I did get diarrhea later
March 3, 2020 4:17 AM   Subscribe

 
The Wet Burger ($9.95), named thusly because it is very wet

This is the worst thing I have ever read. I was going to continue that sentence with "in a restaurant review" but I don't think I need to.
posted by Rock Steady at 4:26 AM on March 3, 2020 [38 favorites]


Seeing restaurant prices in New York always make me feel like such a hick.
posted by octothorpe at 4:33 AM on March 3, 2020 [11 favorites]


Extremely annoying I-don't-even-own-a-TV voice: I'm sorry, but what exactly is this so called "salt bay" of which they are talking about, and what does he do to meat, exactly? I'm utterly in the dark, here.
posted by sixohsix at 4:44 AM on March 3, 2020 [9 favorites]


Salt Bae on Know Your Meme.
He became famous because he cuts steak and seasons it in a flamboyant manner. That's it. Then he opened a restaurant. Really.
posted by like_neon at 4:48 AM on March 3, 2020 [12 favorites]


but what exactly is this so called "salt bay" of which they are talking about

He's a Turkish chef who got famous by making a video of himself sprinkling enough salt on a steak to destroy Carthage.
posted by Cardinal Fang at 4:49 AM on March 3, 2020 [65 favorites]


And also his restaurant in New York supposedly steals tips from the waitstaff (sorry, not sure about a link, just another fun thing about the guy, the nth iteration of milkshake duck).
posted by Ghidorah at 5:01 AM on March 3, 2020 [4 favorites]


Is this the millennial version of Old Bay

Are they related
posted by phooky at 5:08 AM on March 3, 2020 [9 favorites]


Phooky, Old Bay Bae is a crabber from Virginia known for how she seasons her crab boils. The food is much, much better.
posted by os tuberoes at 5:15 AM on March 3, 2020 [27 favorites]


This is pretty funny... though I do think most truffle fries are terrible. That phony "truffle" oil all the restaurants use is so chemical-ly and gross. Blech.

And to be fair, those prices were absurd! Except for the wet burger, I guess?
posted by Grither at 5:29 AM on March 3, 2020 [3 favorites]


Take photos of yourself in the least sexy bathroom in Manhattan, and I’m including every single bathroom at Penn Station in this assessment.

Daaaaaaaamn
posted by Aya Hirano on the Astral Plane at 5:29 AM on March 3, 2020 [16 favorites]


Fwiw the 'wet burger' is a regional thing in Istanbul.
posted by jpziller at 5:40 AM on March 3, 2020 [24 favorites]


Plus: It’s just lousy with bros in pea coats.

Aw, shit, did the pea coat stop being practical and ordinary men's winter outerwear and nobody told me?
posted by jackbishop at 5:42 AM on March 3, 2020 [15 favorites]


pea coats are fine still. if you are in manhattan wearing a canada goose jacket when its above 20 degrees tho, you're in the wickerman
posted by lazaruslong at 5:43 AM on March 3, 2020 [12 favorites]


did the pea coat stop being practical and ordinary men's winter outerwear

Damn it! Just keep them away from barn coats, please! It’s all I ever wanted from rustic-ish outerwear!
posted by Ghidorah at 5:50 AM on March 3, 2020 [2 favorites]


The off-puttingly named wet burger is also called islak burger. islak means ... well, wet, but boy does it carry a dramatically different set of baggage in English.

Meanwhile, these "New York prices" are making me feel foolish because last night I paid $8 for a giant bowl of noodle soup and was annoyed because it was merely good, not great. I couldn't finish it, but only because I was full. I had no digestive issues later. Maybe swing by the Little Asia Cafe in the Twin Cities if you get a chance, it is in a Hmong community centre and they are the latest group being targetted by Trump here.
posted by seraphine at 5:50 AM on March 3, 2020 [9 favorites]


Salt Bae is a Turkish MIT plant.
posted by gucci mane at 5:59 AM on March 3, 2020 [2 favorites]


The food in the article obviously doesn't sound great. I would have liked it more, though, if the writing about flavors was a bit more descriptive -- there are several items that are each described as not tasting of anything, but do they all taste the same, or is the blandness different for each?

