Recently Burger King has launched its new ‘Gourmet King’ range. A line-up of two burgers which attempt to break Burger King from its stigma of being a lesser chain, often associated with grimy tiles and being the sole option at a service station... With these additions can Burger King really become a gourmet establishment?
My first thoughts upon looking at the Gourmet offerings were that it seems to hold up with the theory that ‘Brioche bun = gourmet’. The two burgers, ‘Steakhouse Angus’ and ‘Argentinian Angus’ both opt for rocket as opposed to the traditional wet lettuce. The meat seems to be a higher quality 100% Aberdeen Angus beef, which comes from a bigger blacker cow that looks like this:
Betty, the Aberdeen cow, after belittling and cannibalising the whopper cows.
I was also intrigued by the Argentinian Angus. As someone who's never tried Argentinian food, I was sure that Burger King would be as good a place as any to get an authentic taste of the cuisine...
The Steakhouse Angus
This burger was really good. It had a great moistness throughout. The chef clearly evenly distributed the sauces instead of a lazy squirt in the middle. The barbeque, onions and mayonnaise were balanced really well further elevating this burger. The meat was delicious and honestly did taste gourmet.
The steakhouse was a lot better than McDonalds barbeque offerings - like their weak BBQ quarter pounder.
Barbecue is a lifestyle, it's not just a sauce you can squirt into your burger. The Steakhouses' smoky bacon and hit of onions really encapsulate this - and are more of a flavour story than just a packet of Heinz smokey BBQ sauce.
Overall the burger honestly says a lot. It proves that when we look down on someone and put them in a box, they will get clean, insert rocket into themselves and tidy their act up. This burger was really good, absolutely zero criticism can be given.
10/10
The Argentinian
I was really hoping this burger would be bad so that I could have a point of conflict in my Burger King review. However this burger was extremely original and delicious. It was honestly a flavour I've never had before, and the spice was perfectly balanced, with a hit of raw onion to cut through.
Oh and that chimichurri… incredible. It had a surprising depth of flavour with notes of mint and coriander… I was astonished. Did the Burger King employee know what they were doing when they crafted an Argentinian masterpiece? Or is there a caged Michelin starred South American back there... Let the man out and change the whole place to a street food kitchen.
10/10
The chips
I've just received two of the greatest fast food burgers of my life. And this is what you give me for my starter.
Burger King chips get put down a lot. And actually they deserve to be put down more.
No one wants a pale jaundice chip, taken out too early from the deep fryer - aborted by its trusted burger king worker parent.
Personally I often like to eat my chips raw (without the aid of external sauce), but that was an impossible task, they were too dry and had a weird bite to them. Not to mention the salt.
I actually suspect Burger King salt is the same powder I put in my dishwasher, not awful but has a bit of a harsh taste.
Get better chips. Make them Argentinian chips if you have to. 4/10
Overall Consensus - Has Burger King changed?
To answer this question I think we need to start by asking, does Burger King really need to change? Was it ever bad... Have we ever questioned whether we were just seeing it as inferior due to its lack of adaptation brand-wise. It didn’t have flashy touch screens until recently, and the workers often seem to have a social phobic energy. So is the food actually that bad, or maybe we are just eating purely with our eyes and emotions?
What's important is Burger King is trying, Burger King is mixing it up, he's grabbing those brioche buns and luring the middle classes into his van with them. No Burger king will ever have the ‘McDonald’s taste’, that is so distinct. But what it does have is a trashy sort of meat flavour, that I can't help but fall for.
