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KBNN Field Research: A Week at Shake Shack

By Jenna Amoroso 

Decade of Shack!

Friday, 9:30 a.m. It's raining. The smell of sizzling bacon fills the air. Seemingly oblivious to the precipitation, over 100 people are waiting in line at Shake Shack. After the weeklong celebration of Shake Shack’s 10th anniversary, you can certainly say New Yorkers are dedicated to their love for juicy burgers. Or we just love hype and long lines.

Just like the city of New York, the ladies of KB Network News also love an inspired and well-cooked burger. Being the purveyors of food news that we are, we felt it was our job to dive head first into the Shake Shack celebration and taste as many of these once-in-a-lifetime burgers as possible. While there is much to be done at Foodie Headquarters, tasting the culinary collaborations from New York City’s top chefs was crucial field research. Keeping this in mind, I found myself at Madison Square Park’s Shake Shack four out of five days this week, anxious to get a bite of the action.

The man behind the burger magic!

On Tuesday, celebrated Momofuku chef David Chang arrived to find the longest line in Shack history. Since they open at 11 a.m., the assumption would be that arriving at 10:15 in the morning would allow for a prime location on line - not so true. Over 100 people were queued ahead of me for a glimpse of Chang and a taste of his Shrimp Stack, humming along to the rasta-inspired live children's concert that was echoing through the park. With a record breaking level of attendance, it proved wise of the TV crews to set up shop on the perimeter of the patio, ready to interview Chang and the man behind the Shack and some of New York’s most successful restaurants, Danny Meyer. When Chang appeared, you could have sworn he was a pop star rather than a chef with the way men and women alike were itching to get a photo - a true depiction of the growth and influence of the celebrity chef. I highly doubt that America’s first celebrity chef, Julia Child, would be able to fathom the level of celebrity that today’s chefs have been able to reach.

To revive the waiting crowd, Shack employees handed out ray ban-style Shake Shack sunglasses in their signature electric green and special menus to squealing foodies who instinctively started snapping selfies (which if you Instagram search #decadeofshack, you will have no trouble finding). The level of enthusiasm and customer engagement of the employees is proof of Meyer’s focus on customer satisfaction and exceeds your typical burger joint experience.

As 11 a.m. came around, the Shack team got the crowd cheering and even propositioned a line-long wave before opening shop for the first order of the day. About an hour later I found myself at the window, "Two specials burgers and two fries to go, please!” Another 15 minutes and four ramekins of ketchup later, my buzzer went off and the glorious Shrimp Stack was mine!

David Chang's Momofuku Shrimp Stack

The juicy Shack beef-blend burger was topped with a smoked and griddled shrimp patty, Momofuku Hozon Sauce, Bibb lettuce, pickled onion and salted cucumbers, team KBNN was salivating. But while you could see the delicate shrimp patty, it didn't really pack much flavor and we definitely didn’t get any of the special Hozon Sauce. As an onion devotee, the pickled onions were
 by far my favorite part, imparting a needed crunch and tang to cut through the richness of the burger. While it wasn’t the office favorite, it certainly whet our appetites for the burgers to come.

The man himself!

Wednesday gave way to Bizarre Food's host Andrew Zimmern's goat burger, the Cabrito Butter Burger. After the record breaking line for Chang, I arrived wide eyed and bushy tailed with a bag full of newspapers to read at 9 a.m. - two hours before Shake Shack even opens - to find fifty brave (read: hardcore? crazy?) souls lined up before me. Having conquered half of the papers and buffed up on all the relevant (and not so relevant) world news, Zimmern arrived looking stylish as can be in orange rimmed glasses and a matching pocket square and thanked the masses for coming out and waiting hours for his culinary creation.

As a lover of food both banal and bizarre, I’ve always liked Zimmern and was looking forward to his ground goat burger topped with roasted tomatoes, charred onions (two of my all-time favorite condiments) and herb butter and was excited when he walked toward the crowd for photos. Having bonded with my fellow burger buccaneers, they graciously held my spot in line so I could meet the man behind the burger. He was genial, just like he is on TV, having graciously adopted his public persona more so than some of his chef counterparts.

Andrew Zimmern's Cabrito Butter Burger

The freebie of the day was 10th anniversary Shack T-shirts, which, by the time they got to me, only came in extra large — aka my new nightgown of choice. With my charm and good looks, or well, mostly Venmo, I convinced a newfound friend in line to sell me his second burger, since Shake Shack smartly only allowed two decade burgers per order to ensure that more people could partake in the delicious celebration. With three burgers in tow, I moseyed back to the office and was greeted with cheers.

