Pub – Page 4 – Burger Source

The Salusbury, Salisbury Road, Queens Park

September 16, 2016Posted in Pub, ReviewsTagged beef, burger, eggwash, gastropub, Mayo, Pub, short ribLeave a comment

Gastropub tries to do good burger, doesn’t quite manage it.

Burger Source

If you read my appeal to publicans, you’ll know that I don’t generally review pub burgers. I made an exception for the Salusbury as the pub clearly makes a feature of its ‘aged short rib burger,’ so I thought I’d give it a try.

An independent pub under the same ownership for 15 years, the Salusbury boasts the talents of Andrew Fila, former head chef at the Medcalf, Exmouth Market. The aim to deliver the best food, drink and service. The service is excellent, and I can’t talk to the drink… and the food is generally OK.

But how did they fayre with that pub kryptonite, a genuinely good burger?

The order

Just one burger on the menu, the ‘aged short rib’ burger served with chips. I was asked how I’d like it done and opted for medium, which was a good sign. I was eating with family, who ordered fish and chips, amongst other things, which looked excellent.

The meat of it

This burger should have been good. It was clearly good meat; it was cooked perfectly – look at the cross section shot. But a few crucial things went wrong, sadly.

The meat was underseasoned; so didn’t taste of much. The toppings didn’t add enough to counter it (not even that substantial pickle), and the (very, very) firm eggwashed roll just added too much chewiness. I abandoned half of it immediately.

The burger wasn’t juicy enough; I put this down to too high a lean/fat ratio. It was slightly too tightly compacted too, despite being coarsely ground, which means it was a dense thing to eat your way through.

This sounds incredibly nitpicky, but the end result was a substantial burger that tasted of very little. Not bad… but not good either. And it’s frustrating because the ingredients were clearly top quality.

The chips, however, were crisp, fluffy and delicious with the provided mayonnaise. Which, to be fair, also helped bring the burger together somewhat , packed as it was with salty goodness.

Monkey finger rating

Bun – 1/5
Build – 4/5
Burger – 2/5
Taste – 2/5
Sides – 4/5
Value – 1/5. This thing is not worth £14.50.

Burger rating – 2/5 – A few things for the Salusbury to fix; they clearly have the technical skills but some of the core ingredients – in particular the bun and the beef – need some thought.

The deets

If you’re keen to stop by, the Salusbury is near Queen’s Park tube station in North London; 50-52 Salusbury Road, NW6 6NN. I’d have the fish and chips.

White Ferry House, Sutherland Street, Victoria

August 30, 2016Posted in Pub, RestaurantTagged brioche, burger, london, Pub, victoria, white ferry houseLeave a comment

White Ferry House cheese burger and fries

Well-seasoned, surprisingly juicy, very brioched burger. Soggy fries.

Burger source:

White Ferry House is part of the small pub chain ‘Pub Love,’ which seems to own a few erstwhile independent pubs across London. As well as an extensive gin menu, it gains admission to the Burger Source staple as it does many of the things I asked of publicans in my recent missive in its ‘Burger Craft’ kitchen, and more. Specifically; fresh, locally sourced beef, fresh burgers handmade daily, course ground, well-seasoned meat etc… but I’m getting ahead of myself. You can be reassured that the burger’s heritage here is of quality.

It’s a regular fixture of my company’s ‘night out’ schedule and always features great, speedy service.

The order

I went for a basic cheeseburger with bacon (and fries), weighing in at about £9.50, which, given its location less than ten minutes’ walk from Victoria station, is pretty remarkable. Skin-on fries came as standard. The menu also features a double burger – the Juicy Bastard – that may be cause for a return visit at some stage.

The meat of it:

The ~5oz, course ground patty is well seasoned and delivered sandwiched between a very melty American cheese, topped with tasty, salty, chewy thick cut bacon, sat on a bed of wilted salad… all of which is sandwiched in a sweet brioche – which is a good counterbalance to its salt-tastic contents. Like many of its kin at the moment, it’s an ‘add your own sauce’ burger (ketchup helped even out the savoury explosion further), and it was surprisingly juicy, given it was cooked medium well, if not well done.

White Ferry House burger cross section — Look at the melt on that! Surprisingly juicy for a medium well burger.

I’d have to be hunting to criticize, and – as such – I’d probably only be able to improve on this burger with some thought on the sauce situation. Perhaps some mustard cooked into the beef and/or relish for the burger. But I suppose then it would be a different burger!

The fries, sadly, were undercooked – they look lovely but were a bit greasy and soggy, so were donated to the colleagues I was out with. The overall presentation was a bit flat as – essentially – it was just a burger and chips on a plate. Only so much you can do with that, but it was – at least – a very nice plate.

Monkey finger rating

Bun – 4/5
Build – 4/5
Burger – 4.5/5
Taste – 4/5
Sides – 2/5
Value – 4/5

Burger rating – 4/5 – A very solid burger outing which would probably get a 4.5 overall had it not been for the mediocre fries. Worth a stop.