The wet/islak burger sounds unappealing in the main FPP link but the street food version described in the link above sounds like a great late night option I would love to try someday.
posted by Dip Flash at 5:59 AM on March 3, 2020 [5 favorites]


The restaurant is down the street from my office. I think I’ll be giving it a miss.
posted by holborne at 6:03 AM on March 3, 2020


oh a meme review on a meme website of a meme restaurant in a meme city its just memes all the way down isn't it
posted by Bwentman at 6:18 AM on March 3, 2020 [23 favorites]


Isn't this meme/concept like 5 or more years old? I never saw the meme, but I remember years ago reading about this guy's restaurant BASED on the meme. So then I looked up the meme. And then I wished I never heard about any of this. And now it's back to sit in my head.

Original meme: Attractive Turkish guy seasons a steak by sprinkling fluffy, flaky salt on it in a seductive way to camera with his bare hands. Then he opened a restaurant, which featured the Turkish man himself putting salt on your very own steak table side as a stunt. But food safety laws forbid him from doing this table side unless he used food prep gloves. Which made his famous (harmless-looking) method impossible to do. So the entire thing was pointless.

I want to know: how can you screw up hamburgers so badly? Can't you just hire a few culinary-school people with banquet & pro-food-service credentials to at least make a good hamburger? And THEN charge $25 for it? It's not a really hard thing to make and have turn out good to great, especially with a decent kitchen and semi-skilled chefs.

The internet was a mistake.
posted by SoberHighland at 6:34 AM on March 3, 2020 [5 favorites]


I thought I had already read this review, but the one I already read said the wet burger was OK. They seemed to have been in Turkey. Otherwise it was exactly the same. Memes all the way down.
posted by mumimor at 6:50 AM on March 3, 2020


- there are several items that are each described as not tasting of anything, but do they all taste the same, or is the blandness different for each?


This question is putting me in an existential quandary - if they dont taste of anything how can they taste different from each other? but if they all taste the same isnt that what they taste like (the taste of nothingness?).
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 6:50 AM on March 3, 2020 [7 favorites]


Are Guy Fieri restaurants good? I mean, I've come to really like the guy after watching 500 episodes of Guy's Grocery Games - dude has to have serious carpal tunnel in his "right this way" elbow, amirite? - but I seem to remember his restaurants getting panned.
posted by grumpybear69 at 6:52 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


Well, obviously, a) there's nothing that can't be screwed up (see the previous comment about pea coats, and jpziller's link to the info about the wet burger does make it sound delicious, when it's done right (and maybe even orders of magnitude cheaper); and b) celebrities open not-really-great restaurants all the time, and if your "celebrity" is based on an already-past-its-sell-by-date meme, and unless you're yourself serious about your food (and based on the reviews of his previous restaurant, he isn't), why not?
posted by Halloween Jack at 6:53 AM on March 3, 2020


how can you screw up hamburgers so badly?


I'm told by restaurant folks that it is actually difficult to do a hamburger truly well.

My own dining experience confirms that. There's only one spot in my neighborhood where the hamburger is up to my standards. The burger at 97% of places is unremarkable or downright mediocre.
posted by mikeand1 at 6:58 AM on March 3, 2020 [5 favorites]


And here’s me, thinking a burger and fries is about tasting good and making me full, with proper amounts of salt and grease.

I’m such an idiot.
posted by drivingmenuts at 6:59 AM on March 3, 2020


I got about three paragraphs in. I don't get it.
1. Why would you try to make food with no flavor?
2. Why would you open a restaurant to serve food with no flavor?
3. Why would you go to a restaurant where the stated goal is to serve food with no flavor?

The bus left and I wasn't on it.
posted by dfm500 at 6:59 AM on March 3, 2020


I mean... isn't this the expected outcome when you open a restaurant based on an Instagram meme?
posted by slkinsey at 7:04 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


I mean... isn't this the expected outcome when you open a restaurant based on an Instagram meme?

More memes?
posted by Fizz at 7:12 AM on March 3, 2020


but if they all taste the same isnt that what they taste like (the taste of nothingness?).

