A splendidly meat-free upgrade to the boringly traditional cheeseburger

July 12, 2023 2:00 AM

In Thailand, people have been enjoying [1] [2] 'The Real Cheeseburger' (Facebook post), available at Burger King restaurants. This deliciously consists of a standard burger bun, wholesomely engorged with twenty slices of the delicacy 'American Cheese'. Fine dining reviews are surprisingly mixed; on TikTok, a diner described the burger as “greasy” but “pretty delicious”. If not to your palate, then alternative cheeseburgers are available. Bon appétit!
posted by Wordshore (50 comments total)

(now I've read other posts, it is just a coincidence that this one directly follows the previous one here on the front page)
posted by Wordshore at 2:03 AM on July 12, 2023 [5 favorites]

Whaaatttttt. Ok I used to eat Velveeta chunks as a child this is not much different. Mustard is really good with process cheese. I think 20 slices is probably overwhelming for that bun though. Pretty layout with the alternating corners. I’m not judging! Go for it.
posted by seanmpuckett at 3:43 AM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

I think my main problem is that, from a shape point of view, it doesn't look easy to eat. The human mouth has not - yet - evolved to comfortably eat a vertical stack of twenty slices of American cheese, mouthwatering though the thought of it is. It might be easier to consume, and more convenient, to put it in a blender and make some kind of "Real Cheeseburger Smoothie"?

There is much debate/excitement over this meal on The Internet. However, some people are arguing it should be more accurately described as a grilled cheese sandwich, or cheese toastie. Huh.
posted by Wordshore at 4:01 AM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

it should be more accurately described as a grilled cheese sandwich

From the non promo pictures in the “surprisingly” article at least, it doesn’t even look grilled in reality? Just a deep stack of dry cheese.
posted by advil at 4:09 AM on July 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

However, some people are arguing it should be more accurately described as a grilled cheese sandwich, or cheese toastie.

Both of those would require it to actually be toasted or grilled or griddled or something though, right? From the pictures in the review article, it looks like it just straight up is twenty slices of cheese between two buns. It's a cheese batch (or bap, roll, cob, whatever your preferred regionalism is).
posted by Dysk at 4:10 AM on July 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

Cheesechurger (not beeschurger).

Count me in as revolted. Even like, three slices of unmelted American on a cheese sandwich is too much.
posted by uncleozzy at 4:12 AM on July 12, 2023 [10 favorites]

My son does this (though he only uses about 3 slices of cheese and only on regular bread, not a bun). I don’t get it, but at least he’s eating.
posted by Mchelly at 4:15 AM on July 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

Hey Thailand! This was NOT an instruction video!
posted by lalochezia at 4:19 AM on July 12, 2023 [7 favorites]

Lol, this is great.

I have a funny memory related to Burger King cheeseburgers. As a kid in the 70s, I was a picky eater, and on the occasions where I found myself at a fast food place, I just wanted a literal "cheese+burger" on the bun, no condiments, lettuce, etc.

Ordering this could be trickier than you think, I would often say "I would like a cheeseburger, plain, nothing on it" and that would do the trick. Occasionally, the order-taker would still be confused or need more explanation, so I might say "A cheeseburger...just cheese, nothing else".

On quite a few occasions I would get some version of this "real cheeseburger", a bun and a few slices of cheese.

Quite the trailblazer I was.
posted by jeremias at 4:38 AM on July 12, 2023 [4 favorites]

OK so now that I'm awake. What these folks are missing is that you take the American Cheese slices, maybe two of them, and you put it between two slices of ultra-white Wonder bread, and remove the crust, and then you crush it into a ball, and then you dip THAT into yellow mustard. And it's really good. At least I have memories of it being really good, I can't eat bread now. I think they should do this, this is the natural evolution. Take "food no one wants" and transform it into a new shape and douse it in "condiment" and it's haute cuisine. This is unix! I know this!
posted by seanmpuckett at 4:46 AM on July 12, 2023 [6 favorites]

ok i'll type it

maybe the real cheeseburger was the friends we ate along the way

posted by glonous keming at 4:48 AM on July 12, 2023 [14 favorites]

However, some people are arguing it should be more accurately described as a grilled cheese sandwich, or cheese toastie.

u/Fuck_Blue_Shells has entered the chat.
posted by vorpal bunny at 5:50 AM on July 12, 2023 [4 favorites]

I am largely on page with bread+cheese+grease+grill=grilled cheese sandwich. There is nothing finer to dip in your bowl of reconstituted condensed tomato soup. This is a what do you call it in statistics an orbital? a local minima? that's it -- it's a local maxima of a thing, like catsup. any change makes it lesser than itself.
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:55 AM on July 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

three slices of unmelted American on a cheese sandwich is too much

One slice is too much. American "cheese" is an abomination.
posted by doctornemo at 6:03 AM on July 12, 2023 [6 favorites]

I’m a lifelong vegetarian and picky eater and as a kid I’d on purpose get the plain-cheeseburger-without-the-burger that jeremias describes. But they’d only put one cheese on it which isn’t enough.

