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. ↩

Grilled Cheese Truck / Los Angeles, CA

Sometimes an idea comes along that is so simple, and yet so totally ingenious that you just have to stand up and slow clap the dudes that thought it up, ‘Lucas’ style. So we applaud the comfort food genius that is Los Angeles’ Grilled Cheese Truck.

What’s all the more awesome is that these guys take such a staple, classic, comfort food and reinvent it with panache too. It’s testament to how well they do it that I’ve seen queues for this mobile eatery easily stretch 20-plus long. Our first visit attempt was at the fairly legendary Abbot Kinney First Fridays festival in Venice. The trouble was we’d already tried five trucks by the time we spotted them. Dammit.

And those queues are there for good reason; their Cheesy Mac And Rib is hugely satisfying. The barbecue pork was saucy-sweet, soft and worthy of a place all of its own on a menu. The mac ‘n cheese was heavy on the gooey cheese, sticky yet still trying to escape from every opening, and hinted a savouriness that balanced with the pork brilliantly. One hell of a sandwich.

I’m pretty sure I put this away in under ten mouthfuls it was so good, and if we weren’t going on to somewhere else for more food, I would have had another. A bang up job, and a must for anyone In L.A. who has only got time to visit a handful of food trucks.

• Rob.

[CLOSED] Balans / Bluewater, Kent

Dearest Balans,

I had the chance to patronise your Bluewater branch a couple of weeks ago after taking my parents to the cinema (OK, OK, ‘technically’ they took me, but I totally did offer to pay, honest), and partook in one of your eponymous burgers.

I’d just like to say, valiant effort guys. The place was clearly understaffed and if the waiter hadn’t turned up at the second he did, this would be addressed to Jamie’s Italian (the ‘rents are very impatient you see).

The rushed-off-your-feet vibe was evident in the burger when it arrived. It looked worse than something I make for my packed lunch. In a hurry. At 6.45 in the morning. Very slapdash work. Although all the requisite components were in place, the tomato looked like it was trying to make an escape and the cheese, travesty of travesties, was practically cold and just arbitrarily lobbed in. Furthermore, it was presented closed, but with no condiments inside. I’ll spare you the lengthy details as to why whoever decided this was the correct serving suggestion, suffice it to say, do not like.

But alas, the quality of the patty was pretty good - not juice-ridden, but juicy enough - and cooked with precision - seared just enough on the outside for some bite. The bun wasn’t the freshest, but as a whole it wasn’t that bad! Just a shame it was assembled so miserably.

Oh and, those massive hand cut chips? It’s like eating half a dry jacket potato, not cool guys, not cool. Serve with your fries instead.

Anyways, we’ll put this one down to you being undermanned shall we? Yeah. Okay then.

Apparently you’re pretty big in Westfield.

Yours Condimentally,

• Rob.

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. ↩

[CLOSED] Fornata / Soho, London

In essence, this is a calzone. Albeit a tiny calzone with a big meaty center. And pickles.

We do enjoy a bit of novelty from time to time. So bring on Fornata, a new Italian tapas slash small plates slash Soho backstreet bandwagon-jumper. Yes, those are floorboards stuck to the walls.

The extensive menu suggests sharing a few dishes off the menu, three to four per head, but we came for their take on the burger, coincidentally the most expensive item on it at just under a tenner.

Predictably served on a wooden chopping board, with a few sprigs of lightly dressed lettuce, the burger arrived simultaneously with a baby meatball calzone, which we ordered as a comparison to the burger. Delicate baby Italian pizza pies, if you will.

Cracking it open revealed the steaming patty, cooked medium.. On first taste the meat suffered a touch from underseasoning, but was corrected in part by the saltiness of the drippy mozzarella. In fact, the sun-dried tomato mixed in with the meat almost puts it in meatball class anyway. It added pleasing colour and sweetness, but the pickles brought nothing other than

The sun-ripened tomato spread added both colour and a sweetness to it, but the pickles although present were largely undetectable (Rob picked one out, hot pickles taste weird). Novelty pickle, basically.

The considerable amount of juice from the meat and cheese had metamorphosed the dough on the underside to the consistency of a huge gyoza. It was a nice contrast to the classic Italian pizza crust texture of the top.

In essence, this is a calzone. Albeit a tiny calzone with a big meaty center. And pickles. Although diminutive in stature (placing it on a tapas style menu allows Fornata to get away with this, kind of) and exorbitantly pricey as a result, it’s a nice, inoffensively mild pizza-with-a-hint-of-burger.

So on to the proper meatball calzone, which was ever so slightly smaller (presumably because it had a meatball instead of a burger in it). It was far superior. The addition of a rich creamy tomato sauce gave it the extra kick. A much better dish.

We might go back to Fornata. It’s totally unoffensive, really. A competent backup option for when those other nearby small plates Italian places are too full but not somewhere to seek out.

But we are yearning for something a bit more substantial. Someone open a large plate Italian restaurant please. Italian food looks so doleful on such tiny plates for this price.

• Simon.
• Rob (I think it would be a good place for a date).