Hello drabness, my old friend
I've come to talk with you again
Because a flavour softly creeping
Left its seeds while I was feasting
And the tameness that was planted in my brain
Still remains
Within the taste of nothing

In restless bistros I walked alone
Narrow aisles of faux stone
'Neath the halo of a hung lamp
I turned my gullet to the cold and damp
When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a meme in flight
That split the night
And touched the taste of nothing

And in the naked light I saw
Ten thousand people, maybe more
People eating without savoring
People chewing without enjoying
People plating food that tastebuds never shared
And no one dared
Disturb the taste of nothing

"Fools," said I, "you do not know
"Blandness like a cancer grows.
Hear my words that I might teach you
Taste my spice that I might reach you"
But my words, like zestless seasoning fell
And diffused in the stews, of blandness
posted by nubs at 7:29 AM on March 3, 2020 [34 favorites]


> And here’s me, thinking a burger and fries is about tasting good and making me full, with proper amounts of salt and grease.

One of the best burgers I've ever had cost $20 at the upstairs bar of a farm-to-table restaurant in Michigan where there was hardly anything on it: some lettuce, a tomato, a little mayo. I had one bite and handed it to my wife and said, "Try that." She tried it and said, "That was a happy cow." I agreed, "That cow died happy." Obviously its life was taken too soon but until then it was loved, and it gave of itself in turn. The burger made me want for nothing.

One of the best burgers I've ever had cost somewheres under $5 outside a stripmall in North Carolina. It's hard to set an exact price because the $5 also covered a ridiculous quantity of fries, some chicken nuggets and a drink. The burger was blackened and smoky and wedged in a mashed bun along with some shreds of lettuce and bacon, a disk of tomato, and some random sauces. It seemed like the worst possible thing to order on a roasting hot day at a place that didn't even provide seats and tables, but it satisfied my hunger and need for salty grease with startling precision.

One of the best burgers I've ever had cost around $12 in a city I was exploring on bike. I felt completely tapped out and the mellowing stench of beer in the place somehow pleasingly complemented the absurdly extreme BEEF-ness of the beef. An egg over-easy was on top of the meat, causing an inevitable mess of orangy-yellow yolk cascading on everything below it and fully making up for the moisture the beef wasn't lacking.

One of the best burgers I've ever had... I don't know how much it cost because grandfather footed the bill. They served it with a slab of cheese between two slices of excessively buttered toast. For a drink I had their "world-famous" excessively thick chocolate milkshake. They advertised that any patron who successfully drank three at one sitting could get a fourth for free. I told grandfather I wanted to try and he suggested I go for it when I'm older. It's close to 50 years later now, I still haven't tried and probably won't, but a certain type of burger still carries with it the feeling of being loved, even when that means certain ambitions are being humored rather than supported.
posted by ardgedee at 7:44 AM on March 3, 2020 [50 favorites]


There's only one spot in my neighborhood where the hamburger is up to my standards. The burger at 97% of places is unremarkable or downright mediocre.

See I feel the opposite. I'm pretty happy with the restaurant burgers I can get around me and feel it's not time or cost effective to make hamburgers at home anymore, when I can get one equally cheap with better materials and more toppings without any effort more than pulling out my wallet.
posted by The_Vegetables at 7:45 AM on March 3, 2020 [2 favorites]


Fwiw the 'wet burger' is a regional thing in Istanbul.

I love burgers and oh man that looks really good.
posted by jquinby at 7:47 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


Can confirm that islak burgers are AMAZING. They are everything street food should be and more.

I really love burgers and hate making them myself, and utterly agree with mikeand1. It's really easy to do a burger badly, and hoo boy do a lot of people around me do burgers badly.

(The exception, of course, is Dick's. Classic fast food burger, and so very, very good. I took my sister there for Easter dinner when she visited and we regretted exactly none of our life choices.)
posted by kalimac at 7:52 AM on March 3, 2020 [2 favorites]


Burgers are like pecan pie.