This has too much cheese on it. That is not a sentence you’ll often hear from me, as I am usually on team more-cheese-is-more-better (as, i suspect, are many of us in this thread). Still, I appreciate the commitment to the bit!

But it does look like they may have lightly melted each slice perhaps directly on the grill.
posted by aubilenon at 6:24 AM on July 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

there's a greasy spoon restaurant near me that makes a bacon double cheeseburger that uses grilled cheese sandwiches as the top and bottom bun. i ate one once and honestly it was ok but a bit try-hard and somehow managed to be, culinarily, lesser than the sum of its parts
posted by glonous keming at 6:27 AM on July 12, 2023 [4 favorites]

But it does look like they may have lightly melted each slice perhaps directly on the grill.

Yeah, in the promo images. The photos look rather different.
posted by Dysk at 6:32 AM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

But it does look like they may have lightly melted each slice perhaps directly on the grill.

American/process cheese on a grill doesn't...um...behave like that.
posted by JoeZydeco at 6:34 AM on July 12, 2023 [5 favorites]

La Randalla (*) was an infamous Mexican restaurant in San Francisco’s Mission district whose enchiladas were made with what appeared to be processed American cheese slices melted directly on a flattop and scraped into a tortilla.

(*) It was perpetually Cinco de Maya in La Rondalla
posted by Insert Clever Name Here at 6:44 AM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

20 is fine but if you put 64 on it then you'll go blind
posted by msiebler at 7:01 AM on July 12, 2023 [7 favorites]

nothing finer to dip in your bowl of reconstituted condensed tomato soup

ah, the classic pairing
posted by ovvl at 7:24 AM on July 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

The thing about American cheese is that if you grow up with parents who are on a tight budget so they never purchase ready-made anything and also think that American cheese is an abomination then as an adult you will think that American cheese is...well, delicious might be overstating the case, but at any rate enjoyable from time to time. I like an American cheese sandwich on wonder bread now and then, precisely because when I was growing up a sandwich was a single layer of thin sharp cheddar slices cut with a cheese plane, the cheapest whole wheat bread in the store, mustard, maybe a leaf of iceberg lettuce and two slices of thin-sliced deli turkey. Economical, wholesome, tastes okay, but absolutely nothing like your gluttonous, salty classic American sandwich.
posted by Frowner at 7:31 AM on July 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

Wordshore, nooooooooo!
posted by loquacious at 7:47 AM on July 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

what do you call it in statistics an orbital? a local minima? that's it -- it's a local maxima of a thing

We’re orbiting a chaotic basin of attraction if improving our thing changes it wildly, in all aspects, and yet eventually spirals into the basin. We’ve got a local extreme if a bunch of different things, independently improved, get gradually more and more alike.
posted by clew at 8:28 AM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

I love all sorts of stinky fancy European-style cheese. But American cheese is exactly right for some applications. If I want a breakfast sandwich, I want American cheese melting over my egg, not epoisses or even gruyere.
posted by tavella at 8:29 AM on July 12, 2023 [13 favorites]

Now I am imagining thick slabs of ultra-white bread cut in the shape of sushi rice, with fat slices of American cheese on top, but still wrapped with a little belt of seaweed. OK and you can have ones with bologna instead of cheese. You can have little dipping bowls of mustard, and mayo, and marmite? And little rolls of bread with BLT in them. This is funny, but also kind of serious, california rolls of bread and olive oil and avocado. I bet it would be a hit.
posted by seanmpuckett at 8:36 AM on July 12, 2023 [5 favorites]

I bet it would be a hit.

It would be a hit. That is clearly restaurant genius. You'd need to jazz them up somehow so that you could charge more money - maybe use some kind of ultra-fancy house-made sauces? Or a special extra robust but still spongey white bread?
posted by Frowner at 8:46 AM on July 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

Spam musubi is already a thing, so just swap out the rice for bread and play with the form and fillings. I'd try it--sounds fun.
posted by indexy at 8:53 AM on July 12, 2023

The picture of this thing with a bite taken out of it is appalling.

American Cheese is just so much, ugh. 20 slices? Nope

Pretty sure I ate plenty of American Cheese as a child, (I remember the individually plastic wrapped slices my mom used to buy), but it holds no nostalgia for me. Probably still holding some of the oilyness, but I digress.

