[Review] The Playboy Club Burger at Salvatore's Bar

I'd been invited to try out the burger at The Playboy Club at Salvatore's Bar, which has undergone a refurbishment and renaissance from it's 'Dining Room' days and their £40 Hef burger, to become Salvatore's Bar, ostensibly the same restaurant but with a more laid back lounge-feel complete with big armchairs, corner sofas and scatter cushions.

The Playboy Club itself is sitauted in Mayfair in a building of glass and steel on Old Park Lane. Outside, the slowly changing rainbow of neon lights rotate, like an out of town casino, and subtle bunnies are etched onto the windows. It feels out of kilter with its surroundings, and it's grander neighbours on Park Lane. Entry to The Club is via a couple of big bouncers and a plush reception area where several bunnies greet you, kitted out in full ears, tail and leotard. We dumped coats and were ushered through to Salvatore's Bar (open to both members and non-members) to try a selection of items from their new American-themed menu, including the burger... 

[Review] Vivat Bacchus Black Label Burger

Vivat Bacchus is a bit of a city institution. The wine bar slash restaurant opened in Farringdon back in 2003 and whilst run by restaurateurs from New World wine nation South Africa, it takes its inspiration from the Old World with a rustic feel with stripped wooden floors, and an open, airy restaurant.

They've recently put a new burger on their lunch and dinner menu, and so when visiting for a swift lunchtime warmer of red, I decided to give it a Hamburger Me! once over.

[Review] Bukowski Grill burgers at Boxpark Shoreditch

Bukowski Grill is one of those places that's been around for ages, but I've always had better options and somehow never managed to go. It's located in Boxpark in Shoreditch, a retail park made up of fitted out and customised shipping containers situated between Shoreditch, Hoxton and Liverpool Street.

[Review] Stax Diner Carnaby / Kingley Street, London

Stax diner is a new venture from Bea Vo, lauded baker and founder of upmarket bakery Bea's of Bloomsbury.

Ostensibly it's a diner-cum-soul food joint, located upstairs in the relatively newly renovated Kingly Market, between Carnaby Street and Kingly street, and the space is quite fun.

Meat & Shake, Burgers in Tooting

Situated just 300m from Tooting Bec tube station, and directly opposite the most enormous Spice Village I’ve ever seen, is the somewhat incongruous Meat & Shake – the wooden sign, the exposed brickwork, the naked-yet-caged filament lights are in stark contrast to the pop-up stalls and multi-coloured neon of Upper Tooting Road.

 The restaurant has been open since September 2013, however they recently got in touch to ask me to come and try out their menu. They've been on the list for a while, but as it meant travelling down to Tooting, I hadn't found the time to go. Well now I have, and here are my thoughts on the burgers.

Doing the Quadruple Burger Dash at Bar Boulud, One Hyde Park

Bar Boulud, for those who haven't ventured into Knightsbridge recently, is attached to the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, next to the Candy Brother's white elephant luxury development on the corner of Hyde Park. And it's pretty posh, they even have a guy standing outside to open the door for you. 

After a host of diary clashes (mainly mine), I'd organised to dine with Dini (@dolcedini on Twitter), and we agreed to hit all four burgers at once to see how they compared against each other.

6/10 - Jamies, 1 Fleet Place, Holborn Viaduct, London, EC4M 7RA

Location:
Jamie's Wine Bar and Restaurant is set back from the main drag of Holborn 
Viaduct, in the courtyard that takes you to the entrance to the Thameslink station. A favourite city haunt for lovers of fine wine, Jamie's is first and foremost a winebar (and I might add, one that I love as it introduced me to one of the best value Californian wines I have tasted, and 6 of which are now sitting in my wine cellar at home!) Part of a chain of around seven square mile wine bars (and part of the Kornicis company which owns Smollensky's and Henry J Bean's among others), Jamie's Fleet Place has more of an independent feel. 


Our visit took place over a weekday lunchtime, with three dining companions. Three of us ordered the burger, and the fourth plumped for fish and chips. I was very excited with what they had to offer, as I regularly have a glass of wine in the bar, and have shared some of their platters before, which are great.


Price:
Guinness burger with chips, £9.95. Extra toppings (max. 2 - bacon, cheese, jalapeños, onion rings), £1.50.

Presentation:
Delivered on a large wooden board, the burger arrived (lid off) with chips and little pot of coleslaw. The patty looked hand-made, and the cheese was nicely melted over it, the bacon was then perched at a jaunty angle finishing the base off. On the lid of the bun curly lettuce and salad tomato resided under a splash of salad dressing.

6/10 - The Last, Shoe Lane, off Fleet Street, City of London

Location:
Tucked away on Shoe Lane, The Last is a proper City institution, located near the infamous Punch tavern, the Cartoonist and other old school hack pubs. As part of the Ball Brothers network of bars, this one breaks the mold a little with some pumping 'modern' music, a farmhouse kitchen feel complete with stripped wooden tables and chairs, mini potted plastic plant-in-a-bucket, and tea lights on the tables. Menus are thankfully relatively short with some simple, timeless dishes, and a bevy of sharing platters.


Dining with two fellow burgerites (one who'd already had a Byron burger for lunch), we plumped for two burgers and a chicken sandwich - provenance of meat: unknown!

Price:
Bacon and Cheeseburger with chips: £10.50. Caramelised onions £0.50.

