hamburger – Page 31 – Tasty Burgers

The Whippoorwill

Published on January 1, 2014 by Michael Nusair2 Comments

Location: 1285 Bloor Street West, Toronto
Website: http://www.thewhippoorwill.com/

NOW Toronto recently called the burger from the Whippoorwill the best burger for over ten dollars in the city; it wasn’t even on my radar before that proclamation, but obviously once you make a statement like that I’m pretty much obligated to check the place out.

I showed up at around noon on a Saturday and the place was packed, so they’re obviously doing pretty well.

My dining companion ordered the burger as well, because how can you not order a burger that’s been called the best in the city by a reputable source (even if it is by popular vote, which can sometimes result in questionable results)? You have to. You have no choice.

The Whippoorwill Burger, as per their menu: “ground prime beef, cheddar cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, Russian dressing, on a buttered bun.”

The waitress (the spitting image of Mila Kunis, I should note) asked if medium was okay for the patty; I prefer medium rare, but if I’m reviewing a burger, I’ll take it however the restaurant wants to serve it. Anyway, medium is certainly better than the ubiquitous well done, so I’m not complaining.

The burger was quite good, that’s for sure, but best in the city? That’s questionable. For one thing, it was a bit dry. The pinker part in the middle was reasonably juicy, but closer to the gray, well done edges, it became lamentably dry. It’s a thick patty, and the edges required a bit more chewing power than I’d typically like to expend on a hamburger.

I also don’t think the quality of the beef was high enough for this to be considered as a truly top-shelf hamburger. It was good, don’t get me wrong, but it lacked that satisifyingly beefy bite that you get from really good quality meat.

It probably doesn’t help that there’s a little bit too much going on, flavour-wise. Specifically, the assertively-spiced Russian dressing is completely overpowering, and pretty much punches all of the hamburger’s other flavours in the face. It’s the star of the show when it should clearly be a supporting player. Another supporting player muscling its way to the front of the stage: the sharp cheddar cheese. Though it was perfectly melted, it’s probably not the best choice for a hamburger.

I never thought I’d say this, but the bun was too buttery. Normally I love a buttered bun on a hamburger, but this one was greasy and soaked through with the stuff. Even with all the other flavours, the butter taste was pronounced and a tad overbearing.

It was brunch, so instead of the usual fries the burger came with home fries. They were deep fried with a delightfully crispy exterior. The inside, however, was overcooked; it was crumbly and dry, and borderline inedible without the provided ketchup to lubricate things.

I should probably note that they clearly have consistency issues, so your mileage may vary. My burger came haphazardly assembled, with the components falling out and everything askew. My dining companion, on the other hand, got a picture perfect burger and was raving about how juicy and delicious it was, so who knows. Maybe I got a bad one.

Fresh Burger

Published on December 15, 2013December 15, 2013 by Michael Nusair6 Comments

fresh
Location: 9206 Leslie Street, Richmond Hill
Website: http://www.fresh-burger.com/

It’s always unfortunate when a restaurant flirts with greatness — comes so very close — but just can’t quite get there. Fresh Burger is, sadly, such a place. And they’re close; they really are. But they bungle one key element. Alas, greatness is just out of their grasp.

Fresh Burger sells classic American-style hamburgers a la Burger’s Priest, Holy Chuck, or Five Guys, which involves placing ball of fresh ground beef on a hot griddle and smashing it into a patty. It’s a style of burger cookery that was almost impossible to find anywhere in the GTA even a few years ago, and which has now become increasingly abundant. This, as I’ve mentioned before, warms my heart.

(A note about the picture — they provided plastic forks but not knives. I probably should have just asked them to cut the burger in half for me, but instead I attempted to cut my burger in half by turning my fork upside down and using the stem. As you can tell from the mangled remains, this was not my best idea ever.)

I’m just going to get the bad news out of the way first, because this is a restaurant that otherwise has so much going for it. The beef they use is too lean. If you’ve read many of the other reviews on this blog (or if you eat a lot of burgers in the GTA), you’ll know that this is a distressingly common issue in the city.

In this case, the problem is advertised right on their menu: they use ground sirloin to make their burgers, which is an exceptionally lean cut of beef, and which is pretty much the last thing you want to be making a hamburger out of.

A note to all burger joint owners: Lean burgers = dry burgers. A good hamburger needs at least 20% fat content, if not a little bit more. Hamburgers are not, and never will be, health food. Fat is your friend.

