NYC Tastes

The first time I ate at Umami Burger the glorious truffle aroma from my neighbor's burger almost caused me to fall off my bar stool. I had already ordered the standard  Umami Burger  (which was excellent) but oh I wanted that truffle burger so badly.  I can't believe it's been so long but Mr. T and I finally stopped in last week so I could have my truffle moment. The burger arrived on their standard Portuguese Roll, toasted with just a touch of butter and of course the Umami stamp on top.  All their burgers are cooked medium rare (more towards rare then medium) but the truffle burger also has truffle aioli, truffle cheese and a truffle glaze on top bringing this into supreme truffle burger status. The combination of juicy burger, sauce and melted cheese made this such a messy burger I was thankful to only be eating with Mr. T.  Deep down I didn't care though; a messy face would be completely worth it for this magnificent truffle bomb.  Mr. T tried ...

I thought the hype for this burger place was out of control on the food blogs but standing in front of the restuarnt for just ten minutes and it was clear Umami Burger has a tight hold on the West Coast.  I arrived right around 5:00 opening day and was told there was a 20 minute wait.  As I stood outside every sixty seconds someone would walk by and scream "Umami" or come up to the door and tell the host how much they loved  Umami back in California...it was nonstop.  By the time I got seated I was pretty hyped up myself and ready to chow down on some meat.  I went straight with the Original Umami Burger which comes topped with roasted tomato, shitake mushroom, caramelized onion, house ketchup and a Parmesan crisp. I cut into my burger and the first thing I noticed was the lack of running juices.  Somehow all that wonderful flavor stayed tight inside the slightly charred meat patty, making it incredibly rich and so delicious it would have been amazing ...