A half-eaten La Cense cheeseburger
It’s only the second day of business for the La Cense Beef Burger Truck, and many critics have already weighed in on the griddle-cooked, grass-fed burger. Today the Feed endured the lunchtime wait—about a half hour at 12:30pm—to sample New York’s premier truck burger for ourselves. The verdict:
The two workers—one cooked the burgers while the other handled the customer transactions—managed to remain calm and friendly, despite having to keep pace with an unrelenting stream of orders in what must be an uncomfortably small and steamy mobile kitchen.
The burger is a good size; its 6-ounce patty has an agreeable heft while not being so large that you can’t eat it on the street. As soon as you open the foil wrapper, you’re hit with its wonderful aroma, a combination of the caramelized onions, meat and American cheese (the cheese is optional, the onions aren’t).
It could be a great burger—the cheese is nicely melted, the onions sweet, and the sesame bun soft and well-proportioned to the patty—but in a strange twist, it’s the calling-card meat that’s the biggest disappointment. As others have pointed out, the truck’s griddle doesn’t appear to have enough firepower to properly sear the exterior (we also suspect that with such a heavy demand, it’s necessary to pack every square inch of the griddle, causing the meat to steam in its own juices). Surprisingly, despite being grass-fed, the beef doesn’t have the gamy flavor we’d expect. The texture too was a little off, with a pastiness that suggests the ground beef had been overworked (mixing it too much emulsifies the fat and protein, like in a sausage or meatball). On the positive side, our burger was just a tad under medium, unlike reports of overcooked patties from yesterday.
Frankly, the whole thing seems like a genius marketing strategy for La Cense, an Internet-order company based in Montana that now has the perfect on-the-street method of spreading its brand awareness. They just have to make sure they’re showing their product in its best light.