The hamburger was cooked all the way to well done, par for the course at GTA burger joints. If you’re going to salvage a lean burger, you really shouldn’t cook it too far past medium. A well done burger made with lean ground beef is one hundred percent guaranteed to be dry. That is not my opinion; that is fact.

This is all a roundabout way of saying that the hamburger at Fresh Burger was quite dry. Happily, this is the only misstep for an otherwise above average burger.

Most notably, even if the meat is too lean (and it is), it’s definitely above average in quality, with a rich beefy flavour. The coarsely ground, loosely packed beef has a really great texture which actually helps mitigate the dryness quite a bit — it’s dry, but thanks to the the satisfying texture, it doesn’t feel nearly as dry as many other offenders in this category.

Another plus: the patties have that great, dark brown crust that you can only get by cooking a burger on a really hot flat-top griddle.

The menu is fairly bare-bones, with either a cheeseburger or a double cheeseburger to choose from. I went with the double, but the single is probably the better choice with a burger as lean as this.

The burgers come topped with pickles, onion, tomato, lettuce, secret sauce (a mayo-based Mac-sauce-esque concoction), and nicely melted American cheese. Classic toppings for a classic, fast-food-style burger.

The fresh, squishy bun has just enough heft to hold up to the patties and condiments; like the toppings, this is a perfect fit for a classic burger such as this.

As for the fries, they weren’t anything I’d get too excited over, but they were above average and quite tasty.

Fresh Burger is frustrating. One small change could instantly transform it from a very good burger into a great one, and place it on a shortlist of the GTA’s best burgers. But it is what it is, and despite my one fairly substantial reservation, it’s still quite tasty and certainly worth eating.

Master Steaks

Published on December 1, 2013 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 5895 Dixie Road, Mississauga
Website: http://mastersteaks.com/

The burger at Master Steaks, in theory, should be great. You’d think it would be. The place doubles as a butcher shop, serves mostly steaks, and boasts about their burgers being freshly ground. Promising, right? It all seems like it should add up to an above average burger. Seems, in this case, being the operative word.

Despite its steakhouse leanings, Master Steaks is set up like a fast food joint; the menu’s posted up on the wall, and once you order it’s no more than a few minutes before a tray with your food is in your hands.

I went with the Master Burger — a bacon double cheeseburger — and when it was ready I had it topped with my usual pickles, tomato, and mayo.

It only takes one bite for all that promise to sprout wings and fly right out the door.

For one thing, the grilled hamburger is an especially meatloafy meatloaf burger, with all the stuff they mix into the beef completely overwhelming the burger’s flavour profile. This being mostly a steakhouse, there’s a good chance that they’re using above-average quality beef, but with that slaps-you-in-the-face meatloaf flavour, who can tell? I’ve had meatball sandwiches with a more subtle flavour.

The meat is also a bit too finely ground, which gives the patty a bit of an off texture. And — surprise, surprise — it’s too lean, and the burger is subsequently on the dry side.

Seriously, Master Steaks: way to take my hopes and dreams, pin them to the ground and then beat them senseless. This burger should have been so good! What are you doing?

It’s a bacon cheeseburger; the mild cheddar cheese was fully melted and perfectly acceptable. The bacon, too, was fine. The bun was a tiny bit on the overly-bready side, but was okay. The mayo, however, was actually Miracle Whip (or something very similar), which really shouldn’t be interchangeable with mayonnaise despite looking identical.

As for the fries, they were undercooked. After tempting me with the prospect of a great steakhouse-quality burger and then serving me over-seasoned junk, why not kick me when I’m down, right?

Home of the Brave

Published on November 17, 2013 by Michael NusairLeave a comment

Location: 589 King Street West, Toronto
Website: http://www.thehotb.com/

Home of the Brave opened a few months ago, and word very quickly got out that it’s a place you should probably check out. They serve their take on classic American comfort foods like fried bologna sandwiches, BBQ ribs, and tater tots, in a trendy, hipster-friendly environment (read: it’s dark and loud). The burger isn’t on their regular menu — it is, however, on the late night menu (served after 11:00 PM) and it’s the daily special on Saturdays.

I didn’t even realize they had a burger on the menu, but as soon as I saw it I knew that I had to have it. Called The Altar Boy, it’s described as having “house ground beef, tartar sauce, house made processed cheese, tomato & lettuce.”

