Top 5 French Fries [2017]

French Fries or Chips are deep fried potatoes, known across the whole world. Their first origins take us to Belgium, but they came to be known as French Fries because US President Thomas Jefferson (the first American foodie) came up with the term in the 80s of 1700! French Fries have always been the preferred accompaniment with burgers. This year, we’ve been snooping around a number of restaurants and burger joints, and highly recommend these, to fulfill your Chips cravings:

Just Burger ★★★★½

Not all French Fries are the same. These bagged chips have a high percentage of potato content in them. We presume Just Burger imports these exclusively from some Swedish supplier only they know of. Chef Daniel has managed to get the fries crisped to a level we’ve seldom seen. They are generously seasoned and aren’t greasy, so they compliment a burger nicely. Get an extra sauce dip from a selection of 5 or 6 tasty and exotic flavours and you won’t ever want to touch any other Chips! As of now, these are the undisputed Kings of Fries, and they truly deserve it!

KFC ★★★★

We love them almost as much as the chicken! They are crusty and have an all-crunch edge. They are always dry and appetizing and never limpy or marred by the steam. If there were a world without Just Burger, these would win the Malta French Fry contest, and get an additional award from us, for being consistent across the past years we had the pleasure to eat them!

Badass ★★★

In the past few years, their burgers have become acclaimed all over Malta and garnered an almost-cult following amongst many. But sometimes the quality can be a Hefty Hit or a Miserable Miss, depending on who’s turn is in the kitchen. The same cannot be said for their Sweet Potato Fries, which are always as crispy as crisp can be. They are deliciously sweet, sense-fully salted and the portions are always more than generous. If there’s a magic lamp granting you one wish, that would be a portion of these sweet fries, every single day!

Burger King ★★★½

They are crunchy, precisely salted and slightly less calorific than McDonald’s ones. 1 Medium portion is 328 calories with 15gr of fats. However, BK has managed to better themselves one up in 2017 with their Curly Fries. These fries are even crunchier than the standard ones. And we love the shape! BK should strongly consider having these as an option ALL YEAR ROUND! Get an extra bbq or chili sauce dip, and you’re set in Chips heaven!

The Beer Cave ★★★★

These super crispy fries presumably come from Italy! Chef Marco won’t budge and reveal the secret source or the specific temperature he sets the deep fryers. They are crispy. They are full of flavour. No more adjectives needed, you must try them!

We will bring you more Chips News in the months to come, as restaurants and burger joints up their game, and bring French Fries to a whole new level of awesomeness!

Re-Baptised: The Asparagus Burger

Valletta was declared as a European Capital of Culture. Every Maltese knows that. What not everyone knows, is that here, we have come across one of the most luxury & rich veggie burgers on the whole island!

Our story starts way back 450 years in the past, at the turn of the 16th century, in the palace of the influential Capitano Giacomo de Robertis. De Robertis, who hailed from Bologna, Italy, was employed by the Knights of Malta. Across time, the Palace passed into the possession of some of the wealthiest Maltese families including the Testaferratas and the Marquis Cassar Desain. It was turned into the Hotel Castille in more modern times. This May, the cellars have been converted into The Beer Cave, a secretive underground bar, that hosts a vast selection of more than 120 craft beers! Just in case the secretive part has piqued your interest, this place is located in Castille square! This basement area used to house a traditional bakery, complete with a terracotta oven, an old mill driven by a donkey and the unmissable wine cellar full of valuable bottled grapes.

Like most old buildings in Valletta, the stones were dug out of the bottom of the basement, to create large wells. These walls, arches, and barrel-vaults have proved to be able to withstand sieges, areal bombings, and even earthquakes! While renovating the establishment five months ago, every effort has been made to ensure that The Beer Cave retains all the characteristics of the XVI century palace cellar that makes it such a historical, artistic and architectural gem. The modern bar structure is made from brass and oak, while the barrels you dine and drink on are props from the cult 1977 movie, Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger! Estelle, manager & owner of The Beer Cave is an energetic and bubbly 20-year-old, which has been working in catering for five years, and she has left no stone unturned!

So why did we visit The Beer Cave? For the chilled pilsners, lagers and wheat beers? We are here because we heard rumours and praise on their veggie burger.

First rumour: This is a green burger. Being a veggie burger, we assume you can call this burger green… but the burger is actually green in colour! Chef Marco has fine-tuned his own family recipe to create the bun and has it baked to specification by a local baker. This bun even has a mix of coloured seeds on top, to make it even more unique.

