Burgerquest Final Results

The "Burger Quest" is over.  
Thursday the 22nd of January 2015 marked the end of our "Quest".

We "Burgerteers" want everyone to know that our "Burger Quest" was not meant to be, nor is it, the final word on burgers here in Merida.  However, we stand united that we feel our findings will tickle your taste buds and give you reason to smile!

Our final four, in no particular order, were La Rueda Parrilla Gaucha Norte, La Cabaña Sonorense Steak House, La Recova Montejo Parrilla Argentina & Contemporanea and La Pamplona Steak House by Salamanca. 
The aforementioned names are the full names of each restaurant.
We also went to them in that order not by preference but by time constraints and ease of flow from one to the other.

FYI: We finished the day at Dairy Queen!

At each restaurant we ordered the true and steadfast naked burger.  Bun and meat only!  Nothing else just the bread and the meat.  Each was asked to cook it either medium or medium rare due to the way it was cooked at our previous visit.

This process took four hours to consume the equivalent of one burger per "Burgerteer"!
We started at 12:30 and finished at 4:30 and a consensus was reached.

Note:  A point of observance that we would like to pass along to you, our loyal followers......we have noticed a trend for almost every restaurant to cook their burgers a little bit rarer than what you ask for. 

Of course before we reveal our findings allow me to take you through the day with us on our "Quest" of the Final Four!
We felt that it was appropriate to feature each of the final four with some additional words and a few more photos for your viewing pleasure.

Our first stop...........

Here are a few pictures of the interior and patio area...

Once again I called ahead and Francisco Sosa, manager of La Rueda, allowed us to have a burger if we got there early which is why we started here.

Our waiter, Jorge, who had also waited on us on our previous visit was there and was at the table as we were seated.  He speaks English.
We got our menus and he took our drink orders.

After receiving our drinks we made our naked burger order.  We ordered the Kobe beef style burger at 115 pesos and asked for it to be cooked medium and of course to be cut in four pieces.
The Burgers at La Rueda come with no sides! 
You cannot order fries as they do not offer them.

Please see that at the bottom of the menu it states that the burgers are ONLY served after 7:30 PM.

The burger arrived almost as ordered with no additional items, cut into four pieces but it was cooked more rare than medium as you can see.  

  

The sesame bun was grilled, the patty was preformed but the meat had not been over worked which gives a much denser texture.

The meat had been seared to a perfect level by a very hot grill.  It gave it the charcoal flavor associated with a great burger while allowing for the interior to be very tender and juicy.  To the best of our ability we feel it was seasoned only with salt.

The meat to bun ratio was spot on!   

This burger was setting the bar at a high level and as we strode to our steed and drew our swords we once again for all to hear chanted "All for one burger and a burger for all"!

Check out this link for more information:   https://www.facebook.com/pages/La-Rueda/169246916447008

Our second stop..........

Here are a few pictures of the interior and soon to be new bar area.

I'd like to add that this bar area will be separated from the dining area and closed off by doors so that when there are sporting events, etc the noise of the bar will not filter out into the dining areas.

We were greeted at the door and seated.  We received menus and the waiter took our drink order.

After receiving our drinks we made our naked burger order.  We ordered the rib eye burger at 65 pesos and asked for it to be cooked medium and of course to be cut in four pieces.

Pedro, the owner, came out to greet us as he does just about every customer that enters his establishment.

The burger arrived as ordered with no additional items, cut into four pieces and cooked exactly medium.

The sesame bun was grilled, the patty was hand formed.

The meat was not over worked.

The meat had been seared to a perfect level by a very hot grill. It gave it the charcoal flavor associated with a great burger while allowing for the interior to be very tender and juicy. To the best of our ability we feel it was seasoned only with salt.

The meat to bun ratio was spot on!   

This burger came with fries and they were very, very good.  Cooked perfectly, they were crunchy but still soft in the middle and seasoned to a precise point where none of us had to add salt or anything.

Once again as we strode to our steed we drew our swords once again and for all to hear chanted "All for one burger and a burger for all"!

Check out this link for more information:  https://www.facebook.com/LaCabanaSonorense

Our third stop.........

Here are a few pictures of the interior.........