Cheddar is just better. For pretty much any use case for American Cheese...
posted by Windopaene at 9:15 AM on July 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

Like tavella, I'm an aficionado of flavorful cheeses who's happy to use American cheese in some melty applications, like eggs or a cheeseburger. However, it's got to be a decent deli-sliced American cheese like Boar's Head brand, not the single slice in a wrapper stuff.
posted by mollweide at 9:36 AM on July 12, 2023 [4 favorites]

As someone who would definitely try this anyway:

You do this with Halloumi or Akawie (spellings seem to differ by brand) cheeses!
and you grill them until nice and golden first! That's the real cheeseburger.
posted by Acari at 9:41 AM on July 12, 2023 [5 favorites]

Too much cheese is apparently a thing.

Also, American Processed Cheese is absolutely the best thing for a grilled cheese or a hamburger. Want to be fancy? Use it in conjunction with cheddar and take advantage of the emulsifying salts - they make the cheddar melt better
posted by drewbage1847 at 9:47 AM on July 12, 2023 [5 favorites]

Beyond the thickness of the cheese stack, it's the plainness of this that strikes me. In the one video I watched, the taster does at one point dip it in ketchup. Sorta surprised it's not dressed up a bit with a sauce, pickles, something.
posted by coffeecat at 9:50 AM on July 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

I deeply approve of this in theory, but the photos of the actual thing show that the actual execution is seriously lacking. A nice grilled halloumi patty under a melted slice of american cheese dressed with mustard, pickles, and onions seems more the right play. IN FACT, maybe that's what I am having for lunch.
posted by 3j0hn at 10:02 AM on July 12, 2023 [3 favorites]

twenty slices of the  delicacy  plague that is 'American Cheese'.

vehemently FTFY

I am, however, interested in the beef tallow cheese oil in the video at the "alternative" link in TFA. The video doesn't make it clear whether they're comparing a burger cooked in plain beef tallow with a burger cooked in the cheese oil. If that's not what happened, I'd like to see that comparison to better understand what difference the cheese oil makes. Either way though, I am definitely planning to get a tub of beef tallow for my future burger frying needs.
posted by Greg_Ace at 10:08 AM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

It sounded maybe OK until I saw it. I like a pretty thick grilled cheese, including layered like a club sandwich, but there are limits.

The evolved form of this concept might be a deep-fried cheese patty like a giant oval cheese stick. A dedicated concept joint could stock them in different cheeses, let you top them differently, etc.
posted by snuffleupagus at 10:49 AM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

In the second video, the actual burger (not the promo image) looks melty, but since it's shown being assembled directly onto the bun, my best guess is it's melty from being wrapped in the paper wrapper and placed under the heat lamps. Or maybe they flipped the entire bun/cheese combo once assembled a few times on a flat top grill.

Also, because I am an old, I cannot help but link this.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 11:09 AM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

Thailand has established enough culinary cred on the world stage that I'll try anything being eaten there. If I don't like it then I'm the one who's wrong.
posted by charismatic megafauna at 11:31 AM on July 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

Mankind: We want to live forever!

Also mankind: Builds this atrocity.
posted by tommasz at 12:01 PM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

I used to know a weirdo who was vegetarian and probably had some sort of food aversion, but he was also not even remotely interested in health food and ate at a lot of fast food chain drive throughs. Even worse he was one of those skinny people that was constantly hungry and a stoner.

He liked cruising around in his car in LA a lot, and whenever he felt even a bit peckish he had a habit of randomly pulling over into any given fast food chain and get a plain cheese sandwich to snack on, usually washed down with Mtn Dew.

And almost every time he had to explain himself multiple times that, yes, he just wanted a bun, no meat, no sauce, no pickles, and definitely no veggies with however many extra slices of cheese they could put on it instead of everything else and not being charged too much extra.

His favorite was probably In-n-Out because they get all kinds of weird custom orders and they're used to it, but it didn't really matter what chain it was as long as they had some kind of cheese and some kind of bread. Subway? Cheese and bread. McDonald's? Cheese and bread. Wendy's? Cheese and bread. He'd even go to Taco Bell and just get cheese in plain, dry taco shells or flour tortillas. Like sometimes he'd just order a bean and cheese burrito, hold the beans and salsa and would just get a bunch of cold shredded cheese wrapped up in a tortilla.

