And so, our epic quest for Oslo's best burger begins!
Gerry and I kicked off our quest with Aftenposten's favourite, Illegal Burger on M酶llergata, a few steps from Youngstorget in the city centre.
It's also a stones throw from my former apartment, but I never found the time to visit. Shocking! But the main reason is I never knew it was there.
There's no huge advertising hoardings, no golden M, no primary colours, no shiny website, you get the point. In fact from the outside it looks like a tiny kebab joint.
Once inside you realise it IS tiny, but this is no kebab house.
It was busy so finding a seat took a careful implementation of a “hover and pounce” strategy, perfected over many a summer in British beer gardens. It's clearly a popular place to grab and run, something I'll definitely do in the future, becuase the burgers were really good!
There was a good selection of聽home-made聽charcoal grilled burgers, all cooked to order and offering pretty good value at 86 kroner each (pretty much bang in the middle of what you'd pay in McDonalds versus what you'd pay in a restaurant).
Varieties included the Hot Mama (BBQ Sauce, Jalapenos, Guacamole) and the Blue Cheese Bacon. Yum!
The fresh and lightly toasted buns were fantastic and did not suffer from soggy syndrome. The meat was juicy and well seasoned. My only real complaint was the size, they were a bit small for my hearty appetite 馃檪
Oh, I also really loved the bespoke graphics on the wrappers and menus!
Over to Gerry!
The place is small, Not too small for a regular food parlor, but certainly small for the size of聽its clientele (then again, it was a specially busy day, so maybe it was just bad luck for us.)
So, the food was quite nice. I mean, really nice. The patty was juicy and the bread held the聽contents well (I particularly dislike buns which crumble or rip after they have gained some聽moisture.)
The burger was of good size, not too big to give my small mouth problems, or to聽small that make me wish for more. Chips were also nice, but I resented not giving ketchup聽to go with them (aioli is tasty, but not my favorite in chips.)
Now, not everything was perfect. As I said, if you don鈥檛 get a seat, standing up in the small聽room could be awkward (Seating outside could be an option in non-windy, non-rainy, non-cold days.)
Also, I noticed there were no condiments readily available for the patrons. No聽doubt you could ask for some more this or that while ordering, though, but be on the聽lookout if you like less mayo, some mayo, etc.
One of the waitresses was of the 鈥渘ot-so-kind鈥� class of people that won鈥檛 apologize if they聽bump into you while waiting tables, or get noticeable upset if you can鈥檛 understand what聽they say because of the loudness of music and the background chatter.
All in all, I would say Illegal Burgers are a great experience if you manage to get yourself a聽table and pick your favorite burger right. Still, I wouldn鈥檛 call them the best burgers in Oslo;聽I am sure other places can be just as good.
So a thumbs up from me, and a thumbs in the middle from Gerry. Up next on our quest to find the city's best burger – the Nighthawk Diner in Grunerl酶kka.
You need some kind of points system for this! Just tossing a few things out there…. Quality of food, quality of service, ambience of burger bar, value for money, etc.
Nei! See the original post… “Many food blogs such as the Canadian site Burger Quest follow a scorecard approach but I can鈥檛 be doing with all that science. Besides, what makes a good burger is more complex than simply adding up a score for the bun, the meat and the service. I can always put up with poor service if the food is worth it! And this is, after all, just a bit of fun.” 馃檪
Awesome! We’ve been dying for good burgers in Oslo. (Just checked the website, and they’re closed for summer. Sommer stengt! But we’ll definitely hit it in August.)
We’ve been finding a few on our travels, a couple more posts in the offing 馃檪