You want to pay someone else to make you a really tasty one because then you aren't forcibly faced with the package of 70/30 WARNING EXTREME FAT CONTENT USE ONLY UNDER MEDICAL SUPERVISION beef or just how much salt is being put on it, etc. Just like really you want to pick up the pie from Wegmans and not look at the recipe saying "It wants HOW MUCH corn syrup and butter?"
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 7:55 AM on March 3, 2020 [15 favorites]


Islak burgers are basically the Tacos de Canasta of turkish hamburgers, right?
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 8:03 AM on March 3, 2020


'Thing you like - with salt!' is the worst trend. It's inevitably something that had salt already.
posted by StarkRoads at 8:11 AM on March 3, 2020


Thank you ardgedee for the Madeleine moment - your descriptions made my mouth water and I suddenly remembered Friday afternoon trips to Bubba's Arkansas Cafe in London's Spitalfields market; a shabby shack beneath the covered market roof with signs on the door like "no shirt, no shoes, no service" and "no Texans allowed", and outside the shack - although still under cover of the market roof - Bubba grilling away on an open charcoal pit. Those burgers were divine and have never been equalled.
posted by Molesome at 8:14 AM on March 3, 2020


One of the best burgers I've ever had cost somewheres under $5 outside a stripmall in North Carolina. It's hard to set an exact price because the $5 also covered a ridiculous quantity of fries, some chicken nuggets and a drink. The burger was blackened and smoky and wedged in a mashed bun along with some shreds of lettuce and bacon, a disk of tomato, and some random sauces. It seemed like the worst possible thing to order on a roasting hot day at a place that didn't even provide seats and tables, but it satisfied my hunger and need for salty grease with startling precision.

Damn it now I NEED Cook Out and I'm stuck up here in NYC like a FOOL.
posted by showbiz_liz at 8:41 AM on March 3, 2020 [4 favorites]


All this is making me wonder what happened to the “I Kiss You” guy
posted by thelonius at 8:44 AM on March 3, 2020 [3 favorites]


Last I hear, he was suing Borat for stealing his schtick.
posted by jenkinsEar at 8:55 AM on March 3, 2020 [4 favorites]


I spent last summer on a quest to make the perfect burger and, after many failures, settled on the smashburger, which is a clear winner.

- 75% lean meat
- a cast-iron griddle (Lodge or similar)
- a wide, flat metal spatula and other implement to press said spatula down - I use an OXO potato masher
- shake shack sauce (Veganaise makes a good mayo substitute in case you're also making Beyond burgers)
- salt and pepper
- Buns & toppings of your choice (I like brioche buns, bacon, American cheese and thin-sliced spicy brine pickles - this year I'll be taking a page from the Melt Shop book and putting a bunch of that stuff under the meat)

Get the griddle hot, roll the meat into little balls, put them on the griddle, smoosh them down with the spatula & implement, apply salt & pepper, cook until they're nice and carmelized, put them on a bun w/ cheese and the sauce, add the toppings, eat. SO TASTY! You may need to pour off some fat after a while if you're making a lot of them.

The main problem with burgers, I found, is that cooking them on a grill causes all of the delicious fat to just leave the party. Pressing on them, rather than causing the meat to sear like it would on a griddle, just sort of deforms them and squeezes out juices. I tried the dimple method, the salt before method, the don't-work-the-meat-too-much method. Nothing worked except the smashburger. I might try thicker burgers on the griddle this year just in case that was the prime problem.

#BurgerLife
posted by grumpybear69 at 8:59 AM on March 3, 2020 [13 favorites]


If you squeeze it, it oozes greasy tears.

Same.
posted by doctornecessiter at 9:05 AM on March 3, 2020 [21 favorites]


I spent last summer on a quest to make the perfect burger and, after many failures, settled on the smashburger, which is a clear winner.

Same all around. It's not hard to get right, either. I've worked the grill for a cookout with about 20 people and it came out very well. The key is to steal a good recipe. Here's one I can recommend from extensive application.

Honestly, if you follow the directions pretty closely, you can't go wrong. I got a ton of mileage out of my PK grill this way. Just make sure that your meat is at most 80% lean and move quickly - the patties should each spend less than a minute on the grill. Most of the work is prep so that you're ready to churn them out.