Second rumour: Just like many veggie burgers we have come across, this one has no name! It’s just called veggie burger! We think that this is very unjust, so we are re-baptising this burger as the Asparagus burger!

The burger itself is made of very few components. The patty is a mash of chickpeas, marrow, carrots, spring onions, grated breadcrumbs, and asparagus. Asparagus, often considered as an aristocrat of the plant kingdom, is one of the main ingredients. It commands higher prices than most other vegetables, as a lot of patience and hard work goes into the growing of this unusual perennial crop. On a gram per gram basis, the raw materials used here, are the most expensive we’ve seen in the local veggie burgers scene.

During preparation, salt and pepper are added to the patty, together with a sizzle of olive oil, and it is grilled until it crusts. The consistency of the patty is granular with mushy bits. The taste of asparagus works well with the other vegetables in the mix and is very present with an earthy and fresh flavour. It has no bitter or sour tones, as the plant was rightly picked in it’s prime and hasn’t been overcooked at all. A lot of thought has gone into the blending of the vegetables, and Chef Marco has done a stellar job here. Marco manages the whole kitchen on his own two hands. He hails from Alto Adige in Trentino, a region of Northern Italy, surrounded by mountains. He has been living in Malta for 18 years, and can speak Maltese too! During his years in Malta, Marco worked in a number of popular restaurants and hotels, before landing at The Beer Cave, where he has devised many Italian flavoured entrées and main dishes.

There is no sauce in this burger, just the green bun, the asparagus patty, 2 slices of tomatoes and ruccola. The bread to vegetable ratio tends to favour the bread part. One fix we came up with as an afterthought, would be to ask for a double patty version! Would you dare do that?!

No burger is complete without fries, and Marco has managed to captivate our attention with his special super crispy fries! He won’t budge and reveal the secret moves that push these chips to the top 5 hit list of the crunchiest fries ever! We presume it’s a unique brand of potatoes he gets from some Italian supplier, and the specific temperature he sets the deep fryers. He won’t tell, so if you love crispy fries, you need to experience these in person!

Special Edition: Pink October Burger

What’s Pink for one whole month, and has some green, some red, some yellow and blue?
It’s the burger of the month that Just Burger in Sliema has just come up with!

We’ve seen banks and Castille lighted fuchsia and pedestrian crossings painted pink, all for breast cancer awareness month.
And now we have a Burger too.

This October burger has four main elements. At the very base, there is a very generous portion of Rocket salad. This is the only vegetable ingredient. These dark, green leaves have a peppery taste and add some crunchiness to the whole burger. At the epicenter of every Just Burger, there’s always the beef patty. No matter what other ingredients are on top or beneath, the 140g Angus Beef patty is always the star. The hand-formed patty has a thick crust, singed with char. The beef is always juicy, whatever temperate you ask for, so it’s no wonder it lands a beefy punch to the overall flavour. 

The patty is crowned by Brie, crusted in golden panko crumbs. Brie is a soft cheese that has origins in France. It’s also referred to as the queen of cheeses, in some culinary circles, as it’s used in a multitude of recipes, even desserts. The cheese is covered with a crispy panko shell, deep fried, so it envelopes the melting Brie. Panko is generally flakier than regular breadcrumbs, so it absorbs less oil than standard breading. Anything tangy & acidic goes very well with the full flavour of Brie. This is why we have a serving of spicy blueberry jam on the very top of this burger. Just Burger wanted to add some antioxidants in the name of Pink October, so they made the jam themselves, with a blueberry reduction and some spice for good measure.

All the elements remind us of a well-balanced charcuterie board, between a bun… and they favourably taste mostly gratifying too. We miss a bit of balsamic in the mix, but you can get an extra portion of sauce from a selection of 5 or 6, to fix that. Indeed these sauces are so tasty that everyone should use them in the burger itself, and not as dips for fries!

While some less-adventurous, might envision the combination of blueberries, cheese, and beef as a little atypical, it does work, as it’s part sweet, part tangy and downright delicious! And that’s why if you want to sport a pink ribbon and like burgers, your next destination should be Sliema. Keep in mind that this burger will, unfortunately, go away, once October is over, so better make a date in the calendar now.

Something Fishy in Marsascala

Anchor James is an Irish sailor with a temper. Do not cross him when it comes to all things sea, Guinness or fish & chips. When he told us that he has come across the best burger of the sea, just here in Malta, we were a little bit skeptic. Not wanting to test his ire, we set on to investigate. We had no treasure map, just hearsay evidence, and crossed-fingers.

