Burger Triumphant
MATUS, VICTORINO
Burger Triumphant Or, requiem for the hot dog BY VICTORINO MATUS Somehow I’d forgotten that summer isn’t truffl e season, which made my recent visit to DB Bistro Moderne in midtown Manhattan...
...It’s a good product—a very damn good product—but it’s not what America is looking for in a burger...
...Burgers appeal to every segment, across any age group or demographic that I know, if you’re doing it by race, if you’re doing it by economics,” says Tom Racosky, founder of the fl edgling Big Buns Gourmet Grill in Arlington, Virginia...
...What never goes out of style...
...The founders had already successfully converted their drive-in that once served barbecue and employed carhops into, according to Ozersky, “a profi t machine that you would turn on in the morning and turn off at night,” thanks to the McDonalds’ Speedee Service System...
...Two years after Boulud’s creation debuted, the Old Homestead, which was the fi rst American restaurant to feature Japanese Kobe beef on its menu, announced it would be selling its own hamburger for the fi rst time in its 140year history: the $41 Kobe burger...
...The stock market is no good...
...the meat of the hamburger’s meaning lies in how it changed the world, and why...
...the same standard of cleanliness protects your food...
...McDonald’s fi nally responded with its Quarter Pounder in 1972 for 53 cents...
...then hang it up a Chimney, and smoke it with Saw-dust for a Week or ten Days...
...Adds Ozersky: “It was in the concept of cooperative partnership between the company and its franchisees that tapped into the boundless economic energies of the postwar years and helped McDonald’s to take its place at the center of American commercial culture...
...In a company newsletter from 1926, Ingram stated, “The day of the dirty, greasy hamburger is past...
...Other restaurants then joined the fray, the most recent being the Wall Street Burger Shoppe, which features a $175 hamburger complete with foie gras, black truffl e shavings, and gold leaf fl akes...
...The menu was shortened and the food preparation resembled an assembly line (involving six-foot griddles, precision condiment pumps, and a heat bar to keep the sandwiches warm...
...But why...
...In the 1950s and early ’60s hamburgers were only 15 cents, French fried potatoes were 10 cents, and milk shakes were 20 cents...
...It was called the Whopper, created by James McLamore, cofounder of Insta-Burger King (later Burger King) in 1957, and it was larger than anything on McDonald’s menu— a quarter-pound of fl ame-broiled beef...
...To this day the debate remains unresolved, but one thing was certain: The hamburger’s image would change from a poor person’s food to everyone’s favorite meal thanks largely to Walter Anderson, a former fry cook, and his real estate agent, Edgar Waldo “Billy” Ingram...
...They are very good boiled in Peas Porridge, and roasted with toasted Bread under it, or in an Amlet...
...Gas prices are high...
...Louis World’s Fair...
...A regular doughnut is $2, and then you pay $12 for it because it’s the quest to get the best because it’s something you’ve been eating all your life...
...Is it a sizzling disc of goodness, served in a roadside restaurant dense with local lore, or the grim end product of a secret, sinister empire of tormented animals and unspeakable slaughtering practices...
...you are being served on the same kind of counter...
...the coffee you drink is made in accordance with a certain formula...
...replies the Old Homestead’s Marc Sherry...
...The way he sees it, Americans cannot get enough of the hamburger precisely because it is everywhere...
...As much as we want change in this world, we want comfort also...
...Ingram “created the template for all fast-food restaurants in the world,” writes Ozersky...
...And while it is more than a mere chronology of events, the history of the sandwich from its humble origins to its current exalted state is what makes this book vastly entertaining...
...Why not...
...For Josh Ozersky, “Studying [the hamburger] story is one way of studying the country that invented it, and then reinvented it again and again...
...In addition, the owners’ target customers were no longer teenagers but the family—particularly busy postwar mothers...
...Of course, the hamburger’s image hasn’t always shined...
...What do Americans think of when they think of the hamburger...
