Burger Review #2: The Subi Burger

It was a deceptively pleasant afternoon last Saturday when my beloved grandfather and I ventured down to Subiaco Oval to watch our football team of choice, the mighty West Coast Eagles, take on the pointless Carlton Blues. Little did I know that an evening of pain and anguish awaited me.

No, I'm not talking about the fact that the Eagles only played for half the game, before meekly waving the white flag and getting trampled into the turf by Carlton. And I'm not even talking about the feral, wild-eyed Carlton supporters who all had their team song memorised in their tiny brains (but, unfortunately, not the number of a good dentist).

No, I'm talking about the dreaded 'Subi Burger'.

Neither of these things are true.

APPEARANCE: Well, what can you say? This is the burger you threaten to show your kids when they are acting up. The burger you brandish to repel a charging bear. The kind of burger that can stand in for the Big Bad on an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Yes, it is perhaps the ugliest burger known to mankind. SCORE: 2

This crawls out of your closet at night.

INGREDIENTS: The Subi Burger is presented between a soft, sesame seed bun, not unlike the kind you can buy at your local Coles. You know, mass-produced and loaded with sugar. A thick slice of tomato straddles the thicker wad of meat and spices. Underneath that was a sprinkling of stale lettuce, swimming in a thick pool of mysterious sauce. An underwhelming combination, all up. SCORE: 4

HANDLING: Despite being composed of sub-par ingredients, the Subi Burger held together surprisingly well. Nothing fell out (not there was much to fall out) and there was no dripping of any kind. I imagine the components had plenty of time to congeal while they were sweating together in the bain-marie, their relationships developing over a long period, like a series of Big Brother, but with more charm. SCORE: 8

TASTE: It's amazing what science can do these days. The Subi Burger uncannily resembles a real hamburger, but is mostly recycled footballs and ground hogs anus. The bun was soft and all too sweet. The thick wad of unripe tomato proved a challenge for even my well-muscled jaws. Below that was the burger patty, a pleasant thickness but with an unpleasant taste. If there was more than 40% real meat in that greasy slab I will tear up my West Coast membership (just kidding, I don't have a membership). The lettuce shouldn't have bothered turning up at all, as it went completely unnoticed, and the mayo it was wallowing in tasted like a light version of the biological weapon used in the Big Mac. The whole mass had that awful frozen-defrosted-microwaved flavour to it. The flavour of some bleak, Blade Runner-esque future. SCORE: 3

AFTER EFFECTS: The Subi Burger burned in my stomach like a hot coal. Thankfully the discomfort was short-lived, unlike the shameful exit from Subiaco Oval, past leering hoards of gap-toothed Carlton fans. SCORE: 4

VALUE: Anyone who has ever been to an entertainment venue will know that 'value' is a foreign concept to all who work there. This lump of barely-bun and almost-meat cost me a whopping $6 Australian dollaroos. I barely had enough change to pay off the train guards so they wouldn't beat me to death on the long ride home. SCORE: 2

I will say the Subi Burger gave the Big Mac a good run for its money in the race to the bottom. The patty was far more substantial than Macca's offering, but I'm still not convinced it actually contained any meat. It also boasted a healthy slice of (admittedly chewy) tomato, but sadly no pickles. In the end, its price and god-awful looks dragged it down to the same level.

FINAL SCORE: 4/10

Burger Review #1: The Big Mac

Welcome back to the very first burger review here at BBR. I thought long and hard about what to review first, and decided on, arguably, the most famous burger in the world. Yep, it's the McDonald's Big Mac!

One of the signature products of the McDonalds "restaurant" chain, the Big Mac has been around since the hippy-laden days of the mid-sixties. Fun factoid: Big Mac is also the name of the burger-headed policeman whose continued incompetence has allowed the Hamburglar to continue his crime wave for many decades now!

Let's not waste any more time - on to the review!

APPEARANCE: Perhaps the only "restaurant" where plates and cutlery are looked upon with disdain, the Big Mac was provided to me in a battered cardboard box sitting atop a thick wad of napkins.

The One and Only Big Mac. Thank God.

I'm not sure whether the napkins were for the burger or the box, for both were glistening with a sheen of grease. Undeterred, I pressed on and opened up the box...

As far as the McDonalds marketing folk would have you know, this is what a Big Mac looks like:

Okay. Not too shabby-looking. This, however, is what I was served:

Hmm... a slight difference between the two. One is a tall, proud tower of a burger and icon of the biggest fast food empire in the world. The other a slumped, disshevelled lump wallowing in its own filth. SCORE: 3

INGREDIENTS: Two all beef patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun! Yes, we all know the jingle, but how does it measure up in reality? The two all beef patties were small disks of a greyish, meat-like substance. Any thinner and they'd be transparent. The special sauce was a thick, pale yellow, and had mingled with the copious amounts of limp lettuce and raw onion to create an unholy amalgam not unlike vomit. In fact, this is what I imagine Ronald McDonald spews up after a hard night on the bottle:

It was inside Ronald and now its inside YOU.

