The Butcher and the Burger – 1021 W Armitage Ave, Chicago, IL
You can find a burger anywhere – lots of places – fast food joints, bars, gastropubs, chain restaurants, fine dining establishments, and at indie establishments like the Butcher and the Burger. The variety at where you can get a burger makes it difficult to put them against each other, but despite where you get it from, there’s a few common qualities to a great burger.
Pretzel Roll, House patty with Cajun blend, Swiss, Lettuce, Tomato, and Benton’s Smoked Bacon
The first and the most important is the quality of the beef, and that’s where the Butcher and the Burger shines. Al Sternweiler’s house blend of angus beef has an awesome earthy flavor that doesn’t need much else. As far as spices go, you have a variety of choices – from a simple salt and pepper blend, to more flavorful blends like curry-coconut honey, to the extreme ghost-pepper blend. I went with the Cajun blend that added perfect amounts of cayenne to the very flavorful beef.
The second factor in a good burger is the roll, and there’s no better roll that adds to a burger than a pretzel roll (a brioche may come close, but pretzel still wins out IMO). The pretzel roll here is of perfect thickness with hints of butter.
The third component of a good burger is the supporting cast – the cheese, veggie toppings, and sauce. Some places (Longman & Eagle comes to mind) keep it bare bones and simple, others (Kuma’s the obvious one) stack on as the ingredients as high as possible. Many places let you choose your own. I chose here to keep it moderate, adding lettuce, tomato (fairly average), a slice of Swiss (smooth, not too sharp), and Benton’s bacon (thick cut, nice and meaty, you can see sneaking in at the bottom).
And lastly, how all of that comes together can be a bit of an art. Here, the stack was quite high, which made it tough to take the first bite or two, but the roll squashed down a bit, so it became fairly manageable. The combo of the swiss and the thick-cut bacon was the perfect complement to the patty.
Shrimp burger
Sara went with the special shrimp burger on the buttered roll. First time having a shrimp burger, and this worked pretty well. Topped with avocado, tomato and mixed with the house umami glaze, which had a soy flavor with some black sesame seeds mixed in for some texture.
Fries, truffle mayo
The fries here aren’t quite up my alley. Hand cut, skin on, in the same vain as Five Guys, and cooked in lard, so there’s a decent amount of oil, but it definitely adds a pretty strong flavor. The issue was they’re a bit thick and in the end somewhat undercooked. The truffle in the mayo wasn’t overpowering and worked well.
Beignets!
We ended the meal with beignets and some of their house made frozen custard. The beignets were good, but not on the level of Cafe DuMonde in NOLA which they model them after. The custard – raspberry swirl, had more of an ice cream consistency and not overly impressive.
As the name might suggest, the burgers are the highlights here. I recommend keeping it simple – the quality of the patties and the buns shine, and some of the add-ons can cause the price to sneak up if you’re not careful. Definitely interested in trying the grass-fed patty next time, and some of the other patties I’m sure are solid too – the turkey, salmon, and bison burgers all sound interesting.
Till next time!
Choh's Chow 