Our first stop, in the long pursue for the Fish Burger, landed us in the small harbour of Marsascala. Here, we came across Uncle Matt’s Kitchen, renown by locals as Summer Nights prior to 2016. In March of 2016, owner Matthew Pace and chef Antoine Bugeja expanded and rebranded the old-time pizzeria & cafeteria, and now run an open kitchen establishment that can host 500 customers. Here is where we found the Union Jack Battered Fish Burger. Is this the one Anchor James has been hailing all along?

The burger itself is not very flashy, but sometimes the simplest approach has the most pleasing outcome. The core of this burger is made from a whole piece of hand-cut fillet of Nile Perch, lightly coated in beer batter. All is contained in a bun together with lettuce, 2 slices of tomatoes and tartar sauce on the side. Does Anchor James know more than we do on this one? We need to delve deeper into the preparation process.

It transpires that the concept behind this burger creation was to turn the worldwide-acclaimed fish & chips, into Burger form. In Britain and Ireland, Cod and Haddock are the most common fish used for fish and chips, however, we’ve seen other white fish being used all over the globe. This table fish is at the base of many popular dishes in this part of the world, indeed part of river Nile flows into our Mediterranean sea. It’s chockfull of Omega 3, and every 100gr of Nile Perch is packed with 20gr of protein, 0 saturated fats, and only 90 calories!

The fish fillet is coated with a batter made from spices, flour, and drenched in Guinness… Now we know that Anchor James would definitely like this one! It’s fried until it’s crispy, and oven cooked until the inside is glimmery white. It has a delicate taste, with a mild flavour along with a firm and flaky texture. The chef has managed to perfectly nail the cooking temperature, as the fish feels fresh and crispy and shreds easily. Even though the crust has been deep-fried it’s not oily or soggy; the cooking process in the oven helps to dissipate and cure the oil. Uncle Matt is very generous with portions as the piece of fish is thick and juicy, just the way we like our burgers. It’s everything anyone hopes a fish burger to be!

Tartar sauce is known to be the ultimate partner for fish and chips. It’s an essential part of any fish dish, just like butter is to bread. Its salty-sour flavour provides the perfect foil for battered fish. The sauce is made in-house and is presented as a side, so you can spread as much as you like. The flavour is dominant with hints of creamy mayonnaise, sour pickles, the acidity of vinegar or lemon, and parsley or some similar peppery herb. The burger is accompanied by crispy French fries or potato wedges. We would say that the wedges had an edge over the fries, but we guess that many will opt for the fries, just to get a taste of the classic fish & chips.

Our hunt for the Fish burger has not yet come to an end, as we’ve been told that there are other treasure spots around the island. In the meantime, if you’re around Marsascala, have an unfulfilled urge, and are indecisive between fish & chips and a burger… now you know that Uncle Matt can fulfill your burger-craves!

In Search of the Italian Burger

Italian cuisine is a worldwide phenomenon. As Mediterraneans, we Maltese adore Italian food. There’s something intrinsically Italian when you think of Pizza, Pasta… Something is missing, in the magical trio of food-glam… it’s our beloved Burger! Rarely have we seen burgers in classic Italian cookbooks. In the past three years though, burger houses have been sprouting all over Rome, Milan, Naples, Florence… The Marina Club at the Valletta Waterfront wants to ride that wave, and are helming their burger menu with a Gourmet edition of an Italian-flavoured burger. To see if it’s as good as small-talk has it, we need to head off to the Waterfront area in Valletta, a collection of 250-year-old warehouses, originally built by Grand Master Pinto during the baroque era.

Part of the area was devastated during World War 2 and was thoroughly restored in recent years. The doors of the renovated buildings were painted with contrasting shades of colours showing off the different types of goods that were once stored in these vaults from another time. Blue ones stored fish, the green was filled with produce, the yellow housed wheat and the red ones were full of wine canisters.

Our burger of the day is locked in Vault 16. The decor at the Marina Club shines of traditional Maltese Regatta, with a hint of Victorian college rowing culture. Here, diners are considered club members and given the gracious British hospitality reminiscent of typical yacht clubs. Renown artists like Gigi D’Alessio and Michael Bolton have dined here during the past year and a half that the brasserie has been open. Chef Oman leads the kitchen, as he has been here from day one. He’s been working in kitchens since he was a youth, so he surely knows the best ingredients to build an Italian burger to impress.

The 200gr beef patty is made from a mix of whole cuts of brisket & chuck. Chuck has a good lean to fat ratio and a well-balanced flavour. It does not make the perfect meat for a burger on its own though, as it’s not that juicy. You need brisket, with its distinct aroma of liver. Brisket is somewhat grainy when ground, so it provides a good texture for the patty. The end result is a juicy and buttery burger, with a soft and airy texture. It has a palatable and robust flavour which we loved a lot.

