Royal Jubilee

Royal Tavern is celebrating their 10th anniversary this week and with it comes an uber-celebration featuring some of their greatest menu items of all time, with each day having a theme such as “most amazing appetizers” or “best brunches of the past decade”. Kick off night was 10/10 and they were spotlighting their “Burger Birthday” with a surf & turf burger topped with a crabcake, a hawaiian burger, a falafel burger for the veggie crowd and – for the most gluttonous of us – the bacon burger – which had actual ground up bacon mixed with beef. Clearly, that’s the one I decided to go for.

Mmm. Bacon burger topped with more bacon.

I wasn’t sure about the whole bacon in the burger thing but on first bite, I was sold. The flavor combo was pretty delicious and didn’t at all taste like you were eating a giant chunk of bacon. The fat from the bacon I think also kept the meat nice and juicy. It was also topped with cheddar & grilled red onions and came with a side of chili mayo which I was a little indifferent about; it didn’t take anything away from the burger but it didn’t really give it anything extra when I added it either.

My only complaint would have to be that my bun was a little over-toasted (as you can see in this pic). While I don’t mind a toasted bun, the fact that my burger bites were interspersed with this kind of charred bread taste was kind of a turn off. Otherwise, it was a solid burger! I hope maybe they’ll break this one out of the vault again in the future. I definitely think I enjoyed it better than their usual Royal Angus burger (which I sampled a few months back & which is currently being touted as the “Best Burger in Philadelphia”).

Angus Burger at Royal Tavern (and a much less burnt bun)

Burger rating: Bacon Burger “A-” (only due to the bun issue, otherwise it would have been an A) &  Angus Burger “B+”