On a trip up north to Port Douglas recently, I was keen to see what the local burger scene was like and found myself at “Rattle & Hum” – a casual dining Mecca in the main street, complete with large bar, booth seating, pool table and lots of wood fired pizzas and pub cuisine on the menu. My kind of place.
I ordered the “Flame Grilled Beef Burger” – a garlic n’ herbed patty topped with melted cheese, BBQ sauce, caramelised onion and “salad” which turned out to be lettuce, tomato and spinach!? And whilst I had to say “hold the beetroot”, I was feeling hungry and adventurous so decided to throw in a chicken schnitzel too. Once the guy taking the order understood that I actually wanted to have the schnitzel in the burger and not on the side, we were all good!
I was excited as I waited, hoping this would be a delightful burger that kept me satisfied for days. My order was ready, and I headed up to grab it. The waitress handed me the meal and said, “that’s quite a beast you have yourself there”, I said “thank you” and took it as a good sign. This burger was pretty tasty. The garlic n’ herbed patty wasn’t bad and gave the meat a fair bit of flavour. And again, the inclusion of chicken into a beef burger paid dividends. Despite the schnitzel being frighteningly hot in comparison to the rest of the burger, the taste of the chicken against the beef, and crispy against soft, was really good! The spinach was ummmmm let’s say, “interesting” yet didn’t bother me anywhere near as much as the rocket lettuce!! Ugh!!
Chips on the side were delightful, and when it was all washed down with a few traditional Carlton Draughts on tap, the full pub experience was complete! I walked out satisfied, and full. What more do you need? Although, I couldn’t help but wonder if it was the inclusion of the chicken that made this a better experience or was the burger really that good?! Either way, if you are in Port Douglas, it is definitely worth paying a visit to Rattle & Hum, and hopefully you won’t walk out saying “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for!”