The brioche bun is spread with truffle mayo which is a mix of egg yolk and olive oil to produce mayo, laden with shaved truffles. Ancient Romans believed that truffles were of divine origin, so it’s no wonder that these underground tubers are a staple in many Italian dishes. This spread provides a layer of slightly garlicky flavour. It’s earthy and deliciously funky! The same goes for Rocket leaves: these have been used in dishes since the Roman times and are extremely popular in Italian cooking. The dark leaves have a peppery taste similar to watercress and add a level of crunchiness to the whole burger.

No Italian burger would deserve its name without the presence of Parma ham. Prosciutto di Parma is made from legs of pork, cured with sea salt. This keeps the meat as sweet-tasting and as supple as possible. The curing process is controlled so that the ham only absorbs enough salt to preserve it. Hence the meat becomes tender, and the distinctive aroma and flavours of the Parma Ham emerge. It also provides the needed salty element in the concoction of ingredients. The ham is grilled to a level of crispiness that we seldom see in burgers that use bacon as a counterpart. Chef Oman gets a full 5 star on nailing this element alone!

Italy and mozzarella are synonymous. The creamy cheese from Southern Italy is adored by many so that it couldn’t go amiss in our burger. Indeed, it has a starring role. This cheese is produced exclusively from whole buffalo milk, which is heated to a low temperature. It is then left to rest for hours until it can be spun into form. Mozzarella di bufala has a stronger taste and smell, so it stands out from the other ingredients. There’s a reason why this kind of mozzarella was used as it’s a great twist on its cheeseburger cousin!

The burger is served with traditional French fries. Maybe a side of deep-fried gnocchi would have made the burger look more Italian all the way! Though, there’s no mistaking the overall Italian influence in what the Marina Club is offering. The real test is in the taste, and this one passes with flying colours. The ingredients are classic and simple, yet they create a well-balanced burger that is a delicious Italian interpretation of the American classic. Our search for the real Italian burger ends here. Our mission is accomplished. We will definitely be back at the Marina Club, especially since we also loved the limy & minty Lemongrass gin & tonic cocktail, which is a house specialty… even if you are not in the mood for burgers you should try this one out.

Wellington: Story of a Beef Burger

Six years ago, while attending a media conference at The Goring Hotel in London, we were discussing the options of starting a Facebook page dedicated to the burgeoning burger scene in Malta. While enjoying one of the specialties of Chef Cooper, the Beef Wellington, little did we know that one day we would see a burger version of the time-honoured English dish.

Just Burger keep working harder at their now-unstoppable trend, to create a memorable burger every month. All their monthly special burgers have two things in common: they taste good, and they are only available for 30 days! This time around, David and the culinary team at Just Burger have engineered a beef Wellington in a bun. We were really intrigued by this premise when we heard the news. Surely, the place of beef Wellington in on a plate, not between two half buns. Or not? We had to drive all the way to Sliema to see for ourselves if the September burger is anything as good as the all-time popular Asian-flavoured burger from last month.

The classic Beef Wellington is generally a seared fillet steak coated with Duxelles (a mixture of mushrooms and onions, sautéed in butter and wine or alcohol, and reduced to a paste), wrapped in puff pastry and finished in the oven. Some gourmet versions are covered in foie gras. The dish is allegedly named after Arthur Wellesley, who rose to national hero level after defeating Napoleon at Waterloo in 1815. Hence he was prized with the title of first Duke of Wellington. He loved a dish of beef tenderloin, mushroom & truffle pate with wine, all cooked inside a pastry closure, which was an already well-sought dish at that time in France, known as Filet de Boeuf en Croute. His English chef initially dubbed the dish as Wellington Steak and accompanied it by one or two sauces. The origins of the name are murky and could be plain hearsay. For all we know, it could well have been named after the town of Wellington in New Zealand! We wish we had a time-machine to confirm all; whatever the case, the crusted beef dish is here to stay!

What David from Just Burger did was take all the main elements of the Wellington and stack them together to create a tower of a burger. At the very base, there is a bed of Duxelles made from finely chopped mushrooms and onions, garlic, truffle paste and seasoned with herbs. It’s different from the thick Duxelles jam of the Wellington, but all the components are there. Fresh baby spinach leaves go on top. They are raw and taste a bit minerally and are the only leafy alkaline ingredient, meant to balance the rest of the burger. Next up is a layer of puff pastry. It’s flaky, light and has a buttery flavour infused with herbs. The golden puff pastry was freshly baked and tastes really crunchy. The pastry is dosed with a portion of chicken gravy, made in-house. The gravy is thick and pasty and brings a salty element in play. It’s a welcome change to the usual mayo/ketchup sauce we find in most burgers. The gravy oozes as soon as you take a bite, flooding the beef in a burst of warm flavour. The weather has just turned a tad colder, making this heavy burger a joy to consume.

