Annabelle's Bar & Bistro -- San Francisco, CA

68 4th St
San Francisco, CA 94103-3102
415-777-1200
website

Annabelles's Bar & Bistro did not make any lists of great burgers to try in San Francisco. No one suggested that we try it. We did not plan on going there. It was simply close to our location when it was time for lunch, and we were pressed for time.  They were doing a brisk lunch business, but they were able to seat Fat Bruce Lee, our guest, and myself promptly. We ordered a couple of burgers at $13.50 apiece and settled in for 10-minute wait. Once our burgers arrived, it became abundantly apparent why Annabelle's Bar & Bistro was not known/recommended for their cheeseburgers.

The Burger Breakdown...

The Beef: Yawn...1/2 pound patties of pre-ground, 80:20, Niman Ranch Chuck. Super Duper was the only place the we have ever tried that truly made Niman Ranch Chuck work--it generally fell pretty flat. That trend was not bucked at Annabelle's.

• The beef was only mildly beefy in flavor. 
• My burger was peppered with connective tissue.
• The beef had no trace of aging. 
• The burgers were very greasy rather than juicy.

The Seasoning: There was a dash of salt and pepper applied to the exterior of the big, greasy, bland patties. The salt did not compensate for the lack of flavor.

The Sear: The sear from the grill was moderate, and there was even a slight char, but no real flavor or texture was developed. This was also due, in part, to the fact that my burger came out dead Rare rather than the Medium, which I had requested.

The Preparation: The Chuck arrived pre-ground (medium-coarse) and was formed into thick, irregular, 1/2 pound patties. It was cooked on a gas-fired grill. It was not cooked nearly long enough. To top it off, for some reason the patties were placed on the plate prior to being set on the bun. The copious grease from the patties then saturated the exterior of the bottom bun, which made it a greasy mess in the hand.


The Cheese: Yawn....this was ho-hum Tillamook Cheddar. It was bland, rubbery, and it contributed almost nothing but more fat to the dish.

The Bun: The bun came from Italian-French Bakery, and the bun was terrific. It was a burger bun made from Italian bread.....WIN...it was savory, sweet, and just chewy enough! Sadly, the bottom bun was unpleasantly oily to the touch.  So it goes.

The Meat To Bun Ratio: The greasy beef was too much for the superb bun.

The Fries: The house-cut fries were cooked in rice bran oil....these were adequate, but they should have gone an extra 30 seconds in the fryer to get some color on them. The fries did not maintain their crispness, and this was unfortunate considering that was the strong point of rice bran oil.

The Value: I was in a hurry, so I ate half and sent the rest back. $13.50 for a weak burger was too much no matter how big the burger. Quantity rarely trumps quality. The value was poor.

When General Manager, Micah Tell, inquired about the quality of the burgers, I shared my opinions with her. She did agree that the burger was undercooked. In spite of that, the check arrived for the full amount and with a straight face. I called Ms. Tell back to our table, and after a bit of back and forth she grudgingly agreed to adjust the check amount to reflect the half burger that I managed to eat. Her attitude was far more spicy and interesting than the cheeseburgers. It seemed safe to assume that Annabelle's Bar & Bistro did not base its business on repeat customers. The pickles were darn tasty, though.

Burger Review : Pass on the greasy blandness.


Rating...2 Bites

Super Duper -- San Francisco, CA

2304 Market Street, at 16th
San Francisco, CA 94114

415-558-8123

website

Here's what Super Duper posted about themselves on their site. 

"Fast food burgers, slow food values.

At Super Duper, we serve fast food style burgers, fries, and shakes all made with the best ingredients available to us. Our beef is 100% Niman Ranch all natural beef ground fresh each day. Our shakes and cones are made with organic Strauss cream from Petaluma, and our pies and cookies for our sundaes are baked daily in house. We offer a chicken sandwich and a portobella mushroom "burger", and we make our own pickles. All of our packaging is compostable, because we care about our environment just as much as we care about our burgers." 

It had been a mixed bag of burgers in San Francisco, but Super Duper came highly recommended from a reliable source. This was one of those instances where the name was apt. The burgers, and everything else, at Super Duper were, in fact, super duper. This was the best burger that I had tried in San Francisco.

We ordered a couple of burgers at the register and settled in for a 4 minute wait. The burgers come out with blinding speed at Super Duper. A "Mini" burger was anything but mini. It was a 4 ounce burger for $4.50 or $5.00 with cheese. I opted for the California Sharp Cheddar.  The 1/2 pound burger was 2 bucks more.

