NADC Burger, which stands for Not a Damn Chance, started out in Austin, TX and didn’t make a dime in its first two years. It turns out that giving away burgers for free at the skatepark isn’t super profitable. But with constant iteration and a bar with open kitchen space on Rainey Street, skateboarder Neen Williams and Michelin-Starred Chef Phillip Frankland Lee brought their one perfect burger to life. Most recently the duo has expanded to NYC where I got to try the fruits (or meats) of their labor.
The name of the game at NADC is consistency and quality. Williams explains, “that’s why we make just one burger and fries. And we spent a long time building our burger so that for us it’s our perfect burger.” The NADC burger is two Texas wagyu patties, American cheese, pickles, tamed jalapeños (lightly cooked and pickled to remove the spice but keep the flavor and crunch), and a ton of sauce on a toasted Martin’s bun.
How they arrived at the build, what ingredients they use and their prep methods would be a supersized newsletter all on its own. Lee says, “There’s an almost philosophical reason for everything that we do. ‘Why do you do that with the onions?’ And I’ll be like do you have 15 minutes? I can give you 15 minutes on why the onions, why the onions that way? Why the cheese, why the cheese that way? But that’s two plus years of micro-adjustments.” The goal is for the burger not only to be excellent, but excellent every time.
Lee attributes his time in fine dining for the dedication to high standards for every single meal. “If you over toast the bun, you throw it away. If you overseason, underseason, I don’t care, make it again. It doesn’t go out until it’s correct,” he says about the NADC kitchen.
One of the elements that I could tell took a lot of care was exactly how the patties get cooked. While Lee makes them using a press, he avoids the term “smash burger” when describing the burgers at NADC. “Instagram has changed what a smash burger is. The smash is not supposed to be a thickness,” Lee explains. “The smash is a technique to create a crust, but because of instagram, everybody’s smash burgers are paper thin and because we don’t do that, we don’t call it a smash anymore.”
Once the burgers get pressed and seasoned, they get topped with diced onion so that after flipping, the onions steam and essentially melt into the patty, not dissimilar to the Motz method. Once off the grill, I watch Williams assemble the burgers: a heavy dose of sauce on both buns, a spread of thinly sliced pickles on one side and the tamed jalapeños on the other with the patties plopped on the pickle side of the bun.
I sat out in the Soho backyard for my meal before heading to see Amyl and the Sniffers, as Williams and Lee promised me this burger would be enough to fill me, but light enough that I could go immediately got jostled in the rowdy crowd.
The first bite was as harmonious as I’d been promised - fatty, salty, briny with pops of crunch. The sauce didn’t overwhelm the buns, as they’d been toasted to the point of slight dehydration. Ingredient distribution was even as promised, with every component in every bite. Plus, this will only run you $16, a decent deal in this neck of the woods.
I’m placing the NADC burger at 16 in my ranking - between Rippers and Diner. Thanks again to Neen and Phillip for chatting with me about the method behind the burger!