The same channel came out with what is apparently the revival of an old burger recipe. It looks...Satanic. I will have to make one at some point, but I plan to have the hospital on the line when I actually try it. Anyway...good luck.
posted by Edgewise at 9:19 AM on March 3, 2020 [7 favorites]


In Austin, home to some ridiculously overpriced burgers, we also have Dan’s, where a proper burger (mustard, all the way), fries and a drink will run around $7-8. Now, THAT is a burger place to write about.

If I could drive, I’d be there now.

And yes, they have malts and shakes, vanilla, chocolate and strawberry.

Since SXSW might be cancelled, you’ll have to wait another year to try it.
posted by drivingmenuts at 9:27 AM on March 3, 2020


grumpybear69, your recipe is almost exactly the same as mine, except I vary my sauces instead of just using one. It mystifies me that more people don't know about this.

In my experience, it's not hard to make a burger in either a home or professional kitchen. The problem is that people don't understand what makes a good burger, and so they do all sorts of stupid stuff like making 3lb patties or mixing stuff into the patties like meatloaf or using 99% lean beef. The burger is something best kept simple. If you want to go fancy, add toppings.

Oh, toast your buns too.
posted by kevinbelt at 9:35 AM on March 3, 2020 [2 favorites]


well the best burger I have ever had (repeat performances btw) is home made by mr supermedusa*. seriously. we have access to excellent beef (tiny ranch in Santa Rosa, CA) and he makes these ridiculous 1/2 pound pucks of medium rare perfection. the pucks are well salted and peppered before hand. we generally garnish with cheese, tomato and red onion. we use a ciabatta bun or other similar hardy bread, because the burgers are so juicy they would disintegrate lesser breads. the meat is exceptional in flavor and texture and prepared expertly. I've had burgers near as good out, but nothing better.

*who loves to cook
posted by supermedusa at 9:45 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


@drivingmenuts My favorite Austin burger is Arlo's. And my SXSW plans just got axed today due to a travel restriction for the client I was going to be visiting after. Alas!
posted by grumpybear69 at 9:46 AM on March 3, 2020


The problem is that people don't understand what makes a good burger, and so they do all sorts of stupid stuff like making 3lb patties or mixing stuff into the patties like meatloaf or using 99% lean beef.

Yeah, I think you nailed it with this. You have to go super basic on the meat and do a reasonable portion size. A little salt, that's it, and don't mess with it once you put it on the heat.
posted by tobascodagama at 9:50 AM on March 3, 2020 [2 favorites]


This place sounds bad, but speaking of overdone memes, isn’t the over the top critical restaurant review pretty high on the list?
posted by The Gooch at 9:50 AM on March 3, 2020


One thing I have found about living in West Bumfuck, is that the burgers are actually good in many of the small town restaurants we happen upon. I suspect part of it is that most of them are drawing their meat from local butchers rather than frozen patties off a truck. But yeah, I don't get disappointed. My own local meat market has a distinctive taste to it and strikes just the right amount of fat. When I grill outside in the summer the smell will bring strong folk to their knees. But then I get pissed at living in such a red state so fuck it.

Obligatory How I Met Your Mother Link.
posted by Ber at 9:54 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


I think part of Salt Bae's appeal is that he looks and acts like a 90s action hero.
posted by FJT at 9:57 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


@Ber whoever wrote that piece from HIMYM gets it. I teared up a little.
posted by drivingmenuts at 10:15 AM on March 3, 2020


I am now so hungry for a burger that I am going to Shake Shack.
posted by grumpybear69 at 10:33 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


Bon Appetit just did hamburgers 42 ways (some of these ways are obviously stupid; don't steam your burgers, folks). I think the main takeaway was "get a crust on that" and "maybe some smoke too if you can." Smashburgers or just a cast iron with a reasonably sized 80/20 patty, salt thoroughly immediately beforehand. This isn't hard.

