Hamburger America (20 page)

Yugoslavian immigrant Chris “Bozo” Vodanovich Sr. opened Bozo’s Oyster House on St. Ann Street in New Orleans in 1928. At one point, Bozo had a fleet of eight boats to service the needs of his restaurant. Fresh oysters, shrimp, and catfish were the reasons most locals patronized the tiny restaurant, but from the beginning, Bozo offered a hamburger po’boy as an alternative to seafood.

The burger at Bozo’s is a combination of over 80 years of experience, a proprietary mixture of meat and onions, and a twist on a regional specialty—the po’boy sandwich. Among those for whom the perfect po’boy is a passion, it is understood that the bread used is as important as what goes on it. Because of this Chris uses only the best—French bread from Leidenheimer Bakery, an institution in New Orleans for over 100 years.

I asked Chris how big the burger was and he didn’t know. “We just make them to fit the bread,” he told me, smiling. The bread is not small, making this hamburger po’boy a filling meal. The fresh ground beef has onions and “other spices” mixed in before being hand pattied and cooked on a flattop griddle. The combination of the perfectly cooked burger and the pillowy bread makes for a great regional hamburger experience.

Chris inherited Bozo’s and moved his father’s business out of downtown New Orleans to Metairie in 1979 because, as he put it, “the neighborhood was gettin’ rough.” The Metairie location was expanded to accommodate 120 diners in two dining rooms separated by a large bar.

Today, Bozo’s is owned and run by Mark and Susan Fayard, but Chris still comes in to visit. “He’s here at least three times a week,” Susan told me, and added with a laugh. “We can’t get rid of him!”

While I talked to Chris, every patron said “Thanks, Mr. Chris” as they paid their tabs and left. He speaks with a gentle Louisiana twang and has piercing blue eyes and wavy grey hair. I asked him “Why Bozo?” “In the old country, Bozo was the word for Christ,” he told me, “and my name is Chris.”

 

 

P
ort of Call is a bar and restaurant that sits on the far northeast end of the French Quarter in New Orleans. I say this because when people tell you this place is in the Quarter your thoughts first go to drunken tourists with their souvenir hurricane glasses, lame strip clubs, and big-ass beers. Not so here. Port of Call is on the other end of the quarter, in a quiet, beautiful neighborhood.

The building Port of Call calls home dates back to the turn of the century, where it started as a sailor bar. Over the years it went from grocery store to tavern and then opened as a steakhouse in 1962. Burger sales one day eclipsed the steak, and today Port of Call is the most popular (and best) burger destination in New Orleans.

The decor is comfortably nautical and has dark wood floors, wood walls, wood tables, and a wood bar. The entire ceiling is a web of sisal rope and the whole place feels like it might start rocking with the tide.

There are four burger choices—Hamburger, Cheeseburger, Mushroom Burger, and Mushroom Cheeseburger. It’s the Mushroom cheeseburger that keeps them coming back.

Port of Call grinds its own sirloin and forms burgers into eight-ounce patties. The burgers are char-grilled and served on a bun that seems too small for the amount of meat provided. In order to make the patty fit, the burger is a tall, inch-and-a-half-thick, perfectly cooked fist of meat. The cheese is shredded cheddar and the mushrooms are sautéed in wine, butter, and garlic and melt in your mouth. It looks like a mess when it arrives at your spot at the bar (or at one of the many tables in two dining rooms) but is actually easy to handle once you get going.

Port of Call was spared major damage during the devastating Hurricane Katrina in 2005. “The flooding stopped two blocks that way,” general manager of over thirty years Mike Mollere told me, pointing north. “We were extremely fortunate and had little damage. After the neighborhood opened back up, I just turned the key and we were open for business.” Mike followed his post-hurricane opening by serving first responders and the press.

