The Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Cambridge

Aberdeen Angus Burger with Blue Cheese Dressing

I probably shouldn’t be writing this as I still cannot put a finger on my heavy sense of dissatisfaction with the Gourmet Burger Kitchen in Cambridge, UK. However, the food was great and you should go find out for yourself if it’s true.

While you’re there, you should try their onion rings, which in my opinion, are awesome. Of course, if it’s your first time there, there’s a small staring match with the service staff you need to get through before giving up waiting for them to guide you to a table. You just plow through, with the service staff watching you, to an empty table before the service staff deign to come forth and mumble a few words at you.

What I like about the onion rings is their thickness and the way they are cooked just right so that every bite releases the sweet sweet onion bite without being limp. This is when you discover something missing.

That’s of course, after you questioned the service staff, the busboy and the cashier on how to order food at the Gourmet Burger Kitchen. There are two ways: walk up to the counter and order or wait for the service staff to ask if you want anything. You’d die of starvation before the latter happens, so choose the former.

Back to the onion rings, there’s no sauce to go with it is what’s wrong with it. None that is complimentary, I should qualify. Yes, yes, there’s the ketchup but somehow dousing commercial ketchup on onion rings as beautiful as this is like pissing on William Blake’s The Great Red Dragon and the Woman Clothed with Sun.

I felt it needed something better to dip it in, so I approached the service staff, a thickset Italian (or East European) man who looked at me like a Louvre security guard who’s just been asked where the Big Mona Lisa was. Anyway, I spotted a cup of what looked like a Mayo with chives dip on the counter, so I reached out and took it. The man looked panicky when I did that.

After a while, I think after a furious discussion amongst themselves, a girl placed a bill of GBP2.00 saying that it was for the dip. It was OK, considering that a 250ml bottle of Coke costs GBP4 at that place. The mayo dip with chives went perfectly with the onion rings.

Interior - Aberdeen Angus Burger with Blue Cheese Dressing

So how were the burgers? Well, the beef was Aberdeen Angus, so the flavor is more or less guaranteed. I had a blue cheese dressing to go with my burger while my dinner companion had the classic no-frills burger.

Innards - Aberdeen Angus Burger with Blue Cheese Dressing

The burgers at Gourmet Burger Kitchen is great but it is a task and a half to order. The staff is indecisive and lacks training (in English). I asked to snap shots of the burgers frying, they said yes, and as I lifted my camera to shoot, they stopped me. Then they said OK, then they stopped me.

Dinner at the Gourmet Burger Kitchen wasn’t fun.

Posted on 23rd Nov 2009 in English, Food and Drink, Meat, Modern European

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There Are 3 Comments

xiix commented on November 24, 2009 at 10:45 am

Sorry to hear about your horrible experience with GBK but am not surprised. The staff are mostly clueless and mostly East Europeans. You will get the ‘I only clear, I dont serve’ or vice versa inflexible attitude and mentality.

Frankly, I find the burgers so-so and overpriced, like hell yeah, overpriced!

Unfortunately you do not have access to a kitchen during your visit to the UK. If not, you can have Aberdeen Burgers to your hearts contents simply by just buying Aberdeen Angus burger patties from Marks and Spencers or fabulous ones from Waitrose for a quarter of the cost of your abysmal meal at GBK. And those patties are really, really nice!

xiix commented on November 24, 2009 at 10:47 am

I SERIOUSLY hope you didnt leave a tip. Poor service should never ever be tolerated, even in America where it used to be decent has been rather shitty lately. More of an ‘expected tip’ rather than ‘work for it’.

food.recentrunes.com | Looking back in hunger: a review of 2009 commented on January 1, 2010 at 4:13 am

[...] blog was disappointed with a burger joint in Cambridge but was cheered up to no end with a tasting of Jamon Iberico de Bellota. This blog was further [...]

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