I did wonder if everything in the salt bae place was tasteless because they expect you to avail yourself of the theme and salt the absolute shit out of everything brought to your table. Then I decided nah, they probably just suck at cooking.
posted by axiom at 10:33 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


inexplicably fond of the fact that there was apparently no better way to describe/title/name the burger as basically just "wet meat"
posted by poffin boffin at 11:01 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


moist flesh
posted by poffin boffin at 11:01 AM on March 3, 2020 [3 favorites]


don't steam your burgers, folks

very possibly the best burger i ate in 2019 was steamed (although only after grilling) - noted food-person Kenji Lopez-Alt agrees. (if you cant watch video or dont want to click through, Canard in Portland makes a seriously delicious burger)
posted by Exceptional_Hubris at 11:12 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


don't steam your burgers, folks

That's how we always had them when I was growing up in Albany.
posted by Rock Steady at 11:17 AM on March 3, 2020 [13 favorites]


They do steam a good ham.

The best burger in NYC costs $12.50 and comes from a bar on Avenue C. It's not just delicious, it's amazingly consistent. I've been ordering from them for well over a decade and they never disappoint.
posted by praemunire at 11:19 AM on March 3, 2020 [2 favorites]


bareburger used to be so good and then something?? happened? idk what but i'm mad.
posted by poffin boffin at 11:21 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


Steamed Hams... lol
posted by Windopaene at 11:24 AM on March 3, 2020


> jpziller: Fwiw the 'wet burger' is a regional thing in Istanbul.

That recipe sounds good as hell and I might make it tonight, but if I do I am calling them islak burgers for sure for sure.
posted by Rock Steady at 11:25 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


The Grumpy Report: Shake Shack was delicious, and also mostly empty.
posted by grumpybear69 at 11:27 AM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


The Grumpy Report: Shake Shack was delicious, and also mostly empty.

Let me refer you to Marilyn Hagerty, who literally writes food reviews like this in Grand Forks ND, and she is a national treasure.

(if warned that you're out of free articles, just turn on incognito mode)
posted by AzraelBrown at 11:56 AM on March 3, 2020 [3 favorites]


I eat a lot of veggie burgers that are average at best. When we bake fresh buns they are the best burgers ever. So to me the secret to a great burger is to bake fresh buns.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 12:37 PM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


Maybe all the food is flavorless because you're expected to fling salt over everything? That's the whole gimmick, right?
posted by team lowkey at 12:41 PM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


At Thanksgiving dinner last year, cousins of mine who are roughly half my age started riffing on Salt Bae at the dinner table when someone asked for the salt, and this led to quizzical looks from my parents, so we then we had to cobble together an explanation of Salt Bae, which just ended in someone pulling out their phone and saying "Look, this guy," and showing them a Salt Bae video. They expressed their continued confusion, and I said "Look, your generation had pet rocks, this is like that, sorta."

like_neon: He became famous because he cuts steak and seasons it in a flamboyant manner. That's it. Then he opened a restaurant. Really.

See, that's the explanation I should have gone with.

On review, I could have added, "Basically, salt cascaded through the hair on the underside of a man's forearm and onto your plate."
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 12:56 PM on March 3, 2020 [3 favorites]


I am totally hitting up cookout on the way home.
posted by Stewriffic at 1:08 PM on March 3, 2020


I meant steamed like you would green beans. Not steamed over onions like White Castle does or whatever.
posted by axiom at 1:51 PM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


The Saltbae Baklava Shake ($24.95), which is served in a glass covered with tasteless pistachio shards, doesn’t even have the audacity to taste like vanilla, which I suppose it is intended to be, though I only suspect this because it was made into a frothy white substance with the texture of thick water.

The thing is, a baklava shake sounds like a grand idea, assuming proper execution.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 2:06 PM on March 3, 2020 [3 favorites]


Based on the picture accompanying the review, this is just a piece of soggy baklava on top of a bland milkshake with whipped cream on top. Very disappointing.

Some kind of honey-pistachio milkshake would be delicious, though.
posted by tobascodagama at 2:20 PM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


Is Five Guys not a thing anymore? There was one near my old job and they kicked Shake Shack's ass by a country mile. The fries though, well let's just say I got used to them after a while.

As far as #saltbae goes, sorry, if I'm paying 25 bucks for a burger, it better be made out of gold.
posted by xigxag at 3:27 PM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


Five Guys is still around. They're fine.
posted by tobascodagama at 5:44 PM on March 3, 2020 [1 favorite]


Holy cow, seraphine, the google maps photos of the food at Little Asia Cafe in St. Paul looks totally legit quality, and would, anywhere else in the world.

