Hold the chee

American chain Cheeburger Cheeburger makes its Canadian debut

This review is the latest chapter in my ongoing quest for Burger Valhalla. Here, my friend and hamburger enthusiast Tess joins me for a foray into the world of Cheeburger Cheeburger, where we hoped to find the favour of the Burger Gods.

Like Five Guys, Cheeburger is a modestly sized American burger chain that enjoys a certain cachet in its homeland—voted best burger in 29 cities, proclaims its U.S. website. It’s first and thus far only location in Canada is downtown, in the upscale Cours Mont-Royal. With pink walls, garish carpets and neon lighting, its decor invokes a 1980s strip mall restaurant trying to be a 1950s diner, and clashes bizarrely with the 1920s architecture of the building in which the restaurant is located.

Cheeburger allows you to build your own burger. You choose your patty size—from a modest 5.5 up to a gargantuan 20 ounces—and how you want it cooked—from medium to well done. You pick a cheese from about 10 varieties. You pick any number of free toppings from a dizzying array of around 30. These include the standards but also some unusual items like pepperoni and, um, peanut butter. (“Does anyone order that not as a joke?” asked a bemused Tess.) Only bacon, sautéed mushrooms and caramelized onions cost extra.

Tess decided to get a “classic” size patty (5.5 oz, $8) done medium. Perhaps longing for the days when she worked at a Tex-Mex restaurant, she requested mozzarella, guacamole, jalapenos, tomato, chopped garlic and onion as toppings. As for myself, being only a semi-serious man, it was clear that the “semi-serious” size patty (7 oz, $10), done medium, was the one for me. I requested a fairly con­ventional assortment of toppings: cheddar cheese, mustard, mayo, lettuce, tomato, onion, pickle and hot banana peppers. To accompany our burgers, we requested a combined basket of Cheeburger’s “famous” fries and equally “famous” onion rings (medium size for $5).

Clearly, the only logical way to wash all this saturated fat down was with more saturated fat, so we ordered milkshakes ($5). We had to confront a staggering list of over 60 flavours, which we were told we could combine in any way we wanted. “Over a million different combinations possible!” crowed the peppy waitress. Dazzled as we were by the mathematical possibilities, Tess and I took a mini­malist approach, opting for one flavour each—she chocolate cherry and I Oreo mint.

Our burgers plus the fries and onion rings arrived some 15–20 minutes after we placed the order—a tad slow given that the restaurant was hardly busy. They must have been standing on the counter for a while, because nothing was particularly warm.

We wasted no time to engage in our analysis, beginning with the patties. Both were a considerably smaller in diameter than the bun, resulting in lopsided burger architecture. Both patties had been cooked far beyond medium—hardly a trace of pink inside—and yet there wasn’t much browning on the outside, which is crucial for flavour. The meat was moist enough, though I found the grind to be a bit fine for my taste. On the toppings front, Tess complained that there was barely a trace of guacamole on her burger. Most of my toppings seemed to have been correctly apportioned, but the vegetables lacked crunch and tasted flat. The buns were average—they resembled those cornmeal speckled D’Italiano brand buns you find at supermarkets.

The onion rings were one of the brighter spots in this otherwise lacklustre meal. They were encased in a nice, light and thin batter. They were, however, a bit oil-laden, suggesting insufficient cooking temperature. The thin cut, skin fries suffered of the same problem. Despite exhibiting a deep brown colour, they failed to be crispy.

The milkshakes were okay—not too heavy, not too sweet. Tess said she would have liked hers to be a bit thicker, but I didn’t mind the consistency. I was however disappointed that the Oreo cook­ies in mine had been completely obliterated. I was hoping to find some of those little chunks of brown cookie and icing that I love so much in Oreo ice cream.

Overall, it would seem the Burger Gods do not smile upon the Cheeburger. And so, the quest continues. ■

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