Hi burger fans,
a couple of weeks ago we went to the Timeout: Battle of the Burger event, where we got to sample 8 of London’s favourite burgers. As the inventors of “Burger Battles” we were excited to attend this event as undercover VIPs. Weather wasn’t fit for the occasion but nevertheless we had a great time.
We have changed the format slightly for this occasion because we have to battle 8 burgers at once. Between part 1 and part 2 both our casted favourites will make it through to the next round.
Location: Geoffrey Museum, Hoxton
Before entering the arena, we can already seen all the smoke rising. The battle is on!
We split the eight contestants into two groups of four, so this battle is
Goneburger’s Kickflip
vs. Haché’s Truffle Burger
vs. Mac and Wild’s Venimoo
vs. Bad Egg’s Korean Burger
Let the battle begin ding ding ding 🔔🔔🔔
Goneburger
Starting off at music and food festivals they are now a pop up at The Lexington. They choose to use organic British supplier to give you quality burger ingredients.
This is called ‘The KickFlip’, which consist of organic grass-fed beef, Monterey Jack cheese, whiskey-smoked BBQ sauce, aioli, lettuce, onion & gherkin. This burger was in the finals of National Burger Awards 2018.
The Patty
Since this burger is quartered you can have a nice look at it before you sink your teeth into it. The thick patty is grilled and crispy on the outside while being tender on the inside. The meet has a healthy red colour.
When taking the first bite this is exactly what it feels like. Thanks to crispiness the burger has a really nice bite too it. It only takes a few moments until a sudden burst of pepper hits us. This is easily the most pepper we every had in one bite. Beyond the crispiness the meat flavour doesn’t really come through and the patty is not particularly juicy either.
The Sauce
Perhaps to compensate for the amounts of pepper, the BBQ sauce adds a delightful sweet note to the burger. This is augmented by the salty and tangy gherkins. The burger comes with a rather thin slice of Monterey Jack, an American semi-hard cheese. This type of cheese tends to be quite mild, so it’s flavours didn’t really stack up against the pepper + gherkin combo. The burger could’ve benefitted from melting the cheese on top of the patty to absorb some of its juices.
The Bun
The brioche bun is quite greasy because they put it on the grill with the patties. It is toasted and hence chewy, adding a layer of texture to the crispy patty.
Overall tastiness:
Yvonne: This burger was too over seasoned for me, all I can taste was the peppercorns. Although the patty looks fresh, I would of liked it to be a bit more juicier to taste more of the beef. 🍔🍔🍔
Johannes: I think this was a really nice classic cheese burger. It’s a pity they put so much pepper and salt on it though! 🍔🍔🍔🍔
Haché
The Patty
We have battled this burger before so we went into this battle with a bit of a preconception. Haché clearly make premium burger from high-quality meet and ingredients and indeed the patty is delicious: It is made from steak mince and melts in the mouth. You can really see the burger juices flowing and being absorbed in the bun. They could’ve done a bit more with the flavouring though as the burger overall feels a bit bland.
The Sauce
This is supposed to be a truffle burger, but unfortunately we did not taste any truffle 😦 However the sweetness coming from an onion-based chutney adds a subtle layer of flavour. There is also a light touch of pepper to delicately balance the juices from the meat. Usually we just encounter plastic cheese, therefore the Emmentaler cheese adds a final premium touch to the burger, releasing refined cheesy notes to complement the other flavours.
The Bun
This is a brioche bun which is much drier than the usual buns we’ve tried. It is crispy with a wrinkly appearance on the outside and shows signs of cracking even before the first bite.
With the sauce and juices oozing out, the bun really soaks up a lot of the flavours and oil making it feel slightly greasy.
Overall tastiness:
Yvonne: This burger is much better than the Haché cheeseburger we reviewed last year. Can’t really call it a truffle burger when there is no truffle taste though. Having been to Italy last month, we’ve been accustomed to delicious truffle paste 😛. Great combination of flavours: cheesy, juicy and sweet. 🍔🍔🍔🍔
Johannes: Last time we had the Haché truffle burger it was overwhelmingly truffle-ly. This time I can barely taste it. The patty is perfection though. If only they got the amount of truffle right… 🍔🍔🍔🍔
Bad Egg
When creating the brunch menu at Smokehouse, the owners realised the menu they wanted to create did not fit in with the Smokehouse vibe. Therefore they opened up Bad Egg in 2014, which was first to showcase bottomless brunch in London.
First mini burger we’ve ever battled. This burger looks very intriguing.
ooo using a blowtorch to grill the bun. Watching them make the mini burgers is mesmerising, seeing how each layer of ingredients gets added.
The Korean burger. Very sleek, although the colouring of the meat looks more grey than brown, needs to be a bit crispier.
The Patty
This is a mini version of Bad Egg’s Korean burger, so we had to be careful to not eat it all in one bite! On the first bite we can immediately feel the ground beef texture of the patty, which makes the entire burger feel rather soft. The patty is really juicy and there is bonus-juice coming from the pulled pork. The flavour of the pulled pork is very subtle and the beef taste doesn’t really come through either because they are overpowered by the sauce.
The dry-aged beef comes through as a slightly gamy, smokey flavour on the pellet. This burger has a lot of meat making it feel very heavy.
The Sauce
Since this is a Korean-style burger the sauces all follow this theme. The base is Gochujang mayo – mayonnaise with some Korean red chilli paste mixed in. This is then topped up with some Sriracha. We were prepared for it to get spicy 🌶. The pulled pork is also spiced with (unknown) Korean spices giving it a BBQ smoked, tangy flavour. For someone who doesn’t eat a lot of spicy food the level of hotness is not unbearable high. Overall, this combination of sauces works really well!
The Bun
This is the cutest brioche bun we’ve ever seen! To toast it they use a blow torch, which is pretty cool. For one of our burgers they slightly overdid it though giving it a charred taste. In addition to the soft texture of the patty, the bun is also really soft.
Overall tastiness:
Yvonne: This was an exotic infusion of taste. I’m not usually a fan of spicy burgers but the slight hotness complemented the smokey BBQ sauce, tangy marinade from the pulled pork and creamy mayo. 🍔🍔🍔🍔🍔
Johannes: In spite of his miniature size this was quite a meat feast with sweet pulled pork, spicy mayo and a delicious patty. I really want to try it’s big brother now! 🍔🍔🍔🍔
Mac & Wild
This is the Venimoo burger, which is a beef and venison patty, with cheese, béarnaise & caramelised onions – served in a seeded bun.
The Patty
As the fanatic battle of the burger follower that you are, you probably remember that this one already appeared in a battle (link). That’s why we’ll keep this review a bit shorter. Since last time the burger got quite a good rating we were both excited to eat it again, but the first bite was a massive let-down. We tasted something soggy and slimy, and as it turns out this is the meat. Something must’ve gone wrong in the kitchen because both patties were really under-done, to a point where we didn’t even finish the burgers. There’s isn’t really a point in reviewing this burger any further.
Overall tastiness:
Yvonne: Having remembered how good Mac & Wild Venimoo burger was, I was very disappointed with this version of the burger. Having a too rare patty made it extremely difficult for me to eat. To avoid food poisoning I passed after the first soggy bite:🍔
Johannes: I am heartbroken 🍔
Part II of this blog will be up soon where we review the other four burgers and will reveal our favourite burger in Timeout’s “Battle of the Burger”. These will make it to the next round of our (more extensive) battle, so stay tuned!
Let the battle continue ding ding ding 🔔🔔🔔
Battle of the Burgers 