There was a Burmese restaurant in Vancouver, run by refugees, that opened near a transit hub/ working class neighbourhood that had similar high levels of quality, but closed much too quickly.

If they had the capital to open up in any one of the trendy urban centers and paid for a designer and tenant improvements, they could have become an institution (if they didn't sell out, lowered quality assurance, etc.).

Google 'Baklava Man' and you'll find a story about a Syrian MP refugee to Canada who became a (sub)Reddit legend.

--

(American Ham)Burgers have such a huge range varieties, and everyone's individual experience with them since childhood makes it extraordinarily difficult to quantitatively define an ideal burger.

Maybe you grew up having an emotional connection with a very highly standardized (between restaurants) McDonalds. It might have been good, it might have been bad.

Some people will have different criteria for the "best" of each category of food, so I appreciate the author's objective critique of how the food fails to please.
posted by porpoise at 8:24 PM on March 3, 2020


Oh, when I saw "wet burger" I immediately thought of Sloppy Joes.

Is that still a thing?

I crave it sometimes but I once found the perfect bun (crispy crust that my teeth could still cut through well enough without the filling squirting everywhere, with an inside crumb that completely absorbed the amount and viscosity of the loose moisture that I like with the crumbled hamburger) but it changed one day and repeated failures to find an equivalent has broken my heart towards actively searching for another accessible one.

The new bun wasn't bad, it just wasn't the effortlessly perfect one for my sloppy joes.
posted by porpoise at 8:39 PM on March 3, 2020


The thing is, a baklava shake sounds like a grand idea, assuming proper execution.

Opa! in Seattle had an awesome baklava ice cream. Cinnamon flavor in the ice cream helps create an appealing flavor balance.
posted by StarkRoads at 8:40 AM on March 4, 2020 [4 favorites]


Sloppy Joe's certainly are a thing, at least around here. They're a consistent crowd-pleaser and pair well with steak fries.
posted by jquinby at 8:42 AM on March 4, 2020


Sloppy Joe's certainly are a thing, at least around here. They're a consistent crowd-pleaser and pair well with steak fries.

Sloppy joes are mostly kids food made at home, but chili dumped inside or on top of a hamburger is becoming common, and pretty much the same thing.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:47 AM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]


a chili size is NOT a sloppy joe equivalent!

also if you hate the phrase “wet burger”, allow me to introduce you to the majesty of the Maid-Rite Loose Meat Sandwich
posted by murphy slaw at 8:01 PM on March 4, 2020 [1 favorite]


I have no idea why I find the idea of 'Maid-Rite' so endearing, but that they're preserving terminology from the great depression has certainly got to be a part of it. I've never encountered, much less eaten, at one. Knowingly.

The choice of use, and the transition between, the popular use of 'loose-' and 'ground-' meat must certainly be fascinating. Especially if there were differences between locales.

I've seen 'sausage meat' being used in lieu, also, but (almost?) exclusive to ground pork, and often pre-seasoned.
posted by porpoise at 10:40 PM on March 4, 2020


Ok, why do usereater-submitted photos on google show so much spilled loose meat before consumption was even attempted?

Is that the schtick? That you pick up and hoover the leftover/ spilled loose meat after you've finished the burger?
posted by porpoise at 10:44 PM on March 4, 2020


Sorry, last one, answered my owne question.

Surface area. Grain-sized chunks of beef has enormous surface area: volume ratio.

Proper treatment gets dramatically more Maillard products per unit weight. So, magnitudes more of the good stuff, if you know how to make it happen (isn't too hard).
posted by porpoise at 10:49 PM on March 4, 2020


I made the recipe that jpziller linked above, and they were quite good! Had a strong meatloaf/meatballs vibe that was really tasty. I don't think the whole "brush the sauce all over the buns and bake for 5 minutes" was worth the trouble, though. Next time I think I will just reduce the sauce further to make it more of a topping for the burger and serve it on regular buns.
posted by Rock Steady at 11:15 AM on March 9, 2020


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