The juicy goat burger was smothered in roasted tomatoes and charred onions, though ours was missing the herb butter (I heard rumors that this was the case for many), and was absolutely delicious! The roasted juicy tomato and the sweet charred onion were the perfect topping for the lean goat meat. Throw on a sweet pickle and it was perfect combination of flavors – definitely Iron Palate approved!

As the old saying goes, once you go goat you never go back.

Daniel Humm sans truffles

Around came Thursday, the actual 10th anniversary of Shake Shack and a clear cause for celebration: tents were hoisted; barriers crafted to contain the chaos; special Brooklyn Brewery beer streaming into collector cups; a Dominique Ansel cake; and even bottles of champagne. With the handsome Daniel Humm at the helm and the smell of truffles in air, the line grew to epic lengths and it became apparent that a 9 a.m. arrival was not nearly early enough. With over 100 people ahead of me, I patiently waited in the dreary morning air, managing to successfully complete Am New York's daily crossword puzzle! Go me!

Daniel Humm's Humm Burger

Humm graciously walked the line, shaking hands and kissing babies, before heading to the kitchen to craft his Humm Burger: a decadent Shack beef-blend burger topped with Gruyere cheese, applewood smoked bacon, Bibb lettuce, truffle mayo and fresh shaved black truffles. While there was much dispute in the office about the pervasiveness of the truffle, the gooey Gruyere and creamy aioli were cause enough to give the Humm Burger the Iron Palate stamp of approval. Having enjoyed the burger of the day, it was time to get back to work even though the celebration raged on in Madison Square Park with live music and 'pay what you want' hot dogs.

Fun fact: Shake Shack didn’t start out selling burgers, but humbly began selling hot dogs out of a cart.

And finally Friday was upon us, the final day of chef-crafted burgers. The day’s star was the only female chef in the bunch, chef April Bloomfield, known for her burger brazenness at The Spotted Pig and The Breslin, here with the Breslin Burger. With the rains pouring down on New York City, you'd think the line would be shorter, or start later. As you’ve probably realized by now, that assumption is very wrong and a 9:15 a.m. arrival left me further back than all four days. Armed with an umbrella and a Shake Shack issued poncho, I waited, eavesdropping on the burger enthusiasts around me. One brave soul showed up at 9 a.m. sans umbrella and, only after waiting an hour and a half, figured out that they were serving special decade burgers, declaring, "I can just make that at home!" Turns out she was hired on Task Grabber to order and deliver two special burgers for some suits in the financial district — which goes to show just how serious New Yorkers take their specialty Shake Shack burgers. Granted, this wasn’t only the case on Friday, all week people were paid to hold spots on line for businessmen and women or to deliver burgers. Insane.

Along with arrival of the sun came the Shack employees with sample ramekins of custard, which obviously made the whole affair worth it. The closer to the Shack you meandered, the more enveloped in the smell of sizzling applewood-smoked bacon you became. Bloomfield made her first appearance at 11:30 a.m., where she posed for photos and chatted with hungry fans along with Danny Meyer and the more corporate side of the Shake Shack team. Fortunately, the line moved at record pace and after only waiting three hours, I managed to finagle my buzzer.

April Bloomfield's Breslin Burger

Armed with a Shake Shack paper bag full of burgers and fries, I hurried home to Foodie HQ so the KBNN team could devour the decadent cheese-smothered Breslin Burger, a Breslin beef-blend burger topped with

all-natural applewood smoked bacon and the most glorious Tickler English cheddar cheese sauce you’ve ever tasted in your life. It was flavorful, juicy and drowning in cheese so good you could swim in it. The Iron Palate approved, all-American combination of bacon and cheese definitely made The Breslin Burger a crowd pleaser.

Having the opportunity to taste four chef-crafted burgers was an amazing experience and a successful mission in the field. As the days waned on, I began to recognize my fellow burger warriors: the donut sweater guy; the guy with the horrendous haircut; the less attractive version of Leonardo DiCaprio; and the girl who didn’t understand the concept of the buzzer. As for my favorite burger, I’m torn between the Cabrito and the Breslin – my solution? The Breslin burger topped with Zimmern’s roasted tomatoes and charred onions: Shake Shack Burger-fection.

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