On Saturday, Sophmoricles and I attended the Gothamist-A Hamburger Today “QBQ-BBQ.” As this will no doubt be one of the most-blogged food events of the year, I don’t need to go too terribly in-depth with my coverage, but I will say that Harry’s Water Taxi Beach is a great spot, even if it’s a leap of faith get there (especially with the 7 out of service). I’m sure that when LIC is built up, the layout will make more sense, but for now, with the beach at the far end of a parking lot, nobody stumbles in by accident.
As for the burgers – the elk burger arrived from Moscow, Idaho frozen and, frankly, tasted like it. It was probably a wise decision to cook this one first, and it seemed like most people skipped it, in any case. Having had great buffalo and venison meats before, though, I wasn’t about to pass it up. Alas, though the flavor was intriguing, the after-effects of the freeze and the lean-ness of the meat seem to have conspired to make a less-than-appealing product. I salute Harry and team for thinking out of the box, though.
Both Soph and I skipped the Motz burger – not out of disrespect for Mr. George Motz, guest of honor and active and integral part of the cooking team, but rather out of interest in the last three “specialty” burgers: the “Guber” burger (a recipe from the Wheel Inn in Sedalia, MO), the New Mexico Green Chile/Vermont Cheddar burger, and the Wisconsin butter-burger.
As it stood, we only managed to try the first two of the trifecta before Soph and I had to depart (I to hip-hop karaoke at Southpaw, with special guest star Big Daddy Kane, he to try and catch an express A train back to his uptown headquarters), but I will go out on a limb and declare that the Guber burger deserves to be considered on burger menus outside Missouri. As easy as the preparation is, with heated Peter Pan peanut butter is applied to the patty at a late stage of grilling, and as good as the flavor is, since the peanut taste and the fatty, slightly crusted burger are a match made in sweet-savory heaven, it seems like an easy crowd-pleaser. I’ll be featuring these at the Cape later this summer, no doubt.
The green chile cheeseburger was also pretty fantastic (you had me at the Cabot cheddar, guys), though I had the vague sense that I’d probably eaten something like it before out west. Soph and I agreed that the level of spice was oversold, but I’m a spice freak and he’s a budding medical professional, so perhaps others had different reactions.
I’m sure the butter burger was delicious, too, but we took off after the first three segments of Mr. Motz’s movie had shown. The film looked quite intriguing, actually, and I’ll look forward to seeing it at some future point.
(Special shout out for the fries, by the way. I would have come out to Water Taxi beach just for those – fresh cut skin-on potatoes, golden fried with the perfect amount of salt. Crazy delicious.)
Thanks to Adam, Matty, George, Harry, Jen, and the rest of the AHT-Gothamist-Harry’s team for making this event happen – deliciousness and beautiful views aplenty.
Twenty Bucks A Day 