The deets

The White Ferry House Victoria is to be found at 1a Sutherland Street, London, UK SW1V 4LD. Map etc., here.

An urgent missive to pub landlords and restauranteurs around the UK on the humble burger

July 28, 2016July 29, 2016Posted in Condiments, london, Open letter, Pub, RestaurantTagged bun, burger, fat, grind, london, Open letter, publicans, pubs, restaraunt, restaraunters, the crown old basing, tylney hall, uk5 Comments

Dear publican, restaurant owner / manager / chef,

You’ve doubtless noticed that London, and increasingly the UK in general, has undergone something of a renaissance when it comes to burger fayre. No longer are we satisfied with an overcooked hockey puck of beef, wedged into a floury bap and presented with a bottle of squeezy ketchup by way of condiments. That doesn’t mean we’re all pretentious gits who should order something else (well, maybe it does, but nonetheless); please consider the following attributes of a good burger, easily managed in virtually any kitchen, which will turn your ‘burger’ option from a tedious, seldom-ordered staple to a featured attraction.

After eating burgers at well-thought of pubs and hotels in the area out of curiosity (given I write this blog), I’ve been nothing but disappointed, so felt the need to offer some genuinely well-intentioned advice for chefs to consider. One of these disappointing venues, incidentally, is a five star luxury country hotel and the other is a local pub that boasts a chef who worked at a Michelin-starred restaurant in its kitchen, so these aren’t amateurs. Which makes their burger offers all the more mystifying in their mediocrity.

See what you make of the following:

If you freeze your burgers, freeze them well. Wrap them individually, seal them (zip lock if possible, cling film is porous apparently) limit moisture lose through sublimation when they’re awaiting cooking. Otherwise the juiciest burgers will become dry and powdery when you take them out to cook them. It’s perfectly possible to make a delicious juicy medium burger from a frozen patty – cook it slow and finish it fast.
If you’re buying your burgers in, get them to do all of the above! If they don’t, switch your burger supplier! I found an excellent supermarket burger recently, am sure they’d be available wholesale nationally.
The fat/lean ratio is important. Again, don’t feel the need to use lean meat. 20-25% fat vs 75-80% lean seems to be the magic number. People have to cope with the fact that a burger isn’t the healthiest option on the menu.
The grind is important. If you’re making your own burgers, don’t pack them full of finely ground meat and squash them till they hold their shape. Course ground, loosely packed. Makes for a less chewy mouthful and that melt-in-your-mouth experience.
Burgers shouldn’t be served well done. You’re not allowed by law to sell them below ‘medium’ so go with that. It’ll add a juiciness quotient that is well worth striving for. If you sous vide, this is easy to do for large groups too – just char them on a hot grill for a quick finish and those vital flavours. Unless you’re going for a different burger style (smash-burgers and sliders have different rules).

You can see all the things that are wrong with this burger. Dry, overcooked patty. Tightly packed, fine ground mince. The thick cut bacon? Flavourless and insufficiently charred for my liking. Bun? Stale. Sauce? Ketchup on the side.

It needs seasoning! At least the salt and pepper, the rest is for fancier burgers, but the ‘natural’ flavour of beef is quite bland so help it out.
Think through the sauce. A good condimentary [sic] partner for your burger may not be the cloying sweetness of ketchup or the sharp bite of mustard. A relish, a mustard fry – lots of easy, great options to plan a burger around.
The bun matters. Dry, slightly stale floury baps – won’t do. I’m partial to an egg-washed soft white roll, toasted on the inside only. Has to hold up to juicy beef, and depending on the sweetness of your relish/sauce, you may not want the sweetness of a brioche or demi-brioche (much as they are all the rage, it seems). The bun/patty ratio is important too – except for,dehydrated frozen burgers (the bad kind) most fresh burgers shrink as they lose moisture, so plan your patty size/bun size accordingly. Unlike the BK ads, meat doesn’t need to overhang the bun (you’ll have a problem with bun structural integrity if you do) but less than 95% bun coverage and you start to have plain bread mouthfuls and that’s not a good thing.
Cheese needs to be melted on. Nothing else needs to be said here. A lid and a bit of water work well here without needing to overcook the burger (I witnessed the dirty burger chefs do this, also softening the lettuce and tomato slightly at the same time – a great trick).
Everything else is an accessory. But accessories matter! Whether you include a pickle. Raw or cooked onion or caramelized onion. Chicken-skin fries, triple or double cooked. Lettuce or slaw. Just think it through in the context of a plate. Less is definitely more.

I think that’s most things, but if I’ve missed anything, I’m hoping the burger community will help me out in the comments, and I’ll update this post (with attributions). It seems like a lot but… it’s not really! Change your burger supplier and your baker (or at least, your order from the same!) and brief your chef and you’re away.

In a year with Brexit, Trump, terrorist attacks and celebrity deaths, the last thing anyone needs is a mediocre burger to top it all off.