Having rushed out of London to Birmingham and back at 5am for a 14 hour round trip to see the woman who struck me down with a car four years ago, we were somewhat short of last minute dinner options near our hotel. As lovely as Hammersmith is, it is woefully short of somewhere to eat on a Monday; L’Amorosa is closed, as is the Indian our hotel tried to send us to. We settle for Honest Burger, a small chain of bits of beef between buns beloved of belligerent Londoners. And before those Londoners get shouty for calling them belligerent, yes you bloody are. I’ve travelled on the tube at peak times, I have the footprints on my back to prove it.

They have a nice queuing system that allows us to wait in the pub around the corner until a table becomes available. When one does we are sat upstairs underneath the shadow of the blackboard that is the menu for those with the vision of a mole. We order cocktails in tin cups and bottles of local beer. We get two beef burgers and some bits to ensure we leave full. The beef is served pink they say to which we say fine. Its a solid start for somewhere that charges a little over £40 for burgers and drinks for two.

And then, well, meh. The burgers are boring to the point that they serve to remind me why I quit eating them for a while. The patty is pink but it is also bland, the bun hardly holding its shape. If this was In and Out the emphasis would be on the final word. It’s Five Why’s. Shake Whack. The jalapeño relish and hot sauce one is only distinguishable from the garlic mayo one by levels of attitude. Both have bacon; one crisp, the other not. I get a ribbon of raw fat wedged between my teeth.

The rest is a mixed bag. We get the Paris Hilton of onion rings; they look alright until we get into the doughy interior. The chips, often the bane of the burger shop, are properly good and dusted with rosemary salt. The best bit is the curry sauce that tastes better than my local Indian takeaway. It’s just when the best bit makes up one fortieth of the bill you know there is an intrinsic problem.

Service was ponderous, the bill painful. I could think of half a dozen burger places I would rather eat at for less. And tragically this isn’t the first time this has happened to me in the capital; Bleecker aside I’ve tried little to get me excited. I’ll never have a burger again here. Honest.

5/10

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