We must start this Food Snob installment off with a bit of a confession. We always like to try food from a new place in town as soon as possible, but for one reason or another, we hadn’t made it into Revival Kitchen & Bar on Depot Street – which opened in January – until last week.
Shame on us, we know.
But the important thing is that we have now officially dined at Revival, and it was a thoroughly enjoyable experience, one that made us regret not having gone in sooner.
Led by chef and owner Corey Fletcher, formerly the head chef at The Granite Restaurant, Revival has sort of an upscale menu and a hip, adultish vibe. We don’t typically seek out these types of classy establishments, but we were really in the mood for something very tasty and McDonald’s just wouldn’t do.
Browsing over the menu, which changes at least four times a year, a lot of things caught our eye: Song Away Farm Rabbit (never had rabbit, always wanted to try), Grilled Swordfish (love it), Fried Chicken Thigh (really love it). But on this particular day at this particular time, we wanted something very basic, and we found just the thing.
The name on the menu was fairly innocuous and nondescript: “Burger.” Beneath the mysterious title was a description, explaining that this burger is made with Cascade Brook Farm grass-fed beef, bacon onion jam, greens, gouda cheese and a side of steak fries. Since we love all of those things, this is what we ordered.
When it came out, the presentation was hard to ignore. The top of the bun was moved aside to show off the caramelized bacon onion jam, and the steak fries – which were essentially a quarter of a potato each – had a nice sprinkling of Parmesan cheese coating their golden-brown skins. A small metal cup of ketchup sat opposite the fries.
The first bite we took was into one of those big, thick steak fries. They weren’t at all greasy and had plenty of crispiness to them, and they were nice and hot. The cheese added nice flavor without being way too strong – you would never mistake these for cheesy fries, but you won’t be reaching for the salt shaker, either.
We so liked the steak fries that we put down a couple of them before ever even picking up the burger.
Once we did get around to picking up that burger, it was a joy to eat.
The first thing we noticed was that upon picking it up, nothing dripped onto the plate or our clothes, which is always a good start.
We ordered the burger medium-well, and it was actually cooked exactly so – it’s easy to let it go a little too long and end up with a full-on well-done burger, but this one stayed right in that sweet spot.
The bacon onion jam really shined through in this otherwise pretty standard burger. Thick pieces of smoky bacon paired with the sweet onions made for an excellent flavor boost to the tender beef patty. It blended nicely with the slice of mild gouda.
It’s common for a higher-scale restaurant to go over the top when creating a burger, feeling the need to show off and prove they know how to be fancy and make a burger into some gourmet entrée, but at Revival, they know people just want tasty burgers, and that’s what they’ve created here. At $14 for the burger and fries, it’s definitely not the Dollar Menu, but if you’re serious about burgers, you wouldn’t mess with that cheap stuff anyway.
Revival, at 11 Depot St., is open from 4 to 9 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday and 4 to 10 Fridays and Saturdays. Go to revival- kitchennh.com for more.
