The first in our series about some of the weird and wonderful burgers out there. The ‘slider’ comes from White Castle, who are generally accepted to be the earliest burger chain in the good ole USA.
Launched in 1921 by Billy Ingram, selling small square hamburgers ‘so easy to eat’ they were dubbed sliders. the idea was you ‘bought em by the sack.’ They were designed to be bought in bulk, more of a bite sized burger than a full on meal.
1921 Slider
Inspired by the burger that started it all, the original White Castle Slider. Caramelised onions, cheddar cheese, tomato, lettuce and pickles.
Holes In The Burgers
One unusual feature of the sliders, are the five holes in the patty. This serves the dual purpose of cooking the pattie quicker, as they are usually piled high in the steamer, and allowing the flavour from the bed of onions they are cooked upon, to permeate throughout the stack.
Chicken and Waffle Slider
They now have a range of different sliders, not only in the typical burger bun, but in between waffles or toast.
This one comes with crispy chicken breast, topped with bacon and sandwiched between two Belgian waffles.
French Toast Slider
Or how about this one, Cinnamon swirl French toast, with egg, American cheese and sausage or smoked bacon.
White castle sliders are considered to be one of the most influential burgers in history, kickstarting an entire fast food industry, along with innovations such as standardised food production across the whole chain, and the kitchen as a production line.
We currently don’t do square, and we don’t do sliders, but if you want a top class gourmet burger then check us out.
Another in our look at Burger chains of the world. This time, in the South American nation of Argentina, famous for Evita Peron, football and trying to take over small British protectorates in the South Atlantic.
Creation in 1974
Alfredo Lowenstein, ex owner of Quickfood, who happened to be the parent company of the renowned Argentine hamburger supplier ‘Paty’ joined forces with the Las Lenas tourist complex to launch Pumper Nic.
In 1975 Pumper Nic became the first franchise organisation in Argentina. They expanded quickly to a total of 70 outlets, and a $60 million annual turnover.
Unfortunately this rapid growth meant they quickly outstripped their ability to supervise the franchisees, leading to wide variance in the quality of food between the different outlets.
Menu
Their signature dish was a sandwich with an egg between the patties called the Mobur. They also promoted their famous ‘Dos Por Uno’ or two for the price of one burgers. Fries were called Frenys. Another prime offering was their Jaque, or ham and cheese sandwich.
New Logo
Their original logo was based upon Burger Kings logo, who as it happened didn’t operate in Argentina at the time. However around the late 80’s Burger King launched into the Argentine market, and a resulting lawsuit led to the company not only changing its logo, but also shortening its name to Pumper.
Into The 90’s
Eventually in 1990, Lowenstein handed the business to his sons Diego and Paula. Sadly they had little interest in continuing the business. Eventually they sold the chain in 1995 and associated themselves with the Wendy’s chain.
The following year, the franchise system collapsed, and the new owners were unable to turn things around. By 1999 Pumper Nic declared bankruptcy, bringing to an end an early Argentine success story.
An oldie, but a goodie. Established over 128 years ago, and claiming to have served the first hamburger in the US. Sadly we can’t verify this, as like most other competing claims, the truth is lost in the mists of time, but given its age, Louis Lunch was certainly amongst the first.
History
Louis Lassen, born in Denmark as Ludvig Lassen in 1865 married Sophia Kurtz, a native of the US. Lassen was a Blacksmith and some time preacher, who ended up selling food from a street cart. Over time he began to add lunch items to his cart. Well, we say cart, but wagon was probably a better description.
Legend has it that one day in 1900, a local businessman dashed into the lunch wagon, exclaiming “Loui, I’m in a rush, stick a meatpuck between two planks and step on it.” Lassen placed a burger puck between two slices of bread and sent the man on his way. Allegedly the first burger was born
In 1917 Lassen took over a building that had been a tannery and remained there until 1975, being forced to make way for development and moving two blocks to 263 Crown Street in New Haven.
The business is today owned by the fourth generation of the family.