The Burger Breakdown...

The Beef: This was the usual Niman Ranch 80:20 Chuck. Super Duper demonstrated that it was possible to create a superlative product from Niman Ranch beef. The burgers were JUICY, BEEFY, tender, a little funky, and just plain delicious. This beef tasted nothing like the uninteresting burgers made from that same beef, which we had been bumping into all over town. Perhaps, it was because they took daily delivery of the beef, which was freshly ground by their supplier. Whatever the reason, the expression "bursting with flavor" came to mind.

The Seasoning: This looked like simple sea salt, which they hit both sides of the patty with. The juicy, flavorful beef combined with the coarse flakes of salt to create a perfectly savory combination.

The Sear: WOW! They got an intense, crunchy, flavorful sear onto the burger patty. This was accomplished by cooking it for one minute on each side and otherwise leaving it alone. This was the only properly seared burger that I was able to find in San Francisco.

The Preparation: Luis Flores, Managing Partner of Super Duper, took me on a tour of the small kitchen and showed me the magic in action. The Super Duper burger started its life as a loose ball of coarsely ground Chuck in a refrigerated drawer. Once ordered, the ball of Chuck was placed on an oddly cool flat top. The second the beef hit the high-tech griddle, the surface heated at a remarkable pace. Within seconds the beef was already sizzling. At that point, the ball was smashed to about a 1/3 inch thickness. It was seasoned. It was flipped at the one minute mark, seasoned again, and allowed to cook for an additional minute. While that was happening, a bun was placed in a commercial toaster (a carnival ride for baked goods). The toaster heated the bun throughout and did not require the bun be buttered. The cooked burger was placed on the bun, and the toppings were applied. The even heat within the bun and beef fused the cheese to the patty within a moment. The whole process took less than 3 minutes. This resulted in a juicy burger, which was not greasy. It also created a melt-in-the-mouth, tender bite. The burger came out at just a hair past Medium.


The Cheese: The California Cheddar perfectly complemented the dish. The Cheddar was creamy and just sharp enough to lend its voice to the strong notes of beef, salt, mineral, and funk from the beef. The texture of the cheese was enhanced by the fact that it been melted by the steam coming off both the burger and the bun.

The Bun: This was a bun from La Boulange, and it was specifically made for Super Duper. The perfectly toasted bun was just crisp enough on top, as well. This provided a nice shift in texture as one bit into it. The bun was mild in flavor and took nothing away from the burger. The bun was as moist as a fresh biscuit, but it was dense and firm. The bun was utterly splendid.


The Meat To Ratio: This was perfect, and the last bite was the same as the first.

The Fries: The thin fries came par-cooked and frozen. They were cooked in canola oil to a crisp golden brown and finished with the sea salt. The fries were splendid.

The Toppings: The vegetable toppings that accompanied the cheeseburger were of very high quality. I was impressed at how ripe and flavorful the tomato slices were. Mr. Flores checked in the produce himself.

The Confections: The strawberry shake and the chocolate dipped cone were both ridiculously good and wholesome tasting.

The Value: $5.00 for a spectacular tasting and perfectly prepared burger was tremendous value.

Honestly, I walked into Super Duper with nearly no appetite, and I walked out stuffed, because everything was so good.  Luis Flores shared with me that his philosophy behind Super Duper was to take great ingredients and prepare them simply. A cheeseburger is a remarkably simple thing to prepare well. Super Duper prepared the best burger that I have had in San Francisco. This burger should be on everyone's Top Ten list.  If you liked Roam Artisan Burgers, then you would LOVE Super Duper.

Burger Review : Super Duper made an amazing and honest burger for a great price. You need to try Super Duper.  You need to eat the best burger in San Francisco.

Rating...5 Bites

17AUG11--I took Fat Bruce Lee to the recently opened Super Duper location on Market Street, and it was every bit as good as the burger that I enjoyed several months ago. Super Duper sustained a line of about 7 customers the entire time that we were there, and they kept cranking out meals with a 10-minute wait time. The operation there was tight.

The chicken breast sandwich was also terrific. It was moist, and the chicken had been marinated in an Ancho Chile salsa for about 24 hours. The resulting flavor was complex and extremely satisfying.

Super Duper was also planning on taking over the Johnny Rockets space on Chestnut Street in Cow Hollow. Cow Hollow--congrats on getting the best burgers in the city of San Francisco.

