At the start of each year, the guys over at the Burger Adventure write up a list of their Top 10 burgers for the year just passed. The guys try to review a different burger each week and, as a result, have tried many burgers both in Australia and overseas over the years.
Two of my favourite burgers in Melbourne, Beatbox Kitchen’s Raph Burger and Rockwell & Sons’ Double Patty Smash made Top 10 Burgers of 2013 list, however the number one spot went to the Merrywell’s signature burger, The Merrywell, for the second year running. I was invited to an event that the Merrywell put on to celebrate their award earlier this month and was keen to see what it was all about.
Head chef Ewart Wardhaugh was on hand to show those that were there how he makes the Merrywell Burger. Unsurprisingly, it’s quite simple – as with anything food related, what is important is the quality of ingredients and technique. In the case of the Merrywell Burger, it’s a beef patty which contains a combination of Black Angus chuck rib meat, Black Angus rump cap meat and beef fat cap, a soft damper bun (buttered on the inside), pickles, Roma tomatoes, iceberg lettuce, white cheddar cheese, bacon and “special sauce”. The Merrywell Burger was very tasty and the star was the beef patty which was thick, juicy, charred on the outside and pink on the inside (they way it should be).
The range of sides that were offered at the event were quite good too. My favourite were the fries which were crispy on the outside and very soft on the inside (another thing that’s so simple to perfect yet so often done wrong), the mac and cheese bites with BBQ sauce, and the very addictive (I was going to use moreish, but I couldn’t bring myself to do so. Let something like that slide, and the next thing you know you’re using the “words” like “learnings” and using “literally” in the completely wrong way. It’s a slippery slope readers) ranch style “sweet and sour” popcorn.
Is the Merrywell Burger Melbourne’s best burger? To be honest once you get to a list such as the Burger Adventure’s Top 10, it’s hard to start ranking. Including the Merrywell Burger, the number of burgers that I’ve tried on the list is 6 and you honestly can’t go wrong with any of them. To my mind, it’s nice to see a place in an area that’s full of tourists, that could get away with average food due to its location, making the effort to do a proper, quality burger.
If you wanted to have a go at making the burger at home, you can download a copy of the recipe card here.