Menu
Today the menu consists of ‘The Burger’ which is made from a blend of five cuts of steak then broiled vertically. Accompanied by potato salad, chips and homemade pie. They also use a cheese spread rather than slices.
The patties are broiled on a cast iron vertical gas broiler made in 1898 by the Bridge and Beach Co. and they use a 1929 Savory Radiant Gas Toaster.
Louis’ Lunch ‘It’s My Way Or No Way’
Louis Lunch is famous (Infamous perhaps) for its dislike of ketchup,. In fact asking for ketchup on your burger results in you being ejected from the premises. A no ketchup sign hangs prominently in the restaurant, along with a caption popping up to read “Yale students who try to sneak in ketchup are asked to leave”. The venue is all about the burger, and allows nothing to upstage or detract from it, so no fancy buns or condiments, you get onions, tomato and a squirt of cheese.
Gourmet burgers are one of our main lines nowadays. Despite the campaigns for healthier heating, veganism etc, burgers are still massively popular.
Like most people I have made many a visit to the famous American chains over here, namely McDonalds and Burger King. In fact I am old enough to remember when Wimpy was a massive chain, and truth be told, what I remember of them, their burger was better than either of the USA behemoths.
However there are many other chains or ‘burger joints’ in the US of A. Non at the size of the main two, but some pretty big and expanding. Some of the smaller ones are nowhere near in size, but have massive public followings. We are gonna look at a few of these, their history and menu’s.
Our first contender is the quaintly named In-N-Out Burgers. First launched in the Los Angeles suburb of Baldwin Park California by Harry and Esther Snyder in 1948. The original store was tiny, only some 10ft square. Harry would visit the local wholesalers each morning to pick out the freshest ingredients whilst his wife Esther would take care of the administration and bookkeeping.
The beef patties were made by hand fresh every morning, and quality was a watchword for them from the off.
Drive Through
Harry would work in his garage on a night, after long days of cooking burgers. Later in 1948 he put together a two way voice box allowing his customers to order food without even leaving their cars. This focus on drive through was a mainstay of the companies business model. In fact it wasn’t until restaurant No.21 in 1979 that they even had a sit down section to allow guests to consume their food on the premises.
By 1963 they had grown to the extant that they opened their own processing plant for the burgers, up till then Esther had prepared each patty using a hand press.
By the time Harry Snyder died in 1976, at the age of 63, the chain had grown to 18 restaurants.
Second Generation
Harry’s son 24-year-old Rich Snyder took the reins after his fathers death and expanded the chain rapidly, building the chain to 90 stores over the next 20 years.
Sadly in 1993 whilst returning from opening store No. 93 in Fresno, California, Rich died along with four other passengers when the light aircraft he was in crashed due to being caught in the wake turbulence of a larger aircraft that landed in front of them.
His brother Guy took over and aggressively expanded the company to over 140 locations in six years before dying from an overdose of painkillers.
Esther Snyder died in 2006 at the age of 86 whereupon the presidency passed to Mark Taylor, former VP of operations.
Animal Burgers
They launched their ‘Animal’ burger in 1961, where the beef pattie was fried in a thin layer of mustard, add extra pickles and grilled onions were added.
Protein Burger
Their protein burger, dispenses with the bun and wraps the whole lot in lettuce, for a healthier option.
Flying Dutchman
A real unusual one this, think of taking the burger out of the bun and , well and nothing. That’s what you get, two patties, two slices of cheese (well that yellow stuff the Americans claim is cheese), pickles salad and wrap it in a slice of paper. In N Out have many items on their secret menu. Not on display in the restaurants, but viewable on the website.
In n Out Burgers Crossed Palm Trees
The company tend to have a pair of crossed palm trees at the front of each location. This is allegedly in allusion to Harry Snyder’s favourite movie, It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad World.
Bible Quotes
In keeping with his Christian beliefs, many In n Out Burgers items such as the drinks cups have bible references printed on them.
Take a walk on the wild side. Not your usual beef (now we have nothing against beef, and are very partial to a good juicy beef burger, but beef is a bit, erm vanilla). We now have a range of exotic wild meat burgers.