...And with all the publicity surrounding the two high-priced offerings—Boulud and Sherry both made the rounds on television—the media were now dubbing the affair “The Burger Wars...
...All right, here’s what we’re going to do,” Sherry recalls saying at a staff meeting...
...But is it even a burger...
...In 1916 Anderson opened a hamburger stand in Wichita...
...Without question, the success of McDonald’s can be attributed to Kroc’s willingness to franchise the restaurants...
...It was more about creating a real complex and interesting burger...
...Did you know, for instance, that the fi rst Ronald McDonald clown was played by Willard Scott...
...We want consistency...
...then season it with Pepper, Cloves, Nutmeg, a great Quantity of Garlic cut small, some white Wine Vinegar, some Bay Salt, a Glass of red Wine, and one of Rum...
...Burger Triumphant Or, requiem for the hot dog BY VICTORINO MATUS Somehow I’d forgotten that summer isn’t truffl e season, which made my recent visit to DB Bistro Moderne in midtown Manhattan almost pointless...
...Sherry replies that, in contrast, his Kobe burger “has no gimmicks to it...
...Indeed, it was called White Castle, and while Anderson devoted his time to food innovations, his partner focused on the business...
...On the other hand, the McDonald’s manual left little room for individualism— or what Kroc considered treason...
...That will be the biggest satisfaction I will get—if I can make a burger place in Lyon and the Lyonnais come and eat it...
...We’re going to take the highest, greatest stuff that you can fi nd . . . grind it up, make it into a 20-ounce patty, and send it on out there...
...Boulud calls this a publicity stunt and “a really stupid idea...
...the cups you drink from are identical with thousands of cups that thousands of other people are using at the same moment...
...asks the author, Josh Ozersky...
...When in season, a roughly $150 version is available, with a double portion of black truffl e shavings...
...In 1937, a Glendale, California, restaurateur named Bob Wian created the fi rst double-decker hamburger, which proved a tremendous success...
...hang them in the Air, till they are dry, and they will keep a Year...
...If you can’t sit down and have a great burger, where are we at...
...The escalation both in price and size revealed America’s unconditional love for the hamburger and the near-limitless bounds for burger entrepreneurs—right up to the DB and Kobe burgers...
...The answer can be found in this little book, The Hamburger: A History...
...Luckily, The Hamburger does not devolve into a metaphysical debate...
...He called it the Big Boy (the nickname of a portly six-year-old who worked for him for free food) and the restaurant itself would eventually adopt the moniker...
...White Castle’s Ingram did not, as Ozersky explains, because “he felt [it] would cheapen the White Castle brand...
...But what of the genuine hamburger sandwich...
...mix all these very well together, then take the largest Gut you can fi nd, stuff it very tight...
...Like the DB, the Kobe burger was an enormous hit...
...last year it generated over $1.7 million in sales at the New York location alone...
...Is it cooking or commodity...
...There is no doubt it is an American invention from the late 19th century, although there are competing claims from Wisconsin, New York, Connecticut, and Oklahoma, as well as the 1904 St...
...He compares it to the doughnut: “Someone says to you, ‘I’ve got a doughnut better than any other doughnut you’ve ever had,’ well then it becomes priceless...
...And within the confi nes of this small book, he manages to explain just that, while sprinkling his chapters with fascinating tidbits...
...The funny thing now,” Daniel Boulud tells me, “is that in France, chefs are making burgers all over the place...
...the hamburger you eat is prepared in exactly the same way over a gas fl ame of the same intensity...
...No more shall we be privileged to taste the hamburger at the circuses and carnivals only, for a new system has arisen, the ‘White Castle System.’ ” As a 1932 brochure puts it: When you sit in a White Castle, remember that you are one of several thousands...
...The symbol is just the sizzle...
...Throughout its history, it came to represent (via McDonald’s) American imperialism abroad...
...But still the hamburger fi nds a way to prevail—much like American culture: It may be loathed but it is seemingly unstoppable...
