Junk vs 7th Street: Who is the new London king of smashburgers?

It’s wide London has fallen successful love with smashburgers — those thin, crispy smashed patties, cooked blistery and hard connected a coagulated top, pressed profoundly into the aboveground to maximise the Maillard reaction. 

This attack to patties is simply a benignant of subject hack of cooking, chemically engineered for deliciousness. The process is the browning of foods which turns amino acids and sugars into melanoidins. Those successful crook person hundreds of compounds which springiness a chiseled acceptable of flavours and aromas. With immoderate foods, it’s not a desirable result. But with smashburgers, each that makes for a meatier mouthful. 

Four Legs astatine the Plimsoll and Manna astatine Arcade were aboriginal smashburger pioneers, with Lagom, Bun & Sum, SMSH BN and the hyped Supernova each attracting legions of frenzied fans, converts from the abdominous patties which marked truthful galore edifice and fast-casual burger menus. 

The 2 latest offerings to get successful municipality are Junk and 7th Street; 2 imports arriving with a hurricane of hype, millions of video views and plentifulness of influencer guff.

The erstwhile is an import from France with the radical operating 4 restaurants successful Paris and a full of 11 joints crossed the channel. The second is simply a cult-followed NYC chain, with 16 restaurants successful New York and others successful Washington D.C. and Long Island. While the pop-up successful London has already closed, the institution is rumoured to beryllium looking for a imperishable tract successful Soho. And so, to chopped done the hype, we enactment them nether the spotlight. Here’s the verdict.

Anyone who has been connected societal media successful the past period volition person seen Junk Burger, the highly hyped Soho spot connected Old Compton Street. The abstraction is minimal, austere even, with buffed stainless alloy and a abbreviated paper that reads similar a database of garment sizes astatine Uniqlo. From tiny to XXL, each enactment indicates the fig of smashed burger patties betwixt the brioche buns: tiny has conscionable one, XXL has a coronary-inducing five. There’s a truffle burger enactment too, and a crispy veggie burger, but really, the size-chart paper is designed for meat-loving types. 

The ample location burger is pleasant enough, the brioche bun gives an overarching level of sweetness to equilibrium the meatiness of those 3 patties which, on the edges, person maintained a meaty crunch. The food is brushed and good melted, but the homemade sauce, portion pleasing, offers lone a mild pickle flavour and doesn’t precisely acceptable my burger-loving bosom soaring. It’s tasty, sure, but worthy the hype? Not quite. 

In mean circumstances, a truffle burger isn’t thing I’d ever recommend. Truffle tends to beryllium an add-on for the involvement of it, and often it’s added with a dense hand. But here, the funk of truffle is truthful mild, I wondered if I'd made immoderate mistake successful ordering. Those concerns were enactment to furniture with my archetypal bite, erstwhile the creamy truffle came to the beforehand of the class. The equilibrium of caramelised onions, truffle and lone having 2 cheese-topped patties resulted successful a acold amended burger; successful fact, astir apt the champion truffle burger I’ve ever had. 

Verdict: Anyone opting for a five-patty smash-burger monster apt needs a consecutive jacket. The truffle burger is the existent victor here. 

While the pop-up successful Soho’s Truffle Burger determination connected Bateman thoroughfare has ended, NYC’s best-loved smashburger radical is seemingly eyeing up a imperishable tract successful London for the adjacent future. Before they do, it’s important to cognize what’s what. The paper consists of less choices, with either the Truffle Burger X 7th Street collab and the classical 7th Street location burger connected connection for the pop-up. In New York, there’s besides a vegan ‘Impossible’ burger with a saccharine murphy bun; the paper is arsenic straightforward arsenic it comes. 

The truffl-ey collaboration burger, the squad hastens to pass me, is made with truffle butter. It’s absurdly truffle-heavy connected the nose, conscionable arsenic you’d expect, and likewise to Junk Burger, 7th Street balances this retired with caramelised onions. The sweetness of that murphy brioche bun and the caramelised onions is simply a batch — you’d request to emotion brioche buns to not find it overwhelming — but the juicy patties with that signature Maillard crisp are undeniably pleasing. Those patties don’t rather present the meatiness and umami needed to counteract the sweetness of the bun, and arsenic the pickles are chopped thinner to let the truffle to travel through, it means sweetness reigns supreme. 

On the classical treble cheeseburger, the perfect equilibrium of meat, sweet, pickle and condiment is achieved. The pickles are chopped thick, guaranteeing a level of briny acidity and crunch that is truthful needed from the acquisition to antagonistic that murphy bun. 7th Street knows elemental is champion and the classical treble patty cheeseburger is precisely that, with crispy shards of caramelised beef poking retired of the tiny burger and the food melting into the nutrient conscionable so. 

Verdict: While the truffle burger collab worked, the standout occurrence is the double-patty cheeseburger with those heavy chopped pickles; impervious that the elemental things successful beingness are best. 

The hype is rife crossed some these burger joints and thoughts of the ‘best’ burger successful town people surface. These spots mightiness not assertion that crown — for my money, Black Bear Burger ever wins that contention — but opt for the truffle burger astatine Junk and, erstwhile they return, the classical treble cheeseburger astatine 7th Street, and you’ll not beryllium disappointed. Overall, a tie, truthful agelong arsenic you take wisely.