Classic, in fact, was the watchword of the night. “I just wanted to do a straight-up, classic burger,” said former Top Chef contestant Spike Mendelsohn of Washington’s Good Stuff Eatery, the defending champion, clad in a boxer’s robe and wearing a giant title belt. “We do classic burgers at Bill’s,” said Brett Reichler, chef of the upstart Bill’s Bar and Burger, a first-time entrant who followed Mendelsohn’s lead in having hot models stand around getting out the vote. “What can I say?” said Randy Garutti, czar of Danny Meyer’s phenomenally successful Shake Shack. “The Shack burger is a classic.”
They’re all right. The orthodox cheeseburger, with its pillowy, enriched white bun, Pythagorean square of tangerine-colored American cheese and blissfully unadulterated (and unspiced) beef, is an invention that cannot really be improved upon. Like sashimi or peaches and cream, it’s a gastronomic end point. But this is America. We’re about competition and reinvention — not just at the Burger Bash, but also in the omnipotent market, where fortunes rise and fall over the narrowest bits of brand differentiation. (Take away Ronald and the King, and only an expert can tell the basic McDonald’s and Burger King hamburgers apart.)
