Burger Wellington - Five Burroughs

Despite having a whole house impatiently waiting for us to renovate it, we're trying to achieve family balance by making sure that we have at least one weekend day every week where we don't put our work clothes on or hang out at Bunnings.

We're still kind of new at this family thing, but we have worked out that it's quite good to do something other than sit inside with us all playing with our respective toys all day long (of course kids aren't necessary for that to hold true... It's just harder to get out the door once you have them and for us anyway that means we have to be a bit more intentional about it).

Yesterday we were thinking of heading down to the local playground, but that happens to be right on the south coast, and there was a fairly brisk southerly waiting to chill us to the core, so Plan A lost its gloss.

Luckily, it happens to be Wellington on a Plate season, which means that Wellington's already awesome eateries are all busy upping their game. Mr Cake's colleagues have been working hard to make him jealous by eating as many burgers as possible (the festival started on Friday and by Friday night one workmate had already had tried two), so it seemed only right that we seek out a tasty burger.

After some slightly hangry web-trawling (tip: don't leave the decision making until mealtime) we settled on Five Burroughs, as they had an interesting-sounding burger and we hadn't been there before.

It's always a bit of a gamble taking a wriggly and hungry toddler to a restaurant or cafe. Many cater well to kids but some don't at all - and fair enough, some places aren't aimed at the family market - but you can't always tell which is which until you get there.

Five Burroughs didn't seem to have high chairs, which I guess means they're not super excited when a smeary baby comes in the door (who is?), though bigger kids would probably be pretty happy here. Our whippersnapper (let's call him Little Monkey Cake) was happy enough there but did try to destroy both the venetian blinds and some of the art before we distracted him with food.

Service-wise they were great - just attentive enough, and (a definite win in parenting-land) brought out Little Monkey's burger very quickly.

As well as their "Some Sort of Burger" - Wild venison patty, truffled Kingsmeade Ngawi brie, exotic mushrooms, black garlic mayo, and foraged blackberry ketchup in a Zaida's squid ink milk bun - we ordered the buttermilk fried chicken, truffled fries, and a Bam Bam Baklava milkshake (how could we not?). And a kid's burger for Little Monkey.  

The shake was delicious, with lashings of honey and nuts as you'd expect. I thought it could have been improved with a touch of butter (for the true baklava experience) as the honey was a bit sweet, but I guess there's a very fine balance between serving a flavoured milk beverage and pureeing a dessert and perhaps the latter is not so desirable after all. 

Some Sort of Burger was excellent, with a succulent, well-cooked patty and a rich umami flavour thanks to the intriguing wild mushrooms. The garlic mayo and truffled brie melted into the other flavours, and the blackberry ketchup, served on the side, went well with the burger, though we just added it all to the burger. It was served with a few crisps but these were just okay. 

The fried chicken was pretty good - perfectly cooked meat and lovely crispy coating, though it was a little bland. You can choose between gravy and maple syrup to accompany, and I went with the gravy but think perhaps the syrup would have been a better match. 

The truffled fries were tasty, perfectly cooked with a good truffley flavour... Sadly we couldn't finish them, despite a solid effort by both myself and the Little Monkey.  

All in all it was a pretty awesome Sunday lunch, and it was good to introduce the small person to the marvels of Wellington on a Plate - start as you mean to go on, I say. And we still squeezed in some playtime at the cool Waitangi Park playground afterwards. An all-around win!

Have you tried any burgers yet this year?


Five Burroughs is located at the corner of Roxburgh and Marjoribanks Streets, Mt Victoria, Wellington, fiveboroughs.co.nz