Medium Raw

This was the story going around anyway, as high-fiving day traders from some by-now-defunct investment bank or brokerage house hurried, lemming-like, to order the “best burger ever.” Of course, chances are, the “Kobe beef” in that Kobe beef burger had never been anywhere near Japan. It was a distant relative at best—and even if the sublimely fatty product of pampered Wagyu cattle was used in the burger, it would have been (and remains) an utterly pointless, supremely wasteful, and even unpleasant exercise.

What makes a Wagyu steak so desirable is the unbelievably prodigious marbling of fat that runs through it—often as much as 50 percent. Its resulting tenderness and richness, and the subtle—repeat—subtle flavor. When grinding a hamburger, you can put in as much fat as you like—just reach in the fat can and drop it in the machine—so there’s no reason to pay a hundred bucks for a burger. A burger, presumably, already is about as tender as a piece of meat can be—and a taste as subtle as real Wagyu’s would, in any case, be lost were you to do something so insensitive as bury it between two buns and slather it with ketchup.

A six-ounce tataki of real Wagyu steak, seared rare and sliced thinly, is about all you want or can eat in a sitting. It’s that rich. It’ll flood your head with so much fat you’ll quickly reach a point of diminishing returns. Even an eight-ounce “Kobe burger” made from real Wagyu would be an exercise in futility—and pretty disgusting.

But no. The cream of big-city douchedom ordered these things in droves, bragging about it all the way. It quickly became clear to chefs and restaurateurs that there was a huge, previously untapped market out there for expensive hamburgers—that customers at a certain income level, clearly, were willing, even eager, to pay more. All you had to do was put a “brand” name next to the word “hamburger” and you could add value. That brand could be the name of a famous chef (many of whom wisely began to flock to the concept) or the name of a boutique producer (something that, like the word “Kobe,” implied specially raised, artisanal, humanely treated, organic, or sexually satisfied cattle). Chefs added “extras” like foie gras, truffles, braised oxtail, the exotic cheeses of many lands.

Restaurateur Jeffrey Chodorow’s New York restaurant Kobe Club—a name that implied an establishment where sophisticated gentlemen of the world could gather, mingle with others in the know, share meat-related experiences with like-minded movers and shakers—was meant to be the apotheosis of this concept.

But Chodorow was a little late to the party—New Yorkers had moved on.

Instinctively suspicious of designer labels—as potentially being something they might like in New Jersey—and uneasy with the crassness of the whole Kobe Club concept, New York foodies looked elsewhere for a prestige patty. Perhaps Kobe suffered from its association with Chodorow, a man whom food writers find an irresistible target. It’s almost obligatory for food bloggers to mock his latest ventures—often before they are even open for business. Sneering at Chodorow is like making a mean crack about film director Brett Ratner if you’re a budding film critic. It immediately asserts one’s bona fides as a serious observer. (Chodorow, like Ratner, seems only too happy to oblige: see such absurd, bizarro pastiches of restaurants past as Rocco’s, the reality show–driven abomination; Caviar and Banana, a vaguely Brazilian follow-up; English Is Italian [he isn’t]; and his latest, a jumbo-size attempt to straddle the Asian fusion, sushi, and izakaya markets. Even veteran food critics can’t resist giving him a kick whenever the opportunity presents itself. The jokes write themselves.)

In post-Kobe New York, a new way to pay more for a burger was needed. And smearing foie gras or house-made relish on it was not going to be enough. A return to purist notions of the hamburger began to take hold—even an orthodoxy—in such forums where these things are earnestly considered and discussed. A virtuous burger, it was argued by aficionados, was the “original” recipe, a “roots” burger, unsullied by “foreign” or modern flavors, one whose meaty charm spoke for itself. Said burger should come from the very best mix of the very best parts of the very best quality beef from animals of verifiably excellent breeding. And it should be cooked “right” (whatever that implied).

Enter New York’s Minetta Tavern, where the Black Label Burger is of an exclusive blend prepared by Pat LaFrieda from grass-fed, free-range, organically raised Creekstone Farms beef. Seared simply and unapologetically on a griddle—where, we are assured, God intended us to cook our burgers—and served on a bun with a little onion confit, a slice of tomato, and a leaf of lettuce, everything new is old again. Only it’s 26 dollars now.