The central element of every Just Burger is the beef patty. It’s a signature 140g Angus Beef patty, minced and grilled on the day, in the Just Burger kitchen. The beef is juicy even though we asked for a well-cooked through burger. These guys have erased the word “dry meat” from their vocabulary, and we love that! The beef has a nice dense texture, is not too fatty, and is as tasty as a cut of Angus beef goes. There are two slices of Serrano ham on top. Most classic versions of the Beef Wellington do not feature any kind of ham, but many modern recipes do. This is dry-cured Spanish ham which is similar to Italian Prosciutto but is less fatty and has a more concentrated taste. The ham is crispy and has a pleasant aroma. It also adds a sharp flavor to balance all the richness of the meat. After some thought, we think that this Spanish element was a wise addition.

The burger is topped with another layer of puff pastry and gravy. We foresaw that this would be an open burger, because of the many layers; however, all the ingredients are stacked together in a well thought out way, and the whole burger holds well together, making it easy to bite through all this goodness in a bun. The entire concoction of ingredients is one of the richest and most flavourful burgers we’ve eaten these last few months. Making a Beef Wellington from scratch is a hard task, and turning such a classic into a burger is nothing less than an insane amount of work! So we have to bow at the kitchen team for making an effort to create such a burger, which as far as we know, is a first in Malta. This burger takes everything that’s instinctively pleasurable about eating an Angus burger and racks it up to further heights. If you are only an occasional burger lover, you owe it to yourself to try this burger, at least once in your life. For burger aficionados, you need to consume one or two of these every week, for all September!

Hugo’s Veggie Burger

It’s been two years since Hugo’s Burger Bar opened its doors to Paceville aficionados. It promptly established itself as a niche burger landmark and stole the pole position that McDonald’s held in this territory for so many years. In summer Hugo’s Burgers open until 4 am, so party goers found a new pit-stop for their late night Paceville touring, with the obligatory fries-in-a-cup.

Two months after launching a varied meat-only menu, Hugo’s came up with a vegetable option. Meat, take a back seat, as today is the day to make some room for a new plant-based burger.

Any lover of burgers and vegetables remembers that old school veggie burgers used to rely heavily on soy filling, but not this one. The patty is coated in a batter of panko breadcrumbs, which is lightly fried to make it look and taste crispy. Panko is generally lighter and flakier than regular breadcrumbs, so it absorbs less oil than standard breading. This might be one of the secrets that make this burger alluring to meat eaters. The inside is filled with sweet potato, quinoa, black zucchini, sweet corn, carrots, spring onions, kidney beans, chick peas and coloured peppers. This seems like a whole garden full of fiber, whole grains and legumes inside! We checked, and all the bits are really in there. All the vegetables are sourced from local produce. The vegetables are mashed and blended just enough to create a dough-like patty with a very uniform texture. Even though all the ingredients have been worked out in a patty, the burger still has a hint of the real vegetables inside with an appealing consistency and a hearty flavour.

The bun is your standard brioche bun; it’s fresh, sturdy and does a good job of holding all the burger elements together. It also has the Hugo seal, which emanates a kind of royalty and exclusive feel. The bun is the perfect size for the veggie patty, so full points must go to the chef who engineered this one. Both sides of the bun are covered with a Tzatziki dressing spread, made from yogurt, garlic, mint, and cucumber. Tzatziki is a wise choice here, as it adds a layer of refreshing and mild flavour. We also get some raw mixed leaves and carrot strings on top.

Amidst the crunchy breadcrumbs crust and the mushy inside, this burger has a moderate spicy flavour going on. But above all, the patty is moist and not dried out, like some of the other baked options out there. The mix inside the patty went through a few iterations throughout its lifetime, but we’re very convinced with its current version. There is enough flavour coming from the choice of vegetables inside the patty itself, that other condiments might taste superfluous. The extra raw toppings are there to add texture, and not necessarily taste.

Hugo’s made the right move when they added a veggie option to their menu, almost from the very start, as it provides a pit-stop to bean & zucchini lovers. We don’t know if this burger is going to convert any beef fans, seeing that Hugo’s has so many beef burger options… but you never know!