After a string of mediocre (or worse!) hamburgers, this was just what the doctor ordered: beefy, juicy, and seriously satisfying. It’s a bit busy; it actually reminded me quite a bit of the burger at Wallace & Co. Like that one, it’s a saucy, juicy mess with a little bit more going on than it probably should. And like that one, it’s really good.

I think the quality of the beef is better here than at Wallace & Co. The griddled, medium rare patty has a pretty solid beefy flavour (or at least it seemed to in the few less condimented mouthfuls I got).

The tangy tartar sauce is a little bit more assertive than I’d like, but it tastes good and mostly compliments the burger pretty well. Though they’re going to the trouble of making their own processed cheese, there’s so much else going on that you can’t really tell.

The fresh sesame seed bun has enough heft to hold up to the messy burger without ever tipping the scales and throwing off the beef-to-bun ratio. It’s pretty great.

It’s a shame that this burger isn’t on the regular menu. It’s kind of sad that a burger that they only occasionally serve here is head and shoulders above what they serve at a lot of burger joints (I’m thinking specifically of my most recent review, the mediocre-at-best Patty & Frank’s), but there you go.

The closest thing on the menu to fries are the tater tots — though with their creamy interior and cripy coating, they’re more like fried mashed potato bites than tater tots. But whatever they are, they’re pretty darn good.

The Buffalo cauliflower is also quite tasty. If you have to eat cauliflower, battered, deep fried, and dipped in house-made Buffalo and ranch sauces is probably the way to go.

(Image of the outside of the restaurant in the header photo courtesy of kiki’s B.F.F. I totally forgot to take that picture. Whoops!)

Patty & Frank’s

Published on November 3, 2013November 3, 2013 by Michael Nusair2 Comments

Location: 467 Danforth Avenue, Toronto
Website: http://pattyandfranks.ca/

Every time a new burger place opens in the city, I immediately perk up. Will it be Toronto’s next great burger joint? Who knows! It’s like an unwrapped present. Exciting!

As the name implies, Patty & Frank’s serves both hamburgers and hot dogs, though it should be fairly obvious that I’m much more interested in the former and less in the latter (this isn’t Tasty Hot Dogs, after all).

The restaurant is bright, cheerful, and incredibly spacious. I don’t think you’ll have to worry about finding a place to sit.

I typically try to order a burger joint’s namesake burger, assuming they have one, but in this case the P & F Signature is so comically overstuffed (it comes topped with, among other stuff, cheese, a hot dog, and french fries) that I knew I’d never be able to taste the patty.

So I just ordered a plain burger, waited for my name to be called, then had it topped with pickles, tomato, and mayo.

Their cooking method is a little different than most Toronto burger joints. The uncooked patty is first placed on a griddle, then finished off on the grill. You’d think that this method would result in some browning on the surface of the patty, but nope — aside from the grill marks, it was completely gray. So I can’t say I quite understand the point of the two-step cooking process.

I sat down and took a bite. Sadly, it was clear pretty quickly that this wasn’t quite the present I was hoping it would be. Is there a gift receipt…?

It’s a meatloaf burger, though by the standards of this style of hamburger they’re fairly conservative with the seasonings. There’s definitely something more than salt and pepper in the patty, but it’s subtle. Still, it’s enough to knock out whatever mild beefy flavour this particular meat might have once had, which makes me sad.

The patty is also a bit on the salty side. At first I thought that perhaps this was from the mayo that was very liberally applied on my burger, but my dining companion found his burger to be a little bit salty as well.

The well done burger is somewhat juicy, which I definitely appreciated. But the patty has been really tightly packed, and is a bit more dense than I’d like. It’s odd, because you’d think that the one benefit of their two-step cooking process would be that they could grab a fresh ball of beef, smash it on the griddle and then transfer it over to the grill, which would allow for a much more loosely packed and texturally satisfying patty. But nope, the patties are formed in advance and are quite dense.

The bun tasted fresh and suited the burger well, and the condiments were fine (aside from the fairly obscene amount of mayo).

So no, Patty & Frank’s is not Toronto’s next great burger joint. It’s barely even good. I mean, it’s fine. I’ve certainly had worse. It’s a big fat meh, and honestly, I’m getting a bit sick of big fat mehs.

As for the fries, though they tasted a bit oily, they were pretty good and actually kind of reminded me of chip truck fries.