I've been to the Palais a few times. It's in a nice location, it's quite nice inside and the food is decent. I went a few weeks ago again, and not surprisingly, I couldn't go past the burger option on the menu. It's a bit more 'fancy' than a lot of burgers out there, but it's not too over the top. The bar is also quite good, so it's a good sport for a burger and a beer (or three).
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| The "Beachfront Bistro" at the Palais Hotel, Semaphore |
The burger as per the menu:
palais beef burger - prime beef pattie, bacon, cheddar cheese, slow cooked onion jam, tomato relish and salad greens on a toasted lepinja bun served w chunky chips and garlic aioli 16.50
It was a nice looking burger, and came with very thick-cut fries. The extras were not your typical burger extras, but a nice change from the usual. The garlic aioli was a nice addition to the fries, but a little bland.
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| Palais Burger with Fries and Garlic Aioli |
Meat:
The meat was extremely disappointing. It was more like a Cevapcici than a burger pattie. That's fine if that's what you want, but I wanted a burger! It was over-seasoned, chewy and a bit dry. It did taste ok, but just didn't seem like a burger to me. Despite not tasting bad, I really can't rate it highly as a burger pattie.
Score: 2/5
Cheese:
The cheese was very nicely melted - a good characteristic of cheddar cheeses. It was salty, gooey and tasty. It wasn't as good as the processed cheese that fast food places use in terms of taste, but it was a good addition, and went some way to making up for the poor beef.
Score: 3.5/5
Bun:
The bun was a little different to most places. A lot of hotels etc. think putting some meat, cheese and salad in a fancy bun or roll makes a "gourmet" burger. They are wrong! It was nicely toasted, and tasted good, but didn't do anything to compensate for the meat. Good, but nothing amazing.
Score: 3/5
Extras:
The extras in the Palais burger were a little different. Rather than the standard lettuce, tomato, onion and ketchup/mustard, the burger contained "slow-cooked onion jam, tomato relish and salad greens". They were good. The onion jam was sweet, but tangy. The relish was also tangy, but not over-powering. A better addition than tomato sauce/ketchup in my opinion. The salad greens were simply a couple of types of wilted lettuce - not in the same league as the other extras. They added a lot of welcome flavour to the burger. Such extras are great for unusual burgers, or those where the meat and cheese is lacking (as was the case with the Palais burger).
Score: 3.5/5
Fries:
The fries appeared to be hand-cut. They were very thick. They appeared white, an indication of them being under-done. This was definitely the case. They were even too under-cooked for me. They tasted average. The garlic aioli wasn't too bad, but was rather bland and could have been stronger. I'd eat these fries if they were given to me, but definitely wouldn't rush out to get them again.
Score: 2.5/5
Would I recommend it? Probably not. It isn't a bad-tasting mixture of meat, cheese, bread and extras. It's just not a burger to me. The meat is extremely important, and almost no combination of amazing additions such as cheese and extras is going to redeem a burger with such a poor pattie. It wouldn't take much for the Palais to improve this burger - but they need to start with the fundamentals.
Total score: 14.5/25
(Decent, worth a shot)
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