...It sounds feasible until you have to ask the butcher for “the largest Gut you can fi nd...
...In 1969 Dave Thomas started his own hamburger restaurant in Columbus, Ohio, called Wendy’s (after his daughter) and he had the audacity to sell hamburgers for a staggering 55 cents...
...After all, why order the DB burger stuffed with foie gras and braised short ribs marinated in red wine if I can’t also get my fresh shavings of black P?rigord truffl e? (That a preserved truffl e is blended into the meat is beside the point...
...And yet an upstart rival would gain critical success by selling a hamburger for 29 cents...
...An icon of freedom or the quintessence of conformity...
...He stressed not only serving a savory burger with saut?ed onions, ketchup, and mustard (in a custom-made white bun) but also the cleanliness of the establishment, as represented by its spotless fl oors and white walls...
...The ruthless Kroc was known for fi ring employees who chewed gum, wore sideburns, sported mustaches, or drank Manhattans...
...But as Ozersky points out, we are indebted to the franchisees who did break from the system with an occasional innovation, such as Herb Paterson of Santa Barbara (the Egg McMuffi n), Jim Delligatti of Pittsburgh (the Big Mac), and Lou Groen of Cincinnati (the Filet-O-Fish...
...you are sitting on the same kind of stool...
...But in order for Big Boys to proliferate around the country, Wian had to embrace the franchising system...
...Ozersky, the online food editor of New York, traces the hamburger as far back as 1763 in a recipe for what he calls a “proto-hamburger ancestor” in Hannah Glasse’s Art of Cookery, Made Plain and Easy: Take a pound of Beef, mince it very small, with half a Pound of the best Suet...
...only the ‘operators’ under his iron control could be counted upon to uphold the standards of the System...
...By 1961, annual sales totaled $61 million...
...Not to be morbid, but it’s the number one meal [of death row inmates] eaten as their last meal before execution, a hamburger and fries...
...then mix three Quarters of a Pound of Suet cut in large Pieces...
...Victorino Matus is assistant managing editor of THE WEEKLY STANDARD...
...I’ll be the king...
...Going to the movies, Sunday football, Monday night football, the hot dog, afternoon at the ball park, Thanksgiving dinner, the hamburger...
...How did a sandwich once reviled as something unsanitary and purchased outside factories and at carnivals come so far...
...Not so, says Marc Sherry, proprietor of the Old Homestead Steakhouse in lower Manhattan’s meat-packing district...
...This might sound excessive, but the DB is still a magnifi cent creation...
...today, that number soars to $29 billion...
...For me it was not about creating decadence,” insists the celebrity chef...
...Of course, another strong selling point was price...
...The fl avor combination of the sirloin and short ribs is divine—even without the fresh black truffl e. Its inventor, the French chef Daniel Boulud, describes the DB, which weighs nine ounces and is four inches tall, as a “burger for grown-ups...
...It knows no boundaries...
...In 1954, the paper cup and blender salesman visited a San Bernardino hamburger joint and was so impressed by the operation and the loyalty of its customers that he offered to go into partnership with (and later buy out) the owners, brothers Richard and Maurice McDonald...
...There were health concerns for the general population (and specifi cally obese children) and raging debates over animal cruelty and environmental degradation...
...Over time, other burger businesses would arise...
...As you might guess, it depends on who you ask...
...Boulud had the idea for “a fancy French-American burger” in late 2000, and to this day, out of 100 lunchtime customers at DB Bistro Moderne, roughly 80 will order the $32 indulgence...
...On the lighter side, he asks, “What’s classic in your life...
...But neither Ingram nor Wian would be as successful as Ray Kroc...
...In each instance, the larger and more expensive sandwiches proved ever more popular...
...So maybe I should open a little burger place in Lyon, my home town...
...As the author notes, “Ingram understood before anyone else that he was building, not just a hamburger chain, but an identity, what today would be called a brand...
Vol. 14 • September 2008 • No. 3