Rockin’ The Atomic burger

We’re always ecstatic when any restaurant introduces a number of new burgers on their menu. But when Hard Rock Cafe rocks their way with 4 new burgers in one go, our burger-senses go haywire! Since opening its first restaurant in Malta towards the end of 2000, Hard Rock have always kept a consistent quality when it comes to burger food. We had to check them out on day one, which happens to be one August summer day. It’s not your standard Maltese summer day though. It’s one hell of a summer day, or to be more precise, one with a temperature of 43°C, sporting an almost-combustible Lucifer heatwave! The perfect burger to enjoy on this one day must definitely be The Atomic, a concoction of spicy fried onions, hot pepper jack cheese, chillied sriracha sauce and flaming fried jalapenos! That’s a burger name that pays homage to the heat intensity of the Maltese summer of 2017! This burger promises to be hot & fiery and coupled with the outdoor temperature, and we are risking to be reduced to ashes after 3 bites. Or maybe not?

The Atomic burger was conceived in the Las Vegas Hard Rock Cafe kitchens and gets its name from the nuclear testing that goes on at the Nevada national security site, in the middle of the desert. Nevada has seen a good number of bomb & nuclear device testing since the 50s. Let’s see if #MALTAburgers can safely diffuse The Atomic, and get out unscathed.

The first layers on top of the toasted bun are arugula and sriracha mayo. There’s a reason why Hard Rock has put Arugula in this burger. While the paler variety of Arugula leaves have a mild flavour, the darker ones taste more pepperish. It’s a level of pepper any infant can handle, so everyone is safe at this stage. The sriracha sauce tastes of mayonnaise, chilli, vinegar, garlic, lime juice and some soy sauce. This is not the secret recipe that Hard Rock use, it’s our own personal guess work! It’s a good level of spice that welcomes you to what is to come next!

One level up, we find a sliced tomato and the signature beef patty. The tomato provides a tangy kick to brighten up the flavour of the grilled beef. The patty is made from 225gr of Hard Rock’s proprietary blend of certified Angus beef. It’s the same patty used in all Legendary burgers. The temperature is medium, but it’s not of the almost-raw & uncooked-pink variety. The kitchen people have managed to do a well cooked-through patty while keeping the right level of moist, just the way we like it.

The next levels of the burger are the most impetus ones on the hotness scale. There is one whole level of sliced jalapenos, lightly fried in a batter. These peppers have a slight tart flavour that contrasts with the sweetness of what tastes like a beer batter. These jalapenos are the spiciest element of the whole burger. You are either wo/man enough to eat them as they are, or just drop them… which would go against the whole concept of The Atomic! As if that is not enough, the jalapenos are smothered in 2 slices of Pepper Jack cheese, which is a Monterey Jack cheese flavoured with spicy peppers and herbs. You might want to cheat and remove the black pepper dots on the cheese using your cutlery, but the pepper jack only has a light spice to it. Lucidly it’s complimented with the smart sweetness of fried onions that go on top. There’s a whole bunch of them, so they provide a crispy element while making this burger look towery.

You get no onion rings on top of The Atomic. It wouldn’t live up to its name if it were so. Instead, you get 2 whole peppers! They are encrusted in a beer-batter of the same variety of the sliced japaneos, found some levels down. The peppers are more akin of poppers. When it comes to peppers, they can either be lacking in heat and similar to bell peppers or so hot that they create a raging inferno in your mouth. These are rated somewhere in between, and very tolerable to eat as they are! They can be sliced in half, and the seeds scraped away. Why? Green Jalapeno chillies get hotter by age until they turn bright red. The smoother the pepper, the younger and milder it is. We think this is the variety of peppers that Hard Rock are using, as they have a kind heart and a bit of mercy for sensitive tongues. The seeds inside also contain a good level of the hotness. Remove them, and you might even eat 3 in a row without a flinch. Either way, prepare to order 2 or 3 cocktails plus a hose of water because this burger will set the insides of your mouth to hot-mode!

The Atomic has a lot, and some more, going on. It’s made up of a lot of well-thought out components that provide, both sweet and salty elements, with a “tiny” bit of spice. All these ingredients work together and create an experience bursting with flavours that taste over the top but in a beautifully-done concept. The concept goes another extra mile further to what we are accustomed at Hard Rock Cafe. Indeed this time around we also have the option to choose between 3 different varieties of French fries, done in a very artisan way. Each French fry can be paired with a different dipping sauce. Fries option are Chilli Seasoned, Parmesan Romano or Herb & Garlic Fries and can be paired with Chipotle Garlic Ketchup, Garlic Aioli and Chimichurri Mayo sauces respectively. The seasoned chilli fries we tried with The Atomic are crispy and flavourful.

