The infamous Burger & Lobster (brought to you by the fine people behind Goodmans) have just opened their latest joint on the Old Bailey, near St. Paul’s. Our Jack puts this ‘£20 lobster’ idea to the test and the results are pleasing. Also there’s no queueing (at all)!
Rating:
Cuisine:
Surf & Turf / American
Appeals To:
Seafood seers, the good men and women of London who are fans of Goodman. Anyone who ever ate a whole lobster in Maine or Nova Scotia and wants to get that same experience – or something similar.
People who go for ‘trendy restaurants’ and will queue for excessive periods of time to prove it (sad but true, we guess…)
Crabshack and American food aficionados who prefer a focus on the ‘surf’ aspect of surf and turf. And prefer a slightly more ‘refined’ drinks menu…
In a Word
Straightforward
Well, it does what it says on the tin/sign/marketing…
What you see before you is the latest London location for Burger & Lobster (*fanfair* the global phenomenon!) I think this is number 9 though I may be wrong. These are the (Russian?) guys behind the Goodman steakhouses, and so you could say that they know a little something about meat, at the least!
The Ambiance
As for the aesthetic of the place…very American, I dunno if ‘Crabshack’ would be the right word, but the rustic wood, oldschool filament lamps and lobster cages on the walls come pretty close.
As this is a relatively new location, they’re not quite as rammed as I hear the other ones can get (yet!). 3 hour queues? Apparently people will put up with such things. As for queuing up for 3 hours for a restaurant? I love food but you won’t see me doing that. Ever. Not ever. Spend more time waiting than eating? REALLY?! Who does that? OK, I’ll stop.
Though the ‘no reservation’ system seems pretentious, the actual dining experience, thankfully, does not feel quite the same way. From what I saw, staff are super chill, and you eat off of trays instead of plates (which is either pretentious or unpretentious, I dunno).
This is a legit place to go with friends and loved ones – a lot of fun. It is, however, not a good place to take new business acquaintances or potential romantic connections. Eating with a bib whilst pieces of crustacean fly everywhere probably isn’t a good look (though I could be wrong!). Before anyone asks, no, you don’t get to choose which lobster you’re going to eat from the tanks (which I am grateful for – I don’t think I am quite ready to confront the reality of choosing exactly what has to die to feed me. Goddamn…)
The Food
It’s a strange one, this place, the menu basically has three mains – a whole lobster, a burger and what I guess is simply a lobster roll (cold lobster, warm meat – strong combination). No menu for food at all – you just pick one of the three. As your waiter/waitress may tell you – we “only do three things, but we do them well’.
Every meal comes with a side salad (tastes legit due to cheese and other unhealthy things) and a reasonable portion of fries (which are, dare I say, a dead ringer for those you’d get at McDonalds). Lobsters are sourced fresh from Nova Scotia and Maine (I think?), depending on season.
As far as lobsters go, I have eaten lobsters all over the US and these are….pretty close to how I remember (ask for it steamed instead of grilled for full fishy lobster flavours…)
Onto their pricing: £20 is a bit steep for a burger but for a lobster it feels like a bargain.
Idea: you could theoretically eat here ‘economically’ by getting a lobster to split between the two of you (provided you weren’t hugely hungry). And buy more drinks and desserts. Said desserts and drinks are a…reasonable selection, reasonably priced – I suppose about average for London. They do quite a few cocktails, I think 17 last time I checked.
Part of the fun is, obviously, eating the lobster with the cracking tools they provide (your patience is rewarded by access to the delicious parts of the flesh hidden in the deep recesses of the exoskeleton). Eating lobster is actually not as hard, nor messy, as people think it is. You simply crack the joints with the dangerous implements they provide you (in this instance, the ‘Westmark Cracky’, lol).
What We Ate
‘The Burger’
10oz steak beefburger with optional bacon and cheese (Jay chose both…)
‘The Whole Lobster’
A 1.5lb(ish) lobster served steamed (you can have it grilled) with garlic lemon butter (you can choose ‘regular’ butter
das it
The Verdict:
All in all, good food, nice location – none of this speedy table turnover and frenetic rushing I read about in some other reviews. So yeah, a somewhat minimalist approach to restaurateuring which delivers upon its promise of burger and/or lobster.
If they keep their lobster pricing the same, I will most certainly be back. Well done to you, (possibly Russian) people of Burger and Lobster!
The Details:
30 Old Bailey, Ludgate, London, EC4M 7HS
http://www.burgerandlobster.com/home/locations/london/old-bailey/
@burger_lobster
http://www.burgerandlobster.com/home/locations/london/old-bailey/
@burger_lobster