The Ultimate Regional Burger Road Trip with a Burger Scholar | The Burger Show

steamed ham army where's my where my steamed ham army hey my steamed ham army at [Music] burger scholar George remotes is what you call a road warrior he's logged thousands of miles in his car chasing down burgers all over the country and today I'm lucky enough to be his co-pilot and he takes me through one of the most important roots in hamburger history in the most unlikely of places Central Connecticut it's home to some of the most unusual burgers on the planet as well as the birthplace of the original hamburger barely any clouds in the sky the sun's out awesome day for a road trip I do this all the time and I love it I I feel the most comfortable in my car driving to eat burgers now that we're on this like burger quest I mean I'm with the man in Connecticut in Connecticut and your license plate even says hamburger on it hey why are we here Connecticut is a very unique place for hamburgers because it really was the birthplace of manufacturing in America Connecticut has a very very strong hamburger working at Woking man food burgers make sense first makes sense you've done this before but you're showing me where it all started it what started but also where how and why it started here well how does this you know hamburger culture proliferate in a place that is you would normally think of you think of New York City I think of California think of Chicago you would know I think of Connecticut but people definitely should today we're going to Louie's lunch and New Haven Connecticut Ted's restaurant in Meriden Connecticut which is the home of the steamed cheeseburger which will be and then of course Shady Glen it's a mid-century diner that looks like it is lost in time [Music] this place is I believe the most historically significant hamburger restaurant in America it's because it has actually been the longest continually operating hamburger restaurant in America it's been around for 118 years being in here this is like eating at a museum yeah basically you read it you're actually in the cradle of hamburgers yeah man I'm excited to try everything Louise lunch turned the century this place was a horse-drawn hamburger cart there were some Hamburg steaks which is something you ate to the fork and a knife on a plate but a guy came in he was in a rush apparently these guys said hey we'll put it on some toast for you and he ran out the door and that was it the hamburger apparently at that point was born now there are earlier claims to the hamburger that happened at state fairs in the Midwest maybe a few years earlier 1020 years earlier but this is the actual documented case of a hamburger being invented at a place that has never stopped serving hamburgers you ready I'm ready you're gonna be kind of blown away by its simplicity I I can't wait the big reveal yeah I'm is nothing to it look at to basically it think of a grilled cheese with the hamburger strip in the middle of it Wow you know this is all about the burger because the first thing you get his beef is beef flavor he's got to start with two balls and come together to make a single patty it's actually pressed into this cage and then it's cooked from the sides and an upright barometer no cheese they can't put cheese out because that's actually sitting squeezed in this cage upright cook sideways to these cheese spreads they put cheese bread on the toast they keep by that this also predates the hamburger bun by easily by 12 more than 20 years the toast has a toaster for the bunny's toaster goes back to the 20s yeah so cooking in this kitchens like cooking it like a vintage car garage that's you know if you have your old-school Enzo Ferrari I've never seen other boroughs like this in America I mean as a burger historian like yourself you probably want to have one of those I would love to have one job you can see this dude's house I got a lot of blood contractions in my ass fourth-generation proprietor today you heard your background talking to George and now George is a great guy what do you really think of number one rule at being in Louise's don't be an [ __ ] period that's what it should be like that in every restaurant but it can't be goddamn Yelp is you know whatever it's right between reviews and all that crap you can't do it but you're an [ __ ] in this place you're out if you're an [ __ ] this place we don't belong here anyway exactly simple as that you want a brioche bun get the hell out of ya that this is not the place for that this is for an honest meats cheese onion tomato yes burger sandwich pit stop number one New Haven Connecticut Louise lunch the home of the og burger you're the Roadmaster yeah any rules to the road that I need to get about hard and fast rule this is I really am very serious about this no farting at red lights no farting the only fart when the cars moving and then you have to roll the winner no dutch ovens jeffers number two I come and drive like a maniac and no complain about my driving what I was saying about the front of a place don't judge a book by its cover right don't judge this place this is test the esteem cheeseburger did not start a test but this is arguably the best place at this point to get the best primary source example of the team cheese and you're telling me this in season one right like this is like a regional favorite five mile radius this place is everything customers their steamers are all custom-made their spatulas where they pull the meat out are all custom-made it's just a one-of-a-kind burger stand really where does it come from like it's a good question I don't really not only know do you know the real origin stories now do you know we don't see no one really knows it's a point thing because we do know that was invented we don't know why it's stuck around but it's stuck around because it's awesome yeah yeah it's absolutely the one I made for you is very good the one I made for you was really good but this is a far better okay I can't do it I don't know why but I can't make this magic happen oh yeah I'm so the burger to get is that the works its mayo ketchup mustard it's lettuce tomato it's a disc a bran ioan pickle salt pepper it cook the meeting the cheese separately and then the comes out and goes in the bunch cheers Cheers this is not what I ate at your house the cheese has this really nice streakiness to it it's kind of like halloumi or cheese curds on a poutine the way this burger works is that it's a loose grind that's actually loosely packed into these little trays the tray is going to the steaming cabinet cook for 10-12 minutes depending on how busy it is in that steaming box then I thing about that is if someone can run in here national burger they're already ready to go yeah but the nice thing about the loose grind definitely keeps it keeps it so it won't doesn't it doesn't become a dense you know piece of gray matter it's cooked I mean it's far from that yeah well this the beef renders yeah but instead of there being a mired reaction from a flattop or like a flame reaction from like the carbonyl compounds of love like you know what could be on a grill this is very different this is actually completely there just it just rendered beef fat any burger that requires special equipment special technique will always have that next level burger appeal that great this is definitely a next-level burger pit stop number two Ted's steamed cheeseburger the regional oddity here in Connecticut my mind is blown you've been doing this for years man yeah do it for a long time you must know a lot of like skullenbones burger secrets like you know like I'm sure like you know stuff that they tell you I've seen things yeah look yeah I can tell you oh yeah I see some juicy details on certain places I can't I would say I probably have over 50 or 60 different pieces of very private information that where they were told me accidentally that I will never reveal you've been in oh I watched it though oh [Laughter] we did it [Music] stopover three classic every first of all it's just it's admire the place itself for a second I mean look at this place I mean it actually looks like you are inside of a cheeseburger it's got the Browns yellows yellows it's very horizontal like I'd like a cheeseburger people are still wearing paper caps you have amazing murals on the walls I like to describe the mural behind me as a phantasmagorical expression of hamburger fantasy yeah it's almost like when you take your first bite of a hamburger and like this time I like what goes through your head yeah in the beginning it was a dairy farm and they started to actually sell milk add a bit of building at the edge of the dairy farm on the road the winner had come around they were trying to find some way to keep business going they got a grill it started baking sandwiches and hamburger burger and that's how again if you thought the steamed cheeseburger was something else when you see this thing I could feel it the fairies are telling me the burners are near hey guys here it is the Bernice original look at this no excuse my reach Wow awesome experience it was the first thing you notice right away is the smell right but this is Billy one of the owners everyone thanks for having us hey Billy hey dude it's really good to see you hi there there's some crazy science going on there I know because not every cheese can to just you know pop off the griddle not stick right Cheers it's an America chase and this is American cheese made just for you guys or it's something that we can buy on it and the more could but it wouldn't work and then you'd have to come see me so there's a whole method to the madness enjoy thanks Billy thank you thank you this is actually four slices of American cheese four sizes and there's a kaiser roll yeah well at one pad single patty single patty there's probably some type of pickle in there yep so the way it works why they actually take four slices of cheese sort of make a cross a pattern on the top of the burger so that a lot of the cheeses are hanging off at that point people eat a different ways some people just go and hit just go in there or I bet you take the top off and fold the extra cheese in so you actually have the sort of crispy cheese thing going on and see that oh and now you eat the burger it's like a crunch wrap yeah like it's like a pinwheel of cheese yeah Wow it's like a gooey cheese it the very cheesy burger I'm getting bread crunch crunch meat yep like Guzzi cheese and bread so on season one we did a whole episode on son burgers it's like to captivate an audience on Instagram Twitter or social media in every sense of the case this burger is the same kind of burger right but it predates all of that by about seven decades seven decades the people who invented this burger knew like hey you eat with your eyes first so you could obviously get the cheese crisps on your burger yeah it's really cool about this place is that I think it's actually off menu item let me brown the menu you could actually order the cheese crisps alone look at this thank you very much fun yes look at that yeah Cheers I can sell this I coach how I make so much money your experience at Shady Glen is not completely less you've had ice cream on the ice cream made here so lately here we go oh what'd you get dude oh I got chocolate malt ooh exactly the same sip you don't mind this mine is a mocha peanut butter malt you know and that's again next level next level oh man real-deal it's super creamy you're on a dairy farm another one oh it's just some fresh yeah and now that we've been to three great examples of hamburgers in Connecticut you have a favorite I mean they're all pretty close I can't pick favorites I'll do that but you know I can honestly say that like tasting a burger at Louise it was it was like facing history and just knowing that like something that simple has evolved and so what we just had right now here at Shady Glen I mean it was amazing I feel like it's my life's work and my goal to make sure people appreciate these kinds of places that when you walk into a place you have a great burger or have even have a great experience then you owe it to them to walk up and say that was a great experience that was a great burger because it gives them the strength to go on but they know they know they're special yeah [Music] you [Music] what's up burger world 7ky line of the burger show smash that like button hit that subscribe button if not for me for the segue

