I’ve never professed to know anything about what makes food “good”. I mean, sweet chilli sauce is one of my favourite condiments for gods sake and I know that saying blogging that out loud has already condemned me to the bland and empty depths of foodie hell, to spend eternity in a damp pit of “nasty” condiments like sweet chilli, mayonnaise and BBQ sauce.
Oh my, what a lovely hell.
And we all know that I love burgers. Be it Byron’s monstrosity of a big fat burger, or Grand Union’s tall, lanky version, my heart has always belonged to the simple, unpretentious beef burger, and one place that has never, nudda, not once failed to sate my burger appetite is the aptly named Ultimate Burger.
I can already see the masses cringe at my crude and unsophisticated palate. I’m sure my blasphemous claim is on par with liking McDonalds, but hey you know what? I like them too, so go on, send me into the pit of sweet chilli sauce.
I dare you.
So Boxing Day ~ Panu and I had been hanging out to watch James Cameron’s Avatar for like forever, and the excruciating wait was finally over. We were craving burgers for dinner and to be honest, our first choice had been Byron’s new Soho haunt but they were closed so that’s for another day and another blog post.
But The Ultimate Burger, they were open and did I not tell you? They’ve never let me down, not even on Boxing Day.
We headed in and ordered our usual ~ a BBQ beef burger each, a side of fries and Panu (who is guaranteed a place by my side in sweet tooth glutton heaven hell) orders his standard vanilla shake which I am not even kidding here, is like they blended up a litre of ice cream and nothing else. It is so thick I wouldn’t even call it a drink, it’s dessert, really, but you can kid yourself and call it a drink, and have dessert again after. Pure genius.
The burgers, in my very humble opinion, are nothing short of phenomenal. Served with soft, sesame seeded brioche buns, the beef patty oozes cheese from within and is accompanied by a simple tomato slice, a ring of salad onion and a lettuce leaf.
Our particular burgers, the BBQ beef burger, is made even more delectable with a generous dollop of BBQ sauce (hello condiment hell) and as if that wasn’t enough, a dash of sweet onion relish.
I mean oh my God. Is that not perfection in a burger?
Why yes, yes it is.
The fries are also crispy good ~ just the way I like ’em. I love skinny, over cooked fries and for those street vendors who cook them twice to keep them warm, goddamn that double cooked, doubly oily, doubly crispy fries are just up my alley.
I don’t actually think The Ultimate Burger cooks their fries twice. But who knows, really. Regardless, they look and taste like the crunchy golden potato bits that fill my belly and cold winter hands with warm lovin’ and though their burgers are what I hit them up for first, having my choice of fries really doesn’t go astray either.
image courtesy of avatarmovie.com
Dinner in our well rounded bellies, it was time for Avatar. Three hours of unadulterated 3D action and when it was over, I was truly speechless. If that doesn’t tell you what a profoundly astonishing movie it is, I don’t know what will because me? Speechless? Honey, enjoy it because it don’t happen often.
In its magical world and magical ways, Avatar was entertaining to the nth degree, but beyond that it told tales of imperialism, biodiversity, humanity (or there lack of) and even though I really am not that green, environmentalism.
I think what hit home for me was that oh my god, James Cameron has nailed human behaviour down to a tee. We rape and pillage and kill our Earth like there’s no tomorrow (and don’t do squat about it at annual climate change conferences *ahem* Cop15) and when our planet has no more left to give what do we do?
We haul our greedy asses over to the next planet (if we are so lucky to find one with resources) and start destroying them. It is so true and this is what will happen when we finally drain our Earth of fossil fuels. I can almost guarantee it and Mr Cameron, he knows it.
Woah. Time out.
Did I just go all green on y’all there? Sorry, I apologise, now back to beef.
The Ultimate Burger. BBQ beef burger. It’s the ultimate. No joke. Go.
The Ultimate Burger
98 Tottenham Court Road
Fitzrovia, W1T 4TR
0207 436 5355
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