A short walk from my house is a little cobbled street called Ashton Lane. It's very student-y - which is in no way a bad thing... It's full of bars, a couple of restaurants, a cocktail bar that has live sexy dancing (we found that out the hard way), a hot dog stand selling awful hot dogs, a cool cinema where you can hire a sofa, and a fabulous place called Ketchup. It's a burger bar (Ketchup Loves Burgers!) selling almost every kind of burger you can imagine. Literally. They had many many many beef ones with all sorts of combinations of toppings, fish, lamb, a whole lot of chicken, and a few 'special' ones - venison, tuna, Kobe beef. Their normal beef is sourced locally and they can trace the family tree of all the livestock, which is nice.
Much to my excitement, we were seated right by the kitchen.
We had to wait about five minutes for our table, but after we sat down, people were being turned away, despite the fact that it was nearly 3.00 in the afternoon. It's clearly very popular - the burgers aren't cheap but they have a 2for1 student deal which seems to be permanently on offer.
It was very busy, so it took a while for someone to come and take our order. There didn't seem to be enough serving staff, but our food came really very quickly after we had ordered. I got a Bacon Cheeseburger; I was going to go for something a little fancier, but I thought as it was my first time there (and I will be back) I'd see what their basics were like.
'...garnished with two thick slices of sizzling, hickory-smoked bacon, mature Scottish cheddar, crisp lettuce, fresh tomato, pickles, and chipotle mayo.'
There's a little (slightly poncy) note on the menu that says all their burgers are served medium, and to ask if you wanted it more well done. I have to say, I've always been a 'cook-my-meat-until-it's-like-a-plank' sort of a girl, so I thought this would be a good place to start manning up. But when it came, it was just the juicy side of well done. I was a bit disappointed, to be honest.
On the other hand, everything was delicious. And I mean, delicious. The tomatoes and lettuce were a bit lack-lustre, but much better than most. The cheese added a really good cheesy flavour, unlike most cheeseburgers. The bacon wasn't very crispy, but it was nice; same with the pickles. Now I'm writing about it, it doesn't seem like it was very good - especially since I'm dissecting it all to bits. But I swear, I left with no other feeling than 'That was awesome.' I suppose it all just worked together really well - and the chipotle mayo added a really nice gentle heat - though it was disappointingly unsmoky. The burger was seriously juicy, the bun was good - it was just delicious.
We also got some chips and onion rings:
I didn't like the chips. They were too squashy, and I don't like fat chips anyway. The onion rings were big juicy rings of onion, deep-fried in a super-ly crisp batter. Mmmmmmmmm.
It was yummy. And with the 2for1 deal, it was only about £7 each. We were so stuffed, we didn't finish the onion rings or the little pots of coleslaw that come with each burger. I couldn't even finish my burger; there was a little piece about as big as a matchbox sitting there taunting me.
Sadly, we were too full for puddings. But here's a picture of one anyway
They even have their own - yes, you guessed it - ketchup.
You can buy it by the bottle. It was nice, actually - like ketchup but spicy and a lot more tomatoey.
Anyway, it was a lovely, lovely burger bar - the burgers were excellent, the concept is very nice - they even serve milkshakes in milk bottles - and with the student offer it was certainly very cheap. I'm surprised I've only been now, and I'll definitely be back.
So, on a scale of one to yummy - about a 17!
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