Mi Mero Mole’s Nick Zukin—the gourmet, the gourmand, the gastronome, the legend—put his prodigious culinary imagination on overdrive and came up with what might be Burger Week’s biggest, ballsiest, most out-there fantasy burger yet. This burger would cost about $15 on any normal day, but for you, gentle soul, this cornucopia is just $5. He took some rather compromising photos of me trying to get my mouth around the thing last week…take a look at it (I’m reserving the right not to publish his pics) and see what I mean:
- Chris Onstad
- Mi Mero Mole’s $5 burger. Chips and margarita not included.
Sonoran Chile Relleno Burger: Chorizo patty on brioche bun with refried black beans, guacamole, pickled red onions, especial sauce, and bacon-wrapped hatch chile relleno. Available after 2pm at Chinatown location only.
This thing is amazing, and despite its looks, it absolutely works. The flavors are huge but balanced, popping in and out throughout the experience. An initial tang of sauce and tender, flame-roasted chile gives way to bacon and chorizo, which glides beautifully into the rich, lasting flavor of smooth black beans. He might break even on the burger, but he’s going to lose money on napkins, so be a mensch and order a drink, chips, whatever.
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Read all the Burger Week details here!
The Portland Mercury would like to thank our partners once again this year, world-class meat provider Nicky USA, Widmer Brothers Brewing, and Jim Beam Kentucky Fire!
Important reminder: THESE BURGERS WILL SELL OUT. Last year’s restaurants had one main issue with the event last year, and that was people getting angry and rude when they found out that they are part of a reality where restaurants that are getting slammed run out of food. We have better forecasting numbers this year, but please: go early, be kind, get a drink, and, most importantly, a $5 burger is a privilege, not a right. You know what someone who acts like a horse’s ass is? Hint: It has two enormous buttocks and large poops fall out of the middle.
They had to stop selling 40 minutes in today due to being overwhelmed. I don’t mean “500 people showed up at once” overwhelmed, merely “10 people are in line and trying to order this” overwhelmed. They didn’t have an accurate count on how many orders out, how many prepped ingredients they had, and it sounded like they were out of a few things (like buns.)
Burger tasted fantastic though. But not gonna be surprised if they take a break tomorrow, or pull out entirely. It was blindingly obvious that they were woefully unprepared for the onslaught of increased volume that Burger Week brings.
Hope they stay in…they were one that I definitely wanted to try.
Andrew, I’m glad you liked the burger, but come on. That’s baloney. We had a line out the door at 2pm. We had purposefully decided NOT to sell the burger at lunch hoping to avoid just this because we heard the horror stories. We had a full ticket board of burgers by 2:15pm, almost nothing else ordered (those that did order off our normal menu got their food quite quickly). Two o’clock is not traditionally a busy time of day in any restaurant. It’s a complicated burger and we’re not a burger place. We don’t have the equipment or setup to do hundreds of burgers, like the dedicated burger places. Even if our staff was perfectly prepared and trained, there is just so much that our kitchen can handle at once. And there’s only so much we can even prep while still doing our normal prep for our normal customers. We lose money on each of these burgers sold.
I talked to someone today whose friends run a restaurant that participated last year. It’s comments like these and worse that made them quit after the first day and refuse to do it again. (It’s also why you see so many “boring” burgers out there — because there’s just not much benefit in going out of your way for customers who will damn you if you do and damn you if you don’t.)
One of the best burgers I have ever had, I hope you continue to keep this on your menu. Fantastic, I got there at 1:40 yesterday and was 2nd in line.