During the after Christmas part of the year, when our work load drops rapidly for a couple of months. We use the time for maintaining and refreshing our equipment. Improving what we do, and adding new lines to our services.
With the new found spirit of democracy permeating the business. We now hold group sessions to actually discuss things. Truth be told, I still prefer the old system of benevolent dictatorship, but I am co-operating at the minute.
In the interests of bringing you the tastiest burgers possible we undertook a series of ‘tastings’ to check out the potential contenders. Here is a round up of what the butcher told us, and what Emmerson and I thought of the meat.
Now I admit, this one is unusual, I mean, usually its the crocodile doing the eating.
They Said; This one has the look and texture of chicken with a bit of a shellfish taste to it.
Jason Said; This one wasn’t bad, it was more chicken like than beef, but had a faint tang of prawns in the aftertaste. Not my favourite, but edible.
Emmerson Said; Not a big fan, too fishy tasting for me.
Ostrich Burger
Just in case you don’t know, an Ostrich is a bird. Now I know this conjures up images of a robin or something. That’s about as far away as you can get from this bird. Its big. Bloody big in fact, upto 9ft tall in some cases. It is also bloody heavy, weighing as much as 2 adult humans. Oh, and its also bloody fast. Reaching 40m.p.h in bursts and being able to maintain about 35 m.p.h over long distance runs. Makes you wonder how they catch the bloody things.
This one is quite healthy. Well, for meat. It is a red meat (ha, bet you were expecting white like a chicken, which is also a bird). It is lower in fat than beef and high in protein. During the mad cow disease days, or Bovine spongiform encephalopathy to give it its true title (for the record I can actually pronounce that). There were a number of initiatives to replace beef with ostrich, but it seemed to fizzle out after a couple of years.
They Said: A great healthy alternative, low in fat, high in protein and taste delicious
Jason Said; Weird being red meat, cos you really expect a bird to be white. Not bad, similar to beef.
Emmerson Said; I liked this one, not too strong a taste, but different.
Kangaroo Burger
Another iconic animal, hailing from the land down under. I know we all tend to think of them as cute and cuddly, but an Aussie friend tells me they are a real pest. Oh, and they are definitely not cuddly, being heavily muscled and potentially quite dangerous. Personally I voted against this one as it would feel too much like eating Skippy. (If you don’t know who Skippy is, ask your mum, or possibly grandma).
They Said: This one is a very tender, heavily flavoured meat.
Jason Said: I liked this a lot, a strong taste that stood out.
Emmerson Said:The bold earthy flavour definitely puts a bounce in your taste buds.
Wild Boar Burger
This one is another animal, that if you haven’t seen one tends to get associated with a pig. These can be huge. Like, massively huge. Weighing upto around 330kg (about 4 average sized humans). These can be aggressive, are heavily muscled and bloody heavy. There are plenty of documented cases of people being killed by boars.
They Said : A nutty, sweet flavour, but lower in fat than pork.
Jason Said: Another flavoursome meat that stood out.
Emmerson Said: Eatable, but not my favourite.
Now we also have another entry to the menu that has been democratically voted on. I wish to go on record as being dead against this one. But sadly, not everyone is as sensitive and deeply caring as me. This one is the;
Zebra Burger
Poor Ziggy
I think it smacks of cannibalism. We choose an anthropomorphic zebra for our company logo, then decide to eat him.
They Said; “This one has a subtle taste compared to the others”
Emmerson Said : the taste is similar to a beef burger but different , slightly disappointed the burger didn’t have the stripes in.
Jason Said : OH MY GOD! I can’t believe we just ate Ziggy!!!!
Buffalo
Weighing anything upto almost a ton. This is one big chunk of meat. Gawd knows how many burgers is walking around in this image.
They Said; A very health and tasty alternative to beef. The burger is high in nutrients such as protein.
Emmerson Said; Definite liked this, stronger than beef but very similar.
Jason Said; Loved this one, very beef tasting, but a stronger flavour.
If fancy a walk on the wild side and would like to book our Exotic Burgers Service, then check out our burger services.