Presentation:
Ok. This burger was presented in a do it yourself theme. Lid on one side with big chunk of beef tomato and lettuce, burger patty resting on the bun bottom, glistening resplendent in cheddar and bacon. Chip portion was generous, and the whole thing was finished off with a little pot of burger relish. A solid, if standard, burger presentation.


Toppings:
Bacon, cheddar, and caramelised onions (extra). The bacon was pretty good, a thick tongue of salty bacon, with a high meat to fat ratio was very tasty, likewise the cheddar was flavoursome without overpowering the meat. Caramelised onions were...interestingly bright red and dripping pickle juice, stuffed under the meat patty. Their taste was sharp and rather vinegary, but actually worked quite well in the ensemble.

Meat:
Could do better. I asked for my burger to be cooked medium rare, but the waitress came back to tell me they only cook the meat one way 'all the way through'. I hopefully asked whether that meant it would be pink in the middle, but the response was 'it'll be cooked all the way through'. At this point Douglas Adams' Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy sprang into my mind - you know the bit where the Vogon guard is yelling "Resistance is futile", so I caved in as it was clear this was a non-negotiable. Needless to say the meat was overcooked, which is a shame as it was actually fairly thick, minced beef, as you can see below. Sadly thought the texture and flavour were ruined with the overcooking, and the taste of the meat was pretty homogeneous, and the grey beef, although not dry, was lacking the juice of rarer cooked meat. I've had Morrisons burgers that were similar in texture.

Bun:
What a let down. A slightly stale, un-toasted, cheap-ass sesame seed hamburger bun that looks like it was baked at Asda, and fell down the side of the oven, a week ago. Tasteless, and completely not up to the task, especially with the drippy caramelised onions on the base. Total bun fail.


Plate accessories:
Bloody good chips. Whether it was fresh oil, or double frying, the chips were crisp, and satisfyingly tasty. The relish was also quite good, big chunks of pepper and tomato, and complemented the chips.


Overall rating: 6/10
Not awful but for £11 I expected more. The presentation and toppings were promising, but the essence of any good burger is how the meat and bun combine with the rest of the ingredients to produce an experience. And this experience was less The Times, and much more News of the World...The Last has some work to do to convince me the burger is worth coming back for, but failing that I wouldn't mind trying some of those sharing platters!


A note that The Last have happy hour with 50% off drinks from 5-8pm - my fellow diners (Ant and Stu) and I polished off several bottles of Rioja with our meals for a mere £12 a bottle, now that makes it worth going back...

6/10 - Corney and Barrow, Paternoster Square, City of London

Location: Corney and Barrow is a well known city institution boasting a number of restaurant/bars across the square mile. Corney and Barrow, Paternoster Square branch is predominantly restaurant, and is populated with investment bankers and an army of black-clad waiting staff. 

Price:

£13.50

Presentation:

No photo, sorry, but good presentation. Burger was presented 'bun off' with a thick tongue of bacon hanging out. Top of bun was decorated with some sliced pickle and a couple of red onion rings. Chips and mixed leaf salad filled out the rest of the plate.

Toppings:

Bacon and Cheese. Good sized chunk of bacon, although slightly undercooked (too pink for my liking - who's heard of rare pork?!) Cheese was melted and nicely mature and salty. Add some sliced pickle and a couple of rings of red onion

Bread:

Brioche. Really? While a bit of sugar helps make fast food joint burgers palatable, why oh why would you inflict this on a wonderful rare-breed beef patty. While this blog makes no apologies for reflecting the views of its author, surely you must agree ...bun fail.

Meat:

Gooood. As you'd expect for £13.50, the meat came out rare, juicy and flavoursome, a touch of juice dripping from the patty as I lifted it off the plate. Two words - meat win!

Plate Accessories:

Chips, couldn't finish them (they were not good). Salad, drowned in dressing so left that too - luckily the burger filled me up!

Overall rating: 6/10

To summarise the above for Corney and Barrow, Paternoster Square, it comes down to a great quality, handmade beef patty sadly let down by the poor pairing of a brioche bun, tasteless chips and oily salad. My dining partner plumped for the lamb burger, and that had a bun I was envious of...

6/10 - The Fence, Farringdon Road, London

Location: The Fence is a quasi-pub/restaurant located on Farringdon Road, close to Farringdon Tube station. 

Price:

£9.95

Presentation:

Good, split bun with huge pile of mixed leaf salad, cherry tomato and red onion on one side, handmade beef patty with bacon and cheese on other. Good pile of skin on chunky chips heaped up against the burger.

Toppings:

Bacon and cheese. Generous 'tongue' of bacon (long and thick) covered by a single slice of melted cheddar. Bacon tasty, cheese tasteless. 

Bread:

Not good. Plain bap dusted with flour. Looked good and was slightly toasted so gave the impression of a job well done, but first mouthful confirmed it had been toasted because it was slightly stale. Dry and crumbly, didn't hold the burger and its toppings in place, allowing bits to fall out on each bite...bread fail.

Meat:

Oh dear. While the beef patty was homemade, reference should have been made to the coriander seeds liberally added to the beef. Burger requested rare, came medium-well done.  Meat fail.

Plate Accessories:

Good. Chunky chips with skins still on were crisp on the outside and fluffy on the inside - nice and hot, and flavoursome with the skins on.

Overall rating: 6/10


The Fence is a nice pub/bar, and its terrace is a great place to go in the summer, but sadly their burger has let them down. Cooking to order is such a key part of why I go out for food, if it's done badly that is a real let down. Tasteless cheese and a below-par bun all added to give this lunch a poor 6/10.