Purveyor: The Paddington Inn, Paddington NSW, Australia

Menu Item: Charred Chicken Burger

Price: $19 AUD

Squawk: This is an underrated pub in all sorts of ways. Its unassuming street presence belies its modern and vast interior with various rooms, nooks and chill-out areas. The music isn’t awful and it’s not too loud and the candle light creates accost atmosphere. But you, you would sit on a cold rock, surrounded by stacks of speakers and Drum & Bass pill fiends if it meant you could enjoy a ten out of ten chicken burger, and that’s why we love you. The Paddo does quite a few things right on this burger. For starters the brioche is amongst the best we’ve seen with the perfect amount of char. And they put bacon on it – yay! But like most places in Australia, left all the fat on – boo! The meat itself was actually quite bland – relying on the “surrounds” to do the heavy flavour lifting, sadly they don’t. But hey, they got great beers and friendly staff and you can always reach in and peel that bacon fat off.

Buaawk: The sauce on this one was… um… we forgot, because it was forgettable. But they almost make up for it by plonking a bottle of Sriracha on the table when we ask what they have with kick. The fries are fine, but not worth writing about. But what really irks us, and The Paddo isn’t alone in this regard is cooks who leave all the fat on bacon. Trim it!

 – HC