Hard Rock Cafe have come up with a bomb of a burger with The Atomic. It packs enough heat to please fans of spicy food, yet it does not blast your tongue if you have sensitive bud tastes. We’re very intrigued by the new Hard Rock burgers on the block, and we will definitely be back to test run some more.

You Dirty Louisiana!

When it comes to a quick burger meal of chicken, only two places tick all the boxes. In our books, the chicken has to be moist on the inside and crisp on the outside, the price has to be affordable, and the service has to be quick and efficient. Give us dry chicken, and we will hate you for eternity! The team at KFC in Gzira have been consistent throughout the years, and that leaves us no choice but to love their chicken burgers!

So when we heard of their new burger, The Dirty Louisiana, we literally ran all the way from the office to Gzira (15 minutes!) to listen to what’s all this fuss with this Dirty talking from this Louisiana girl. It turns out that the Dirty bit in the name is due to its overload of 3 different types of sauces. So the burger is very saucy. And according to language slang, saucy = moderately dirty!

The burger is a mixture of the original recipe fillet, smothered in 3 sauces and joined by two layers of cheese, three pickles, and a hash brown. This configuration is working out successfully for KFC, as we have noticed variants of it in their past burgers. When you think of KFC, you want chicken with those 11 specially blended herbs and spices that create the perfect layer of crisp, and that’s what we have at the heart of The Dirty Louisiana; a piece of chicken with a good crunch on the exterior which gives way to a soft interior.

The saucy overload comes from 18g of mayo black pepper sauce, 15g of bbq sauce and 15g of supercharger sauce. This last one was created for those seeking a fiery hot and spicy flavour, and is based on chilli. It’s not “dragon breath” level of fiery, but it’s spicy enough to give a flavourful punch. There’s no doubt that there’s more than enough sauce oozing down the sides. It’s a flavour sensation, as the eight different combinations of these three sauces make every bite taste distinct and peculiar… the brown barbecue sauce tastes rich, the cheese and chilli based supercharger sauce tastes hardcore and the black pepper mayonnaise provides a cooling sensation.

The burger is topped with three slices of pickles, which are slightly sweet and cut through all the other components to hit your palate. This addition was a well thought out move by KFC as the overall burger is quite spicy. The heat stays with you all the way through The Dirty Louisiana, until the very last bite. The mix of textures is spot-on; this burger really seems to have everything going the right way.

The Dirty Louisiana comes in a big box, and it’s one of the largest burgers KFC have come up with to date. It seems that KFC want to give big eaters what they want… big, dirty burgers, not just in the name, but also in size! Aesthetically, the burger looks the part, and it’s built to look big. What you actually get is not too far off from the promotional images of the perfect burger. Whoever put this one together in the back kitchen, should be proud and get an achievement badge.

The burger itself packs 735 calories and 35g of protein. As if that’s not enough protein, the box deal meal comes with a signature KFC chicken piece. Who are we to say no to more chicken!

A word about the KFC fries. We love them almost as much as the chicken! They are crusty and have an all-crunch edge. They are always dry and appetizing and never marred by the steaming of a closed bag. If there ever was a French fry contest, KFC would get an award from us.

The Dirty Louisiana should be proud of itself, to have qualified as one of the bigger and tastier burgers that KFC have made to date. We wish that KFC would keep the ball rolling in this direction, and hit back again with an even grander burger in the weeks to come. In the meantime, we’re off to Gzira to have another one!

WHAT IF there’s a Sweet Quinoa Burger wanting to be eaten by you?

What if we told you that there’s an eatery surrounded by fields and peace, with only one way in and one way out, yet it’s only a 10 minute walk away from central Mdina?
What if this same place grills quality beef such as Argentinian rib eye and New Zealand fillet, yet has a selection of unique vegan dishes?
What if it’s run in-family, with none of the bullshit, one sometimes gets to experience from commercial restaurants?
What if they do 5-star Australian-style Freakshow Milkshake desserts in a jar, and your pet is also welcome for dinner?

Sounds surrealistic for Maltese standards, yet this place does exist. And today we’re heading right there, or more precisely to L-Istazzjon, situated on a street that’s not even named on Google Maps and fringes on the outskirts of Rabat and Mdina. It’s less complicated than it sounds though, as it’s only a short 10-minute walk downhill from Roman Villa in Mdina.

