It seemed like the whole city was in collective mourning when the news broke. All five locations of Red Robin would be closing their doors in December. No more freckled lemonades or bottomless steak fries to be had. Regardless, the world moves on. Plenty of other delicious burgers in the city to drown your sorrows in.
One of the newer (and proudly local!) burger establishments that's been generating some buzz is Fox Burger. Brought to you by the same folks behind Elm Cafe (now Speedy's Cantina), District Cafe, and Little Brick, Fox Burger is one of the three new businesses now occupying the heritage building of Gibbard Block in the Highlands neighbourhood. The other two include a boutique liquor store and Jewish-inspired deli, June's Delicatessen.
The renovation of the historic building was quite the undertaking, but the community came out in full support. The Kickstarter campaign, launched back in September 2018, raised over $100,000! Now a year later, the doors are finally open and ready to serve.
Fox Burger is open 6 days a week (closed Tuesdays), from 5-11pm, not including their brunch service on the weekends. SC and I met up on a Friday night, right when they opened. We were already met with a small line but thankfully the restaurant now takes reservations for those who can't there as early as we did. Parking is also readily available, free up and down 112th Ave, as well as across the street in their leased parking lot.
The room is a simple rectangle with an open layout. It's a bit sparse in decoration, but it's quite cozy with the lights dimmed. On Friday night, there was a good mix of families, couples, and groups of friends just hanging out.
As for the menu, it's fairly straightforward. Burgers take precedence of course, with four beef options, one fish, one chicken, and two veggie burgers. There's a small selection of appetizers, salads, and sides to choose from, along with a special kid's menu. They've also recently started doing daily specials, such as $12 burgers on Mondays and half priced bottles of wine on Wednesdays.
I was one of their backers on Kickstarter, so my reward was a "dinner for two." Two drinks, two burgers with sides, and two desserts.
Their drink menu is a curated selection of local beers, wine, cocktails, sodas, and milkshakes. Both SC and I opted for the latter. Her salted caramel apple shake ($7.00) was sweet and fruity, while my vanilla chai shake ($7.00) had plenty of warm spice. Both milkshakes were the ideal texture -- thick enough but easily slurpable. (Maybe too easy. We were getting full even before our burgers came out!)
All of their burgers are ground in-house and made to order. The patties are prepared in classic "smash burger" fashion where the beef is quite literally smashed onto the flat top. In doing so, the burger gets a nice even sear. Crispy edges are developed all along its circumference and the caramelized crust helps to lock juices in. The only downside to smash burgers is a thinner patty, so if it's not enough meat for you, there's always the option to add an extra patty for $4.00.
For our first burger, we opted for their most popular seller -- the bacon pepper smash ($16.00). Smash sauce, pickled peppers, bacon, iceberg lettuce, and American cheddar, all sandwiched between a classic sesame seed bun.
While the other ingredients are quite classic, I liked the ingenuity of the pickled peppers. They added freshness and a good crunch. The other standout for me was the smash sauce -- creamy and tangy with a small kick.
The other burger we tried was the ahi tuna club ($18.00). The ahi tuna was grilled rare, and accompanied with bacon, tomato jam, pickled peppers, lemon aioli, and iceberg lettuce. Everything tasted fresh but I felt like the tuna was somewhat lost here. We both preferred the beef burger over this one.
Burgers also come with a side of your choice. The house garlic fries is the only one that doesn't come with a surcharge. Hand-cut and skin-on, the fries are crispy and garlicky. They also come in a generous pile on your plate.
We upgraded one of the sides to the rotini & cheese (+$3.00). A slightly elevated mac & cheese with 3-cheese mornay sauce, scallions, crispy fried onions, and rotini noodles. The spiral nature of rotini helps trap more sauce within its ridges but SC found there wasn't enough sauce to coat the noodles. It was a bit on the dry side for her.
We were pretty much bursting at the seams at this point, but we still had dessert to power through! The lemon curd and blackberry ice cream sandwich ($8.00) was a refreshing choice. Lemon curd and blackberry jam semifreddo, sandwiched between two poppyseed macaron cookies. We were both hoping for more blackberries in the ice cream, but I think we just drew the short straw when it came to our slice.
Our final bite of the night was the apple pie with cinnamon ice cream and salted caramel ($8.00). Flaky crust, warm jammy apples, and cold, smooth ice cream. The perfect finishing touch was that drizzle of sweet, sweet caramel. If you have enough room for dessert, this is the one.
What does the fox say? It's telling you to eat here.
Fox Burger
6423 112 Ave NW
Edmonton, AB
(780) 250-0369
- CT
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