There is even more to this restaurant that I didn't take photos of.  La Recova is an upscale restaurant and considered one of the "finer dining" restaurants here in Merida.

We were greeted at the door and seated.  We received menus and the waiter took our drink order.

After receiving our drinks we made our naked burger order.  We ordered the USDA Prime burger of the house (de la casa)  at 170 pesos and asked for it to be cooked medium rare and of course to be cut in four pieces.

The burger arrived almost as ordered with no additional items, cut into four pieces but cooked medium not medium rare.

The sesame bun was not grilled, the patty was preformed and over worked which gave it a denser texture and not very juicy.
The meat was seasoned lightly with something besides salt.

The meat had been seared by a relatively hot grill but it only had a minimal amount of the charcoal flavor associated with a great burger.  The interior was not tender and juicy.

The meat to bun ratio was heavy on the meat side.    

This burger came with souffléd potatoes which resembled small sopapillas. 

Check out this link for more information: 
http://www.larecovamerida.com/

Once again as we strode to our steed we drew our swords again and for all to hear chanted "All for one burger and a burger for all"!

Our fourth and last stop.............

Here are a couple of pictures of the interior.......

Because of the hour that we arrived, around 3, the place was packed and the valet parking individual told us that the only seating was at the bar. So, we assumed the bar position and that didn't seem to be alien to any of us!  LOL!

The interior is one big dining area along with the bar. 

We were greeted at the top of the stairs
and seated.  We received menus and the bartender took our drink order.

After receiving our drinks we made our naked burger order.  We ordered the Angus burger at 115 pesos and asked for it to be cooked medium and of course to be cut in four pieces.

The burger arrived not even close as ordered!  It was delivered with mayo, cheese and bacon.  Plus it was cooked much more rare then medium as you can see.  However, it was cut into four pieces!

It was very noisy since the place was full but we can guarantee you that we ordered it correctly and it was understood.


Since we are "Burgerteers" and nothing deters us from our appointed "Quest" we removed the additional items and did our best to surmise the flavor of the meat.  
You may ask why not send it back????? We had given thought to either sending it back or ordering another but the consensus was that it took over 45 minutes to get this one and we didn't want to wait another 45 minutes.  We knew the wait was due to the fact that they were slammed.

The sesame bun was not grilled, the patty was preformed but not over worked.  The meat had been grilled but the exact flavor was eluding us due to it having been in contact with the added toppings. The flavor seemed fine but it only had a minimal amount of the charcoal flavor associated with a great burger. The meat was on the chewy side but it was juicy.

The meat to bun ratio was spot on.    

The fries that came with it were good, not great!

Check out this link for more information: 
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Pamplona-Steak-House-tel9441413/448712515261765

For the last time we strode to our steed but this time we were all tilting a wee bit as we drew our swords again and for all to hear chanted "All for one burger and a burger for all"!


Now I need to say before I go any farther that every "Quest" in life does sometimes change the way we look at things.  You know that I like rare meat and most of the others like it less rare but my personal observation over the course of our "Quest" is that my fellow "Burgerteers" are starting to lean towards the rarer side of things and being rewarded by the flavors they have experienced when prepared correctly.  Now don't get me wrong there's nothing wrong with having a burger or a steak cooked more on the "well done" side, and, ah, oh, choke, crap....yes there is, it just ruins the flavor!  Forget I said that!  LOL!

Our final analysis was based on numerous factors that we felt had to be considered.  The flavor of the meat and bun were paramount!  However, there were other major factors as well, quality/type of meat to be compared, consistency from the first to second visit, and the "wallet" affect or as it is better known, the "bang for the buck"!  (this had to be considered since we did not have a deep pocketed sponsor!...maybe next Quest, hint!  hint!)  LOL!

Our choice for the best "Quest" Burger is.........






envelope please.......................................







drum roll..............................................

Please stop by when you get a chance and tell Pedro the the "Burgerteers" sent you.  He and his family will appreciate your business and your taste buds will enjoy your choice! 

FYI: La Cabaña Sonorense and La Rueda were very close but two factors pushed La Cabaña Sonorense into first place.  Those two items were price and not serving a burger for lunch.

