A Fancy Burger at Bar Boloud Review

When hunting for the perfect burger there’s always the problem of first defining what we’re after so that we then can rate whether something is perfect according to that criteria. On the top of my mind I can name two distinct categories: the hand held burger and the fancy burger served at proper restaurants meant to be eaten with a knife and fork.

The hand held is the epitome of a burger, if there ever was a competition for burgers (like with chili’s) this would be what the rules stipulated (i.e. buns, dressing, patty, salad, for example) and something that potentially could quite easily be ranked and even worked towards being perfected. The fancy burger is much harder, there’s too much choice and preferences involved but that doesn’t stop everyone and their mom from trying to perfect the burger and cash in on the burger revival among foodies.

Bar Boloud at the Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park is the house bistro and one part of superstar chef Daniel Boloud’s restaurant empire. It’s his first restaurant in Europe (as far as I can tell) and mixes high quality charcuterie, French Bistro classics and American staples. It must be quite popular since they phoned two days in advance to confirm my booking (and it was packed the Friday night we visited) but they had no problem seating us when we arrived 15 minutes before our reservation.

The BB Burger

They have an entire section of the menu devoted to burgers with multiple versions trying to trump the classic with added meat or other ways of making it “more”. Their top of the line burger is simply called the BB Burger, a patty with a slice of foie gras and shredded short rib on top. I didn’t try but it would’ve been impossible to eat with your hands. Not only did it seem very inappropriate at Bar Boloud but it was also way too thick, so per definition it’s a fancy burger.

Perfectly cooked patty of the BB Burger.

Perfectly cooked patty of the BB Burger.

By eating it with knife and fork it actually has more in common with a “normal” plate dish than a burger, due to the way the different parts of it slide around you get a slight variation with each bite. One bite it might be beef patty and salad, the next it’s foie gras and short rib. In this way it actually keeps interesting and new the entire time and you can explore new combinations in a way that I usually do on more complex plated dishes. However, it would all have been in vain had it not been for the fact that the burger is simply spectacular. The patty is thick, meaty and grilled to perfection with the most alluring even pink inside. The foie gras gives a very French twist and the short rib is a clever way of adding barbecue “sauce” with a much better vehicle than a bare dressing would. All in all it’s a very fancy and sophisticated burger for the connoisseur, perhaps the best I’ve had in this genre. Since they nailed all of the basics I guess the same amount of total enjoyment could’ve been had from their basic burger, especially if you grab it properly, but this one is definitely more interesting.

Another of their burgers is the pulled pork on top of the patty, the Piggie, featuring a hot green-chili mayonnaise inside the top bun. The heat from the chili cuts through the richness of the pork in a very good way and provides a very balanced, if somewhat hot, burger. It’s simpler in concept than the BB but very easy to just enjoy.

Classic French string fries was served along with it, the crunch was alright but they had too little fluffiness inside, almost as if they were almost all shell and no inside at all. I think that slightly thicker fries would solve it for them but I guess that then it wouldn’t be as French as it is now.

Burgers: £12-20. Mandarin Oriental Hyde Park, London, UK. Mon-Sat 12-01, Sun 12-22. http://www.barboulud.com/london/