Channel: First We Feast

Views: 2,245,495

Rating: 4.9312615 out of 5

Keywords: First we feast, fwf, firstwefeast, food, food porn, cook, cooking, chef, kitchen, recipe, cocktail, bartender, craft beer, complex, complex media, Cook (Profession)sean evans, the burger show, burger show, the burger show season 3, alvin cailan, original burger, burger scholar, george motz, the burger scholar, burger roadtrip, louis lunch

Id: 4Jlf29CEf90

Length: 13min 44sec (824 seconds)

Published: Tue Apr 02 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/Okay_Splenda_Monkey]

When I hear that someone is a burger scholar, I have a hard time not picturing Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons. Glad to be wrong.

[u/curbthemeplays]

Louis Lunch is a good time. The meat is the star and really good. Basic and good.

I think my favorite gourmet burger in the state is the Smoker at Prime 16 New Haven. Shout out to Dive Bar too.

Favorite casual takeout is Mr Mac’s Canteen. There’s something magical and simple about those.

[u/Synapse82]

That’s a super cool video thanks, also makes me miss cable tv. I’m still rebelling.

Hamburger invented in CT, I’m running with it! Also, I’m going to try all those places.

[u/djdeforte]

Man, I remember Shady Glen as a kid. Such a good burger, and a really great shake.