We were disappointed with La Recova and Pamplona because our first visits were really good. You can see the difference in the burgers by looking at the pictures from our first visits in the previous posts and the pictures in this our final visits.

Regardless, these four restaurants would not have been chosen as our "Final Four" if they had not previously impressed us. Setting aside the inconsistencies that we all know arise in many of the restaurants here, we, "The Burgerteers" feel that all of our "Final Four" restaurants are good places to have a burger and each offers your a different dining experience.

Who knows, maybe you'll go forth as loyal subjects of the Merida Burger Kingdom and conduct your own mini-"Quest" and try each one to see what you think.  
An honorable mention is being given to Scott over at Canada Burger.  

They couldn't be considered because their burger is a pork burger but that doesn't take away the fact that Canada Burger has a great burger and you should check it out.  You get a cheeseburger, fries and a can of soda for 80 pesos.  
Check out this link for more information: 
http://www.canadaburger.com/

We have been asked by many of you if there will be another "Quest" and at this point we believe there will be.

This "Quest" started on July 18th 2014 which means out of 28 possible Fridays for a "Burger Quest" to happen we got around to it almost half the Fridays.  I don't think that's a bad average considering that we are all retired, we all like to travel and we all have wives or almismo w/o papers not to mention that there's an occasional medical thing or two that comes along from time to time at our ages!
We have bantered around what the future "Quest" might be but we have not come to any conclusions.
We will make you a promise that if and when another "Quest" is chosen and we your dandy "Adventurteers" strap on our swords and saddle up again we will certainly let you know.

In closing, we, the "Burgerteers" humbly want to thank our followers for sticking with us throughout our "Quest"!
We appreciated both the good and not so good feedback that we received. We are pleased that we were able to pass on information about various restaurants that serve burgers here in Merida.  We hope that you found our information useful and that we helped you find a great burger!

"All for one burger and a burger for all"!

PS:  The "Burgerteers" received no compensations, bribes, discounts or free burgers nor were any pressures or influences of any type placed upon us for our reviews.  Our "Quest" was totally self serving and yummy!

Burger Quest 12th Outing

This is our twelfth "Burger Quest" and our last in this series.
We have now selected our top four restaurants for burgers from the ones we visited and reported on during our "Quest"!
On the afternoon of Thursday the 22nd we are going to each of the four, one right after the other.  We will be ordering the naked burger at each place and we will judge each by just the burger and the bun. We will then determine what we feel is our top burger. The results should be posted next Friday so please keep your eye out for our top pick!

Ok, let's get to this our last "Quest".  It was Reg's turn to pick the place and in turn pick us all up and transport us to his choice!  He did so in style, as always, and we headed North up Prolongation.

I think we were all a bit surprised when he pulled in to the parking lot of Bostons but we didn't hesitate to get out and get ready to go in!

Now I have never entered Bostons where I wasn't greeted by a very pleasant hostess and today was no different. 

 Most speak fairly good English as well and our hostess today was probably better than me at speaking English!  LOL!

There are two parts to the Boston's Restaurant.  The regular dining area which is spacious and bright.....

.....and the sports
bar area. 

Now don't get me wrong, I have been in Bostons on numerous occasions with my wife Debi and we have never had a bad meal. Also when I go to my friend Vic's for MNF and we decide on pizza we always get it there cause we think they have good pizza. However, I have never had a burger there.

So Reg said that we would sit in the Sports bar area so the hostess took us in and we picked a booth.

The waiter was right there and took our drink order and gave us menus.

Now I must make a statement about their liter beer mugs!  Wow!  Those suckers are big and heavy and hold a lot of beer!  LOL!  

We looked over the menu and it is large and by that I mean many pages, like twelve or so. More pages than I wanted to take pictures of so I just concentrated on the burger page.

Lots of choices but as you know by now if you have followed our "Quests" we needed to order the naked burger first.  So we explained that we wanted just a burger and the bun and how we wanted it cooked, medium, and that we wanted it cut into four pieces.

Now at this point I need to address that at about this time the battery in my camera went dead.  Bummer!  Yes, I checked it before I left the house and it didn't show that it was discharged at all.  Why am I telling you this, well, only because I can't provide as many pictures of the burgers as I usually do.

Moving on the burger arrives just as ordered and cut into four pieces.