Seriously, they could have named the place Super, Fantastic, Totally Freaking Amazing Burger, and it would not have been exaggeration.

Jollibee -- San Francisco, CA

This one, mercifully, has closed.

Location : Lots of places
Jollibee Website

OK, it has been established that San Francisco has more than its fair share of lousy cheeseburgers, but it seems that they are actively seeking to best the worst by bringing in international competitors.  Enter Jollibee--the Philippines answer to crappy burgers.  Ready...Set...Terrible!

Jollibee was our futile, last ditch effort to find a morsel of burger goodness in San Francisco.  That effort resulted in complete failure.

The Jollibee cheeseburger was mercifully small, but it packed a wallop of crappiness.  Steamed, rubbery, salty, searless--just craptastic.  Oddly, this sliver of crap could not compete with the grinning evil on a bun delivered by Cafe Zuni, though.

It was barely worth reviewing--it was just a cheap, low-quality, unpleasant, highly processed bit of fast food awfulness.

No sear--just gray rubbberyness.

The seasoning was overwhelmingly salty.

The bun was thin and flabby.

The whole thing was a PASS.

Also, the fries sucked, but they weren't as crappy as the fishy mess served up at the Mission Beach Cafe.

What the eff is that little bee smiling about?  The fact that he served you a turd, and you paid 2 bucks for it, that's what.

Burger Review : Weak--do not want.

Rating...1 Bite

Zuni Cafe -- San Francisco, CA

415-552-2522
1658 Market Street
San Francisco, CA 94102
Zuni Cafe Website

It had been a crappy couple of burger days in San Francisco when Tess of the B'Urgervilles and I went to the much lauded Zuni Cafe for their signature, house-ground burgers.  Keep in mind that this cheeseburger was served on GD focaccia, so one can imagine the gustatory hell that we were about to enter.  The burger was 17 bucks, and the cheese (something snooty in the White Cheddar family) was an additional $1.75......dicks.  Ready...Set...Terrible!

The burger arrived and looked fine until it was flipped over to reveal a cool, grill treatment, so it had weak sear marks and a rubbery crust.  The focaccia (rosemary) was oddly lacking both rosemary and the customary, slightly chewy and firm texture--it was more like cornbread.

Bite one--hmmm that's oddly gamy--I wonder if it's just me--looks across table to see similar look of confusion mirrored on dining partner's face.

Bite two--well, that's sort of........fishy tasting and reaching for unpleasant.

Bite three--this is downright unsettling.

Bite four--no, it's just plain off-putting.

Bite five--there was no bite five.

I have failed--I could not choke this one down.  However, I consider myself a survivor of the single worst burger that I have ever tried.  It was a crapcake--and that was actually insulting to cakes of crap everywhere.

The grind was fine as polenta, and the flavor was pure, fishy skank.  It was also remarkably firm, which suggested that they took puréed ground round, added dashinomoto (bonito flakes) or fish food, and an egg--whizzed it up in a food processor while going out back to smoke, and then caught up with an old friend for ten minutes before realizing the mixture was nearly liquefied, and then saying "eff it, let's serve it anyway." The cooked burger ended up being a meatloaf made with Gerber baby food with the flavor of overly "ripe" salmon. I assume that they did not bother trimming the beef deeply enough and handed us a burger made from the bacteria-rich rind of the dry-aged beef.

The mouth feel was ghastly--mealy, vaguely toasted focaccia sandwiching mealy "beef" with a greasy wad of salty cheese.  More sadly, the dubious focaccia dutifully soaked up the fishy drippings to deliver a bite of something resembling a soggy, carp-flavored brownie.

The waitress sheepishly hustled away the plates of 2/3rds consumed burgers and brought us a dessert menu to cleanse our palettes.  The strawberry sorbet was bright, sunny, and bursting with fruit flavor, and the peach meringata dish was a work of genius from the dual perspectives of texture and flavor.  That meant that someone in the Zuni Cafe kitchen was worth a damn, but it certainly was not the guy on the grill.

In all fairness, the burgers were removed from the tab. There were other patrons in the restaurant that were not revolted by similar looking burgers, which suggests that either we got a bad batch or that the other patrons were OK with the food. 

Burger Review : Astonishingly bad. Tee up Destiny's Child's I'm a Survivor, and just walk the other way.  You really, really don't want to know.  I could still taste it 24 hours later.

