘nice’.

Bread Street Kitchen is the most clumsily designed restaurant we’ve been in for years.

The menu positively froths with buzzwords, you can choose from the ‘raw bar’, ‘hot kitchen’, ‘small plates’ and the slightly spa-esque ‘hot stone’.

The reclaimed furniture: if you don’t manage to get a leather booth, you’re sitting on chairs from an Essex secondary school. We’re also trying to figure out who is supplying London’s caterers with all these low wattage filament lightbulbs. It’s been done to death here.

There is no set menu, and the portion control is rigorously small - Gordon wants you to buy at least three courses each, push a few cocktails down you and flummox you with a bafflingly long and expensive wine list. It’s the kind of wine list that sits perfectly in, say, Claridges; arguably it fits the clientele here, but it’s not for two scruffy bloggers buying a burger each and sharing a few sides.

It’s all very impressive when you’re in there. Very Big Manhattan Restaurant in what they’re going for. The illusion of which is ruined once you leave again and walk past the Nando’s next door.

If you can withstand the try-hard reclaimed decor, the cufflinked clientele, and the soft, incessant, insufferable balearic beats, then it’s worth a go. But we’d suggest getting an ISA, saving up, then taking lots of money and ploughing your way through the cocktail menu as quickly as possible. Or doing a law degree first.

• Simon.
• Rob.

1. If you’re wondering why Rob was watching the Christmas Cookalong, then it’s worth noting that his job at the Big British Castle involves watching lots of television. He was working on Christmas Day, the poor sausage. ↩