It was cooked to a lovely medium and the burger to bun ratio was great!  It was juicy and it had the best bun we have had since we started our "Quests".  There was nothing to complain about, it was very good!

If you look at the menu you'll see that they advertise Kaiser rolls and they are great and toasted!!!!

We then ordered our other burgers and they came as ordered as well and were very good.

There is no doubt and we all agreed that we'd be pleased to come back any time for a burger at Boston's!

Oh and the fries were some of the best we had during our "Quests" as well!

Overall Reg chose well and it was a great "Quest" and it was super to have it be a good one!

Here is a link for Boston's here in Merida.

http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=es&u=http://www.bostons.com.mx/&prev=search

Burger Quest 11th Outing

The holidays are behind us and our time off from Questing was filled with good friends, good food and good ale....well make that wine and beer, ahhh, and maybe a few spirits too!

But now we have regrouped and have our next "Quest" in the bag....so to speak.

It was my turn this time and I decided to contact my favorite steak house, La Rueda, which only serves burgers after 7:30 PM, to see if they would be willing to make an exception.
Contact was made with the manager, Francisco Sosa, and he obliged my request.  It was extremely nice of him to do that for the "Burgerteers"!

According to our waiter, Jorge, part of the reason for the "special" dispensation was that we arrived before the lunch business got into high gear and there was plenty of room on the grill.  When the lunch business is 'getting it on' the grill is filled with steaks and the steaks take priority over burgers.  Makes total sense to me. 

Now before I go further let me be very clear that this is a steak restaurant!  They serve mostly meat!  There is no chicken, no fish, no pasta!  They do have a few pizzas and they do have great salads!  They do not have individual salads!  The salads they serve will feed four people providing you are not eating just salad.  
They also have empanadas which my wife has with salad when we go there as she is a pescatarian.

We entered and were greeted by the hostess.  

We asked to speak to Francisco.  He greeted us and thanked us for coming and said he was pleased to oblige our request.

Maybe it's because I have been there before but when you enter you know you are in a steak restaurant!  The straight forwardness of the interior and the decor emphatically says "MEAT"!  I think you can tell that by the pictures.

We were then taken to a table.

So we receive our menus and our drink order was taken. 
*Please see the menus at the end of the post.



The drinks arrive and we place our order for the first burger....the naked burger.  Medium rare as always and we order the Kobe.  Our waiter Jorge spoke English which helped with taking our special burger request but he did come back once to check just to be sure.  I'm pretty sure the grilling maestro questioned his order.
It is obvious that there is basically no one that goes in to any of the establishments that we have gone to so far and orders just a burger and the bun.  It is totally alien to do that.

The burger arrives and it looks good.  Nothing on it and cut into three pieces as requested.

Upon opening it up we see that it is heavily weighted to the rare side.  I'm drooling and Reg and Barry are going with it but would like it cooked a bit more.

Now this way of cooking seems to be the norm from what we have seen so far.  Most places cook a medium rare request on the rare side so it would make sense if you don't like them like that to order medium on your first visit to see where they take you.

The meat to toasted bun ratio was very good and the burger's diameter was larger than the bun.  

You could see that it was preformed but the way it came apart suggested that they make up the burgers and then form them themselves.  We all thought this but we could be wrong.

Tender, very juicy and even though it was cooked a little light for two of us the opinions were this burger is in the top two!  The flavor was outstanding.

We then ordered our burgers, again Kobe, the way we liked them and they arrived as requested.  Ordering this one medium got Reg and Barry their medium rare burger and I stuck with the medium rare.  Grrrrr!

As we are finishing Francisco appears and inquires as to our experience and we responded accordingly.  I just hope he'll let us do this again when we go back to our top three and do the taste off!  We'll see!

I have also included their wine list which in my opinion is quite nice.  It is obvious that it is a steak restaurant as the list is super heavily weighted with vino tintos.  Which, again in my opinion, you can't go wrong with either the Fuzion Santa Rita Tempranillo/Malbec or the Las Moras Black Label Bonarda....both are Argentinian wines.

Until our swords cross yet again we are at your service!
One for all and all for one!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

https://www.facebook.com/pages/La-Rueda/169246916447008