Burger Brew-Ha

Moo

Somewhere along the way, the hamburger (once a $5 paper-wrapped sog of meat and bun) decided it deserved a PR agent, a sommelier, and a line around the corner.

Today, burgers are no longer food you ate with one hand while driving a stick, they are statements, even events and have names!  So what is it about burgers that has the global restaurant market buzzing, foaming, and charging $38 for ground meat on a buttery bun?  Let’s dig in and preferably with someone else’s credit card.

The Luxury Burger Arms Race

This all started innocently enough. A chef upgraded the beef. Another added brioche. Someone threw truffle aioli on it and whispered “elevated.” Suddenly, the burger was no longer something you ate, it was something you experienced. It now sits on fine dining menus right under the Tomahawk Rib-eye and Bone-in Filet. There’s the $50 Black Label burger crowd. The $75 Wagyu brigade. The $120 “chef’s tasting burger” that arrives cut in half like it just underwent couple’s therapy. And then, of course, the infamous Fleur Burger in Las Vegas that comes with a “vintage” bottle of Bourdeaux and a price tag of $5,000.  At that price point, you’re not paying for beef. You’re paying for the right to say, “It was actually worth it,” while everyone at the table judges you.

Modern burger menus can easily read like Sotheby’s auction catalogs.

• Japanese Wagyu• Dry-aged beef

• Foie gras topping

• Black truffle shaved tableside (always tableside so they can charge you more)

• Gold leaf, because we all should eat metal once in a while.

Somewhere, a cow is rolling its eyes.

And what about the buns. Brioche is now entry-level. Pretzel buns seem so pedestrian. Potato rolls are acceptable but suspicious but now we are seeing milk buns, house-baked sourdough hybrids, or buns that we are told are proofed longer. OK, we’ll wait. All of this so the final product can still drip down your wrist like a toddler’s ice cream cone.

Gastropubs, those joints that serve enormous comfort food favorites along with pitchers of beer, are the worst offenders. They lure you in with Edison bulbs and reclaimed wood, then casually list a $28 burger like that’s just what burgers cost now. Fries? Extra. Cheese? Extra. Bacon? Wayyy extra. Suddenly you’re staring at a $41 lunch and wondering where your life went wrong. And yet, you order it. Because the description said “house-ground blend” and “signature sauce,” and you’re not strong enough to resist.

$25.00 Deconstruction

Like everything else normal, burgers became a thing when Instagram exploded.  Let’s be honest: burgers photograph obscenely well. The melt. The stack. The lettuce hanging just right and then the cross-section reveal. Burgers suddenly became edible influencers. Celebrity chefs jumped right in and quickly hung a shingle on the side of the bun, like Sam the Cooking Guy with his Naughty Sammy, Bobby Flay’s Crunchburger, Danial Boulud’s DB $42.00 offering and Guy Fieri’s bacon-mac and cheese monster. A $14 smashburger doesn’t trend. A $34 Wagyu burger with bone marrow butter and a side of duck-fat fries? That gets likes, saves, reposts, and a caption that says, “Wow, worth it.” The burger has become the most democratic luxury flex available. You don’t need a Birkin. You just need a reservation and a tolerance for sodium.

Because in the end, burgers feel safe. They’re nostalgic, familiar and sometimes the only normal offering on the menu AND they can charge you steakhouse prices.

A $50 burger feels less insane than a $50 chicken breast and usually comes with a cloth napkin.