I arrived at Port of Call just before opening, hoping to beat the crowds. No such luck. By the time the ancient, windowless wood doors were unlatched there were over 20 people waiting on the sidewalk to get their mushroom burger fix. “It’s like that every morning,” Mike said, shaking his head. I took a spot at the bar and watched as the restaurant filled almost to capacity with an additional 50 hungry tourists, locals, and construction workers. Within ten minutes the Port of Call was transformed from an empty, dark bar into a bustling, lively hot spot. Mike pointed out that they have the best jukebox in town. “Hey, where else can you hear Zappa on a jukebox?”

 

 

M
y first question for owner Pete Wormell was a dumb one—I asked, “Why Harmon’s Lunch?” Through a thick monotone Maine accent he told me, “We’re only open for lunch.” Even though this tiny burger spot in Maine is open for only four and a half hours a day, they still manage to sell over 80,000 burgers a year.

Amazingly, Pete knows exactly how many burgers he sells every year because he jots down the day’s total on a calendar. When I asked him why, he said, “I’m weird, I guess.” You can ask him how many he sold on any day in the last decade and he’ll be able to tell you. “Look,” he said, pointing to the calendar, “We only sold 144 that day because of snow.”

Pete and friend Cliff bought Harmon’s in 1995 from Marvin Harmon, who was looking for the right people to buy the place. “I blame him,” Pete said, pointing at Cliff, who was working the grill. Cliff had seen an ad in the paper
that the restaurant was for sale. He has since sold his portion to Pete, who joked, “We’re still friends part-time.”

Marvin built the small wood-frame burger joint in 1960. Today, not much has changed, but Pete started an impressive collection of vintage Maine dairy bottles that line the walls. It’s a collection that is rooted in his family’s dairy past.

Both Pete and Cliff share time at the busy seasoned griddle cranking out excellent burgers. The menu is limited to burgers, hot dogs, and grilled cheese, but fresh-cut fries are also available. If you ask for milk, specify either “white” or “chocolate” or be pegged a tourist.

The burger at Harmon’s is small but tasty. Pete buys fresh ground beef and uses a patty former at the restaurant to make two-ounce patties. “We made them by hand for the first six months,” Cliff told me. “That was enough.”

A fully loaded burger comes with mustard, fried onions, and a signature sweet red relish. “Most people think it’s going to be hot because of its color,” Pete told me. A local bakery provides preservative-free buns that are steamed to limp. The bun creates an impossibly soft, warm pillow that cradles the perfectly cooked thin patty.

The wait at Harmon’s, especially on a Saturday, can be up to 45 minutes. “We get backed up,” Pete said, “but to have the quality you can’t do more.”

When Pete and Cliff first took the helm at Harmon’s, they decided to slightly alter the menu and offer a traditional Maine favorite—the lobster roll. The attempt backfired and the roll was pulled from the menu after only a few weeks. “This is a hamburger place,” Pete explained, and attributed the failure to the old adage “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.”

 

 

B
ill Bartley is an original. He stands at the griddle at his family’s Harvard Square eatery shouting things at me like “We’re the BEST!” and “This is the greatest burger ANYWHERE!” He’s smiling and extremely energetic and has the kind of cocksure confidence and running dialogue usually reserved for someone like Muhammed Ali in his prime. Fortunately, all of it is true—the burgers at Mr. Bartley’s are unbelievable.

“I’ve probably made over five million burgers in the last 30 years,” Bill told me as he shifted some thick patties on the 600-degree griddle, “All good ones too, all cooked to temp.” If you ask for medium-rare, that’s what you’ll get. Every burger goes out exactly the way Bill wants them
to, which means perfect. If you ask for cheese it’s cooked
separately
from the burger. Where most chefs melt the cheese atop the burger as it nears completion, Bill cooks the perfect burger, tosses a thick slice of cheese directly on the griddle for a minute, then gently transfers it to the burger as it is dispatched to a table. As Bill eloquently explained, “The cheese is ambivalent to the temperature of the burger.”