L-Istazzjon is stationed in a splendid location, all on its own, away from the traffic and noise of the busy city, with majestic views of Mdina on one side and the coasting downhill. This place comes with a rich past, that was a significant milestone in Malta’s transport history. The restaurant is housed in what used to be a central railroad station in Malta’s now defunct and only railroad track. The Malta Railway consisted of a single railway line from Valletta to Mdina and operated between 1883 and 1931. After the railway system stopped operating, the station was turned into a Museum and subsequently converted into the Stazzjon Restaurant in 1986. The restaurant featured railway related photos and a model locomotive and was a must-visit stop for tourists in the busy seasons. It closed down in 2011, and in subsequent years a fire damaged a good part of the structure. In February 2016 it was reopened as L-Stazzjon, a brasserie, bistro, and cafe’. It took almost two years to refurbish the structure to modern standards. The new decor is slick and stylish, but the designers have maintained most features of the old building. The new owners have expanded a new outhouse which can either be open in sunny summertime or converted into a closed dining area in winter when it’s too windy. To really appreciate the beauty of the place and the surrounding countryside, you need to sit at the back of the restaurant or by the windows in the newer extended area. One can enjoy a gorgeous view with clean, fresh air in the terrace area, even on rainy days.

Chef Nicolette is the kitchen boss. She does not like the term Chef and prefers to be called Niki. So be it. Niki has worked most of her adult life in kitchens and shows a passion for innovation while keeping food as simple and fresh as mother nature intended. She likes to work with seasonal produce and prefers to source most of the ingredients locally. All this boils down to the burger of the day, the Sweet Quinoa Burger, a wheat-free vegetarian dream burger with a super-grain as the base ingredient. The patty is made from quinoa, sweet potato, chickpeas, lentils, curry, herbs and coconut oil. It’s shallow fried on the grill and baked for a short time in the oven. Quinoa is a protein-packed grain that looks like couscous and is as versatile as rice but has a richer, nuttier flavor than both of them. It contains every amino acid you can think of, and that’s why vegetarians hoard this grain.

The burger itself has a few simple condiments: rucola, lettuce, tomatoes, onion, and cucumbers. All are raw. The patty itself is the hero. Everything is housed in a brioche bun, with a gluten free option available on request. All the raw vegetables bring a crunchy element, and it’s surprisingly tasty. The patty has a slightly soft consistency, most probably because of the sweet potato element. The curry provides a needed kick, a bit more fragrant than we expected, but pleasantly spicy.

We get some sides too. Mixed vegetables, peppers, and some slices of peaches, cultivated in the nearby fields. You also have a choice when it comes to fries. We love sweet potatoes, but the hand cut Maltese potatoes had a good crunch too. We especially enjoyed the cashew & tahini sauce. Tahini is a dense paste made from crushed sesame seeds, mixed with lemon juice and garlic. This traditional Middle Eastern sauce is a dairy-free alternative to our Cream sauce. It’s both flavorful and appetizing.

The Sweet Quinoa burger has managed to keep its head high amongst its beefy peers. If you are vegetarian and love dining out, you now know where to drag your friends and family next! Your meat-eating friends will love you to bits too.

We thought that was the end of our visit to Rabat, but Niki comes in with freshly baked crispy chickpea patties. One day she came up with the recipe in a dream, and they have been a staple on the menu ever since. These were conceived as a starter, but these balls come packed with flavor and some more. Made from a mix of oats, peanuts, sesame & chia seed as a crust, and chickpeas, Arabian spices, mint, and tahini at the very center, we were totally blown away by the palatable and zestful vibe that comes with every bite. These are a true gem, and if Niki can turn these balls into burger patties, she will create the best vegetable burger on the island!

No visit to L-Istazzjon should go by without trying out the Freakshow milk shakes. These decadent Australian inventions are huge freaky shakes topped with piles of cream and chocolate. The Snickers ones are filled with cream, caramel, peanuts, Nutella, vanilla ice-cream, milk, a mini donut and pieces of snickers bar. The Reeses has peanut butter, Nutella, vanilla ice-cream, milk, a mini donut and you guessed it… Reeses! You don’t need to like milkshakes to fall in love with these jars of sugary joy! It’s like drinking Nutella goodness from a jar, but the ice-cream, caramel, nuts, and chocolate add another level of grooviness.

One last thing. L-Istazzjon is one of the few restaurants we know that boasts a pet-friendly environment. Patrons are more than welcome to bring along their pets. Niki loves to prepare dog treats with natural ingredients like beetroot, banana or quinoa, but there’s nothing to stop you from ordering a pulpy steak for your dog! Niki says that animals deserve no less than human patrons, and everyone is welcome at L-Istazzjon. We dare you to turn up at L-Istazzjon with a komodo dragon or a hippopotamus or maybe a pony…