GBK’s – Rocket Man DIY

It was in BlueWater back end of last year that I tried one of GBK’s burgers and I was unimpressed. I love everything about the branding of GBK and I have always considered it more of a premium burger, for want of another phrase. In truth, since Cheeseburgerme has started, I have definitely realised that some of the most amazing burgers are not developed by these larger brands. The Rocket Man, however, did spark and interest when I saw it advertised for DIY on Plateaway and so, took the plunge, read one to see how it went.

The Bun: 13/20

Firstly, I have to mention the presentation of the DIY kit. I loved the branding, the little coloured stickers and definitely loved the free bag that came which is pictured above.

The buns did look good in the packaging. I am not really a sesame seed kind of person but I have to admit that there is something about a decent sesame bun that does offer nostalgia for burgers in the early 90s for me. GBK provided instruction to toast the buns and so I opted for a quick 7 minutes in the oven which has yielded me some fantastic results of late with DIY Kits so why break a good thing! Again, it worked. Good crispness but soft to the chew. I liked it. The bun wasn’t sweet, like we have come to expect from the modern day brioche, but perhaps the blandness helped encourage the flavours from the others in the stack to produce. Was a decent bun, above average but not ground breaking either.

The Condiments: 4/10

The Rocket Man comes with jalapeños and paprika crispy onions. I definitely tasted the jalapeños, which I liked, but the onions were completely redundant. I literally tasted nothing at all, I didn’t even get the crispness from them. I did wonder, if it was down to the positioning in the stack. The DIY kit directs to have the onions on the heel of the burger and there is a generous amount too but they were MIA, nowhere to be seen, pointless. I did like the jalapeños though!! I like a fresh spice and this definitely offered that although the double edged sword here is that it fired up the habanero jam something chronic. I liked it, wife hated it!

The Condiments: 6/10

The Hot habanero Jam was ok for me. It had a sweetness to it, as expected but it was full of pepper and seeds. I could literally see seeds in the jam and that actually excited me. I have a little bit of a fire mouth and so if there is something hot on the menu I am in, this was no exception. The texture was a little thick for me. I mean, its a burger right, its about that melted cheese and patty and that is always going to be the foundation that you look for. If you are going to be disturbed by something, then be it bacon, or brisket, or pork belly for that matter. Having a thick, gloopy jam, on there, probably not the best idea unless it is absolutely the best jam ever made by a human. So, although I liked it, it did not wow me overall. I think, having such a consistency, some lettuce or something to break it up would have helped.

The Cheese: 18/20

Although my wife and I disagreed hugely in this category, I really loved the cheese. It was a mature cheddar which melted really well over the patty and housed the jalapeños inside. The habanero jam did overpower a lot in this stack but the cheese was just always there on the tip of your tongue. I could taste it consistently, that lovely mature cheddar taste that hangs after every bite and the consistency that makes a burger sexy. It was great. The DIY kit comes with 2 burgers rather than 4 but if I was to have 4 burgers I think I would have double stacked and just made cheeseburgers.

The Patty: 15/20

If you are a frequent on Cheeseburgerme then you will know that one of my colleagues has sporadic shots at the “gaminess of the meat”. I think this patty would have been right up his street. It was not gamy in the slightest and I felt, had no ageing process to it whatsoever. The DIY kit did state to cook the burger for 4 minutes a side on a medium to high heat after a sprinkling of GBK’s special seasoning. I was generous on this sprinkling of special seasoning believe me and I am glad that I was. My next mission is to find out what went into that seasoning because I really loved it. It crusted to the outside of the patty and tasted really good. A tinge of sweet but a savoury made up of what I can describe, at a guess, paprika, onion powder and black pepper as some core components. The meat itself was cooked to medium as the cooking instructions requested but let me assure you it was a 10min cook not a 8 minute cook. At 8 minutes the patties had broken just a little on the flip and they look like horror movies, definitely not ready to cook. Being a little more experienced in the kitchen now it was a quick adjustment and an educated guess but it cooked to medium and tasted good. Not being dry aged meat it wasn’t my ideal meat, the ageing process definitely adds to that richness. GBK’s patty lacked in this area a little for me. Either way, it was a quality meat and tasted nice. The seasoning definitely sneaked it another point or two.

Taste: 13/20

I found it hard to score the taste category and required a lot of thought and reading back on my notes. The Rocket Man has an abundance of strong flavours which cancelled each other out to an extent. Paprika, Mature Cheddar, Jalapeños and Habenero as core components of a burger you expect it to be bursting with flavour. Independent of one another they definitely did have huge profiles but the balance concluded as a bit of a draw. The heat, which you expect, was definitely there but the flavour, as a whole, was intermittent. Disappointing as a venture but still pleasing as a burger. GBK are a good burger company, not one of my top burger restaurants, but you should check our review of The Mighty Burger from GBK

Our Verdict: 69/100

The Rocket Man is a pretty nice burger. Given the standard of some of the burgers that I have tried of late it is not, perhaps, one that I would want to try again. That being said, if I had to take the kids for lunch one day and we were in GBK, the Rocket Man is the burger I would order out of the two I have had from GBK. Overall the balance is not quite right in an adventurous burger in terms of flavour profile. To check out your local GBK you should have a look at their website here