Phagomania: Burger me!

It’s just ground-up meat stuffed inside a roll, folks. That’s all there is to it. OK, sometimes there’s a bit of cheese involved, but there is a strange aura around the burger that takes it beyond just being a type of sandwich. That strange aura is what we’re going to investigate in this Phagomania special. Brace yourself for owls dressed as Jesus Christ, one man’s attempt to chronicle all the burgers in the land, and some troublesome Frenchmen. 

The Editor's Favourite
We couldn’t do a page about burgers without mentioning personal favourites, and it just so happens that said favourite has a pretty odd story behind it. The weird mythos behind burgers and the bizarre culture they seem to drag with them often means that the best meat is found in the most unexpected places. Even still, ‘converted Christian mission’ probably wouldn’t turn up on the list of places you might expect to find the perfect burger until at least page three or four. 

And converted is the correct word to use, as MEATMission (see what they did there?) in London's charming Hoxton appears to have made the full 180 from lovely cuddly Christianity to insane quasi-Satanist-Illuminati-animal-religion. Just look at that photo. That’s the ceiling – a stained glass collage of owls dressed as Jesus, deers in suits, psychotic bears eating chips, and some weird pyramid-eye thing. The lighting was mad, the word ‘MEAT’ was reproduced in neon in four or five different locations around the room, and the bar appeared to be housed in a garden shed from the set of Mad Max. I was confused, and entertained, and confused. Mainly confused. Then I had my mustard-cooked burger, and it was amazing. 

I could go into detail about juiciness of the meat and correct bun-steaming durations, but you know what a burger tastes like. Imagine that, but turned up to 11, and heavily influenced by some kind of bestial witchcraft. The best burger ever, and it’s very hard to describe because I’ve spent all my time talking about the roof. That’s the world of burgers for you. [Peter Simpson]

The Blogger's Journey
James Vs. Burger (jamesvsburgers.com) was born as a result of a conversation between myself and my girlfriend, Pamela. We were sitting at home one night and in the mood for a good burger. When trying to decide where to go, we turned to Google and were shocked at the complete lack of coverage of Glasgow's burger scene [Editor’s note: our bad!]. We love burgers and have had some of the best in London, New York, Amsterdam, Los Angeles and various other places our travels have taken us, but many of our favourite burgers can only be found in Glasgow. We knew that there were chefs in the city who were producing some of the best burgers we had ever eaten and decided that we wanted to go out and find the best of the best.

It started off as a small hobby that we were doing in our spare time – I'd write the reviews and Pamela would take care of the photography; however, almost overnight we received 5,000 hits, then 10,000, then 25,000 and the number just kept on climbing. In less than a year, we've received more than 350,000 hits and the number continues to grow. People love burgers and I think that the popularity of the site just shows how good the scene in Glasgow really is.

Since starting the site, we've taken our love of burgers to a whole new level. We booked a trip to New York purely for burgers, drove to Manchester just to eat at Almost Famous and then come home again and taken on some of the biggest and baddest burgers that Glasgow has to offer, including the Lebowski's 'Burns Supper Beast' burger. Weighing in at a monstrous 6lbs, it consisted of a giant beef patty topped with a mountain of haggis, salad and whiskey cream sauce and served on a toasted seeded bun with a side of fries. It was the type of burger that shortens lives, but we had to try it. [James Lees]

The Frenchmen's Art
Imagine we meet in the street. You ask us what interesting things I've seen lately, and we tell you that we've been following the work of two French graphic designers who spend their evenings creating complex and surreal pieces of photo-collage using beefburgers as the focal point. You would be within your rights tell us that that shouldn't exist, that we were mad for having dreamt it up, before shuffling us into some kind of padded van.

Well shuffle no more, for Fat and Furious burger is a genuine thing (fatandfuriousburger.com). What's more, it's bloody brilliant. The brainchild of designers Quentin and Thomas, and powered by "one love of fat, and two strong livers," the duo's blog is packed with a host of topical creations and some of the most bizarre food imagery since that scene in Eraserhead with the squirming roast chicken.

Fancy a burger that also celebrates the coming of a new pope? These guys have made it, complete with mitre-style detail and little caviar jewels. What about a burger to commemorate the passing of astronaut Neil Armstrong? There it is, covered in coconut, with cream cheese and a little spaceman on top. A hunting-themed burger, with traditional rustic ingredients, on a placemat that makes the whole thing look like a shotgun-wielding burger-headed monster? Yes. They have one of those. 

The world of burgers is an odd place, but when you’re looking at a 007-inspired sandwich covered in gold leaf, accompanied by an ingredients list stuffed with French puns on Bond titles, it’s hard not to smile in a slightly demented fashion. You might have a point about that padded van. [Lewis Macdonald & Peter Simpson]

To find out more about Quentin and Thomas, Phagomania continues with a full interview with the duo, as we try to find out exactly what they’re up to.