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Burger Week: Sloppy Lunch

Alright, so we got a little Sloppy on day four of Burger Week. But if you want to keep it all-American between your buns, there's nothing finer than the burger's slapdash sibling. We took Tartane's Sloppy Lunch for a messy test drive.

Image for Burger Week: Sloppy Lunch
Photo by Christophe Gruny

The fourth and final installment of Burger Week finds Exberliner in Mitte sampling the burger’s more chaotic cousin: the Sloppy Joe. Tartane’s lunch service dishes up a messy masterpiece.

Check out the rest of our week of hedonistic hamburger-scoffing: day one, day two, day three.

All right, the main attraction of the Sloppy Lunch – a weekday lunch service occupying the restaurant Tartane on Torstraße – isn’t the burger, but actually the Sloppy Joe. For non-Amis, something that could be best described as extra-beefy Bolognese sauce between two hamburger buns might seem disconcerting. However, this rare Berlin incarnation of the messy diner classic is as gourmet as it gets. The chef and mastermind behind this pop-up lunch, Andreas Herder, boasts a spunky meat sauce made from scratch with some 25 different herbs. He also bakes the buns himself – he used to make the bread at the popular Themroc up the road. The result, the Absolute Basic (€3.80), could compete as Italy’s best tomato-beef sauce as sandwiched between two halves of absolutely delicious home-baked yeasty delights.

For less adventurous meat lovers, the All Time Classic is a satisfactory regular hamburger. Meat-haters can get in on the Sloppy action with the Zesty Veggie (€4.30), a tofu-based patty with chickpeas, coriander and chilli that tends to sell out by the end of lunch service.

The Sloppy Fries are pretty gourmet as well, baked in the oven with olive oil and rosemary, then flash-fried for extra punch. Dip ‘em in Andreas’ fine “red & white” sauce, a herby, fragrant tomato dip with thyme mayo. Wash your lunch down with homemade ginger lemonade, and top it all off with a slice of delectable Floridian Key Lime Pie.

Originally published in Issue #118, July/August 2013.