I thought I had been stiffed on the pickles, until I spotted one solitary slice trying to make a run for it from one corner of the burger. This delightful combination of ingredients was served within the sesame-seed bun, which included the baffling divider layer that sits in the middle of the burger. Whether this third bun layer is to aid in the stability of the burger or just to act as filler and compensation for the lack of meat, is unclear. I imagine one poor McDonalds worker accidentally ordered way too many bun bottoms than bun tops, and the Big Mac was invented as a solution.

The list of ingredients is quite good, but the quality of said ingredients is beyond disgraceful. SCORE: 3

HANDLING: This is the one area where I thought the Big Mac could score well. Alas, Ronald's signature dish stumbled here as well. As soon as I picked up the burger, half of its lettuce filling spilled out into the box. From there on it was smooth sailing, as the burger can be grasped easily in one hand or two, and the structural integrity was sound. That is until the last few bites, when a dollop of the luminous secret sauce shot out on to my lap. SCORE: 5

TASTE: It only took ten minutes for me to get this burger home from the restaurant, but in that short time it had become stone-cold. The first bite was like sinking my teeth into a cold bun, and then having my mouth injected with acid. The secret sauce is obviously some kind of toxic bioweapon that the government has seen fit to trial on the populace. The burning, stinging sensation as the sauce hit my tongue was a unique experience. As I laboured my way through the burger, I could hardly tell that there was any meat or cheese in there at all. It was just mouthful after mouthful of bun, lettuce, crunchy onion, and slatherings of poison. SCORE: 2

AFTER EFFECTS: Not too bad at first, mainly just a general feeling of unease and impending doom. As time went on, however, the masticated remnants of the Big Mac formed a heavy lump in my gut, torturing me from beyond the grave. I have had worse, however. SCORE: 5

VALUE: The Big Mac by itself costs AUD $4.50, which came as a surprise to me. I had expected maybe $2.95 at the most, but it seems the global financial crisis has hit Ronnie hard. The 'value meal' (with fries and Coke) costs AUD $7.15, so it should really be renamed 'meal'. I still expect my stamps to cost thruppence, though, so maybe I'm old-fashioned. SCORE: 6

In closing, I have no idea how McDonalds has sold so many millions of these burgers. Were they laced with cocaine back in the day? This was a truly harrowing experience, and the only positive I can take from it is that we can only go up in quality from here. Right??

Now, please excuse me while I go purge this burger from my system and make my own 'secret sauce'.

FINAL SCORE: 4/10

Welcome to Brett's Burger Review

Welcome one and all to the proud opening of Brett's Burger Review. I am the titular Brett, and it is my solemn duty to scour the world in search of the ultimate burger. Hamburgers are one of my favourite meals and, because of this, I have become quite picky and selective in my attitude towards what constitutes a great burger.

Each post will subject a hamburger to my in-depth rating system and be scored out of 10 on the following criteria:

APPEARANCE: Your eyes will devour the burger long before your taste buds get a chance, therefore appearance is crucial. A flattened, wrappered burger that doesn't remotely resemble its picture on the advertisement will score poorly, while a neatly plated burger standing tall and proud will do well.

INGREDIENTS: What is actually wedged between those two buns? The right combination of ingredients can make or break a hamburger; more is not always better! This category takes into account the meat patty (the cornerstone of the burger) plus all toppings the chef has seen fit to include. A microwaved patty slathered with dog faeces will score poorly; anything else is a win!

HANDLING: Excuse the sauciness (and excuse that pun!), but a great burger is just like a great pair of breasts: both should be firm, able to be grasped with both hands and have as little leakage as possible. A burger that drips like a torrential downpour, or that must be cut up into smaller portions in order to eat will not score well. A burger you can get your hands and jaws around, without dropping half its ingredients on your lap, will score well.

AFTER-EFFECTS: As any recovering alcoholic will know, a big greasy burger sometimes seems like the perfect way to soak up the night before. And as many burger-chain fans know, sometimes said burger sits in your stomach like a lump of lead and makes you regret ever having been born. This rating takes into account the feeling of fullness and satisfaction after the bad boy has been consumed.

VALUE: Finally, was it all worth it? Monetarily, I mean. Paying $20 for an average burger is not my idea of good value, but paying $10 for a spectacular burger would instantly earn my repeat business.

An Overall score for the burger will then be given, along with a closing summary. You may then rest easy knowing that another hamburger has been through the strictest rating system known to man.

We here at BBR are happy to post guest reviews, so if you happen to sample a particularly delectable (or disgusting) hamburger, let us know about it!

Until next time, keep on burgering!

- Burger-Eating Brett