Disappointing experience in a strange new restaurant/bistro a stone's throw from Ponte Sant'Angelo. The location sounds good, but Fisherman Burger is essentially in a car-park on the Lungotevere, with all the chaos and fury that you'd might expect.
The premise of the restaurant is slightly confused: the hip / industrial eat signage (featuring white on french navy) suggests a young, gourmet fast-food experience, but the oddly shaped interior with a fisherman's net hung over the fancy fresh fish display wants you to believe they can do high-end fish restaurant as well.
In fact, the head waiter can't wait to encourage us to splurge, recommending a selection of raw fish, bouillabaisse, lobster and sea-bass. Sounds pricey. I figure that a place with "Burger" in it's name must be really good at burgers, so I order a burger with merluzzo (cod), on a base of spinach, with bacon, smoked-cheese and mayonnaise to add extra flavour. We all order a mixed anti-pasto of raw fish to start.
The entrée features an oyster each, a couple of clams, two red prawns and a share of three miniature tartares. The red prawns are fine, but the three tartares - salmon, tuna and bream (turned out in tiny, tuna-tin shaped moulds) are roughly chopped and nothing to write home about - the tuna is grey-brown and doesn't seem to be the catch of the day. (Our waiter has talked us into trying these entrées, so we still don't know the price - more on that later.)
We've ordered a bottle of Chardonnay at €18, to share in 3, but it's nothing exceptional.
Before we're half-way through the entrées, our principal dishes arrive. The burger's a real disappointment: the bread would be fine (it's not Bonci, but it's ok) but the two thin discs of cod look like hammered, breaded veal and are about 4mm thick, they're overcooked and completely lacking in taste. I have a delicate palate and can't stand food which had been over-salted, but even this had me reaching for the salt-cellar. The bed of spinach under the cod has been boiled but not refried - it soaks through the lower-half of the burger, which turns into tissue paper in my hand. The layers of cheese and bacon add flavour, but the quality of these ingredients isn't much above Burger King.
Hand cooked chips served in a mini deep-fat fryer, plus a mignon salad, improve the dish overall.
We skip dessert although I have an amaro (on the house). The bill is €37 per head; it's too much for the quality of the ingredients, the cooking, and the general air of bizarre chaos that rules in a restaurant where you are served / handled by five different members of staff over the course of the evening, each with a role more peculiar than the rest. read more