Soul Burger – Randwick

Bianca: As a recently appointed admin of the Facebook burger fervour group ‘The Fatties Burger Appreciation Society’ or FBAS, I’ve now kicked this burger obsession of mine into overdrive. A recent special floating around the FBAS group saw me at ‘Soul Burger’ in Randwick. My eagerness had me there 5 mins or so before they opened, so Madre and I took a little stroll around the little shopping village and made a few mental notes of a couple of cool cafes and restaurants.

Soul Burgers main point of difference is their rather transparent attitude to the product, each burger is named after the main ingredient or protein e.g. a beef burger is ‘The cow’. So there are no illusions to cloud or sugar coat the consumer’s idea or notion of what they’re going to be eating. I respect and admire this approach. I do love my beef burgers and beef and chicken in general but I also love animals and will happily pay a premium for top quality products that ethically source ingredients.

So basically I can eat my burgers and not feel too badly.

The FBAS special reduced the prices of two burgers on the menu, meaning I just had to get a third…ya know. For “research”.

First up was the ‘Cow’ – grass fed beef, cheese, lettuce, tomato, pickle, mustard aioli, tomato relish $10 ($5 FBAS special).  I then added ‘pasture raised pig (bacon) $3. First impressions were positive and the burger certainly looked the part. The bacon was SUPER crispy as I ordered it, the patty was tasty, seasoned well and cooked to my requested order of medium. The tasty cheese was nice but had no prominent flavour, I would have preferred a sharp cheddar or American cheese, the meltage however, was nice. The Luxe milk buns initially looked dry and hard but rest assured these were soft and fluffy. There were a few minor flaws, firstly in its construction with the lettuce and tomato on the base of the burger. This induced some major slippage, as you may know I’m not really a fan of the crispy water in my burgers so removed it half way through. There was also a really large amount of liquid that seeped out from all the burgers but particularly this one and the mushroom burg, perhaps the beef hadn’t been rested long enough before plopping on the burgerooni. Still, a surprisingly good offering, a strong 4/5 pickles.

Mum went with her usual order of the ‘Chicken’ – marinated free range chicken, lettuce, tomato, lemon-mayo and tomato relish $10. I find chicken burgers majorly snooze worthy but mother seems to enjoy them, the chicken was juicy and tender. She didn’t like the cos lettuce as she found it a little stringy and it pulled away from the burger with each bite. The tomato relish was a hit, she only wished there was more of it. The citrusy mayo also added that creamy touch. A 3.4/5 pickles.

And lastly the ‘Mushroom’ – field mushroom, grilled haloumi, roasted peppers, lettuce, tomato, lemon-mayo and pesto $10 ($5 FBAS special). On visuals alone, this was impressive. A towering behemoth. This was mums favourite of the lot, the mushrooms were plump and very ‘meaty’. Quite a hearty replacement for the beefy goodness. The pesto was a winner, I had a stage where I’d eat chunky Costco pesto with just about anything and everything…they no longer stock it “Where my pesto at guys?”. All the vegetables complemented each-other with the haloumi being at the tippy top of near burger nirvana. It had major flaws though, it was really really wet and it leeched liquid everywhere. Before even attacking this burger I had to place a number of tissues underneath it just to catch-all the liquid before it ruined the bottom bun completely. Perhaps the mushrooms could have done with a bit more cooking to rectify that, my the end of it the buns were a complete write off.  Still a very tasty burger indeed, flaws but a strong 3.8/5 pickles.

Soldiering on for the cause we got a small serving of the ‘Red Fries’ – tangy seasoned thick cut beer battered fries with aioli $4. These had a bit of a chilli kick, crispy and fluffy on the inside. Aioli was nice and creamy which really complimented the heat from the spices. A 4/5 spuds.

All in all I was really happy with the quality of the burgers at Soul Burgers and would happily go back and recommend to people if you’re in and around Randwick.

Bianca