Dude ate an alarming amount of fast food cheese and bread, and the "Real Cheeseburger" in the post is probably his idea of heaven and he would be all about it.
posted by loquacious at 5:34 PM on July 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

I can't decide who they're trolling--BK, American culture, Thais who want to eat at BK, or youth who will do/eat anything for lulz.
posted by aught at 6:29 PM on July 12, 2023 [2 favorites]

His favorite was probably In-n-Out because they get all kinds of weird custom orders and they're used to it

A grilled cheese is actually on their secret menu, but they'd have to hold the lettuce, tomatoes, onions, and sauce. I have ordered it just like your friend would, and it's definitely not as good as a proper grilled cheese.
posted by aubilenon at 6:50 PM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

Ctrl-F "plastic"

OK let's be clear, the plastic is the cheese itself. Furthermore, there are no valid applications for american plastic cheese squares. You want boring taste? Mild cheddar. Something that doesn't taste like cheese? Brunost. Ubiquitous? Cheddar I guess. Pre-sliced squares? Havarti. Neater slices than with a knife? Add a cheese slicer to the cutlery drawer. Plasticky texture? Halloumi. Burger replacement? Properly prepared Halloumi. Grilling? Red Leicester. Non-imported? There are so many cheeses from america that aren't process[ed]. Extremely smooth and shiny? Edam. Suspiciously snug in its wrapping? Bavarian smoked. Shaking your head at in disappointment? Appenzeller (sorry not sorry). "Cheese product"? Uh... Babybel. Offending delicate sensibilities? Casu Martzu (don't look that up).

And then if you want to actually fall in love with the cheese there's mature Gouda, or Wyngaard Goat Gouda, or Ossau Iraty, or or or

(also as someone with ARFID, if non-plastic cheeses all trigger food aversion, that sucks and you get to have an exception. I got off lightly in the cheese department - apart from blue cheeses and sometimes soft cheeses, it's mostly the taste wonderland it's supposed to be)
posted by polytope subirb enby-of-piano-dice at 8:48 PM on July 12, 2023 [1 favorite]

I got off lightly in the cheese department

That happens to me there too sometimes, though I usually check first to make sure no-one's watching.
posted by Greg_Ace at 9:16 PM on July 12, 2023 [9 favorites]

If I want cheddar, I'll use cheddar. Sometimes American cheese is exactly what suits. People are sometimes genuinely bizarre about insisting on other people's food choices.
posted by tavella at 3:15 AM on July 13, 2023 [4 favorites]

Cheese, even plastic burger cheese, is sufficiently expensive in Thailand that the current discount price is actually a very cost-effective way to get 20 cheese slices. Anyway Burger King also did a Hershey's tie-in chocolate burger and fries so I think they are just very skilled at viral marketing through trolling.
posted by penguinliz at 3:23 AM on July 13, 2023 [2 favorites]

I really do share your perception of people's insistence on other people's food choices as "bizarre". But when it comes to eating squares of plastic, I strongly believe that for any application other than "attempting to eat non-plastic cheese causes a fight-or-flight response" there is always a better option that satisfies the requirements that put plastic squares up for consideration - whether that's taste, texture, convenience, cost, digestion, trolling, or complementing other ingredients in a meal - and isn't part of the {capitalist violence against your culture/symptom of worldwide disdain for american cuisine} of collapsing the properly broad category of "american cheese" into a single terrifying substance.

That happens to me there too sometimes, though I usually check first to make sure no-one's watching.
28 minutes, good work, I'm glad mefi is on form today.
posted by polytope subirb enby-of-piano-dice at 4:05 AM on July 13, 2023 [1 favorite]

Bless you, everybody suggesting grilled halloumi. Grilled halloumi is delicious, but that is not what people who seek this experience are looking for.

*summons spirits of distant Scots ancestry, uncheese me here*

What you DO, right. is get your block of American cheese slices. I think 20 looks awkward and 10 would do. But, you do you. Anyway, you get your stack of slices, you freeze it, THEN you batter it and whang it in the deep fryer. THEN you put in in a bun and eat it (ketchup, mustard, possibly onions OR pickles, NO lettuce). THAT's how you make this sandwich more awesome.
posted by Pallas Athena at 5:04 AM on July 13, 2023 [6 favorites]

MetaFilter: uncheese me here.
posted by Wordshore at 9:37 AM on July 13, 2023 [3 favorites]

There are a lot of aspersions being cast on american cheese in this thread. I too used to be like you, harboring an irrational hatred of this cheese-food product. But David Chang's burger manifesto taught me to relax and realize that: yes, actually it is the best cheese for burgers.

My ideal burger is bun, cheese, burger. Sometimes bacon. Ketchup on the side, so I can control it. Pickles—yes! Obviously. And the cheese thing has to be very clear: American cheese only. American cheese was invented for the hamburger. People talk about it being processed and artificial and not real cheese—you know what makes it real? When you put it on a hamburger.

But while there are many applications where american cheese is the right cheese (like putting a slice on top of a bowl of spicy ramen, yum!), that doesn't also mean that 20 slices of it in a bun is not kind of gross.
posted by 3j0hn at 10:30 AM on July 14, 2023 [3 favorites]