Rating...1 Bite

Mission Beach Cafe -- San Francisco, CA

1198 Guerrero St
San Francisco, CA 94103
Mission Beach Cafe Website

At the urging of a fellow burger aficionado, Colonel Mustard, myself, and a small army went to Mission Beach Cafe to sample the burger.

Upon entering the restaurant, the smokey smell of BBQ was surely a sign of delicious things to come, right?

The waiter seemed pleased and proud to state that the burger at his cafe was rated #4 in San Francisco.  Who the eff goes around chanting, "We're number 4--We're number 4"?  That's not even good enough to make it to the podium.  Runner-up status is nothing to crow about.

Now take a look at these ingredients.  Maybe the bar was set so high in San Francisco that this assemblage of culinary excellence wasn't enough to make the grade. 

The beef--Prather Ranch--granted, it was pre-ground, but quality, nonetheless
The cheese--aged, Winchester Gouda
The bun--Peppered potato
The tomatoes--heirloom
The fries--Kennebec

This was a surefire recipe for awesomeness--the very best ingredients were sourced, and it would have merely taken a competent effort to assemble the awesome parts into a more awesome whole.

And..........here we go.  It would seem that the theme of the Mission Beach Cafe cheeseburger was Green--Ed Begley, Jr would have been proud.

The Burger Breakdown... 

Desperately seeking beef

• The beef, which was juicy and deliciously seasoned, came out a perfect Med Rare--it even retained some of the aged funk as a front note...........but they cooked it on a cool grill, and that gave us weak grill marks and a rubbery, gray exterior in place of a proper Maillard sear. I attributed this to the energy conservation efforts in the kitchen.  There was no point in making the grill hot and using a bunch of natural gas to cook--that would be been wasteful, and would have required additional energy to cool and/or vent.

Greasy, black grill smear

• The bun was clearly made of recycled Styrofoam, and it was just too bulky for the modest burger. It was also stale and chewy. To add the final insult--rather than toasting it properly on the grill, the kitchen staff wiped it across the grill to create the appearance of grill marks with the blackened grease from the grates--NASTY and BITTER (see photo on right).

Excess bun and a greasy plate

• The fries were obviously cooked in the same oil as some sort of fish, so they tasted nice and........ fishy--I take my Omega-3s, and I prefer not to double up on them while eating fries. They were also clearly re-fried based on the rubbery crust and  sodden texture. Reclaimed oil is best used in cars not in fryers.

• The tomatoes were damned tasty, though.

The "Key Lime Pie"....not so much. It's a fine lemon curd pie, but Key Lime it is not. The used gelatin to set the filling, and it lacked the traditional graham cracker crust.  Ooof.

Burger Review : Meh  Great ingredients are nothing in the face of a concerted effort to minimize their impact.  #4 was probably generous.  Sometimes, the whole is less than sum of its parts.  It is fair to hold out hope for this burger, however.  The beef and seasoning, which are the cornerstone of a great burger, were dead on.

Rating...2 Bites

Balboa Cafe -- San Francisco, CA

3199 Fillmore Street
(at Greenwich)
San Francisco, CA 94123
415-921-3944
website

The Balboa Cafe's site promised the following: "...The elegant bar and interior decor remain relatively untouched, retaining the magic of times gone by, while the menu offers both treasured favorites and savory new dishes. On any given day -- for lunch, brunch, cocktails, or dinner couples, singles, old-timers and newcomers can be found reveling in the joyful din of this San Francisco icon."  Blah, blah, blah---it was a toilet; it reeked of stale booze; it had a movie theater floor stickiness to it.  This did not deter the intrepid Tess of the B'Urgervilles or myself from soldiering on to sample the well-reviewed cheeseburger at Balboa Cafe.

They had a burger, and Gayot.com proclaimed it to be the best thing in that city of vegan self-righteousness.  Sorry, for the grainy pic--the place was very dimly lit (below, there is a great shot of a really awful burger at SFO.).

The burger came out a perfect Med-Rare, and the blood was already soaking into the crusty baguette upon which it was served.  The baguette really worked, because of the texture that it brought to the party. On top of that, the crunch of the crust gave way to something much more yielding as the blood, fats, and other cow juices soaked into it.

The sear was just right on the oval burger--all you Father's Office fans, do not get excited--this burger was NOT an absolute pile of crap--it tasted good.  They hit it with salt and pepper. The beef was well-aged, if not a little (lot) on the oily side.  The burger was, in fact, greasier than the cast of the Jersey Shore, but the unlike that crew, the burger had substance and was enjoyable.

Burger Review : Good enough.

Rating...3 Bites