Bleecker Burger
Zan Kaufman's cheeseburger is a whole-muscle blend of 40-day aged Aubrey Allen beef cooked pink under orange American cheese in a toasted seeded bun, and in June 2026 the World's 101 Best Burger Places ranked it first in the world (Time Out, Hot Dinners).
Why go
Kaufman was a corporate lawyer in New York who quit after a burger on Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village, and she started selling her own off the back of a truck with KERB in 2012 (Harden's, Restaurant). The kiosk in Old Spitalfields Market, opened in 2015, was the first permanent site, and Laura Richards gave it five stars for Time Out in July 2024 (Time Out).
The menu has barely moved since the truck. Kaufman has said the blend uses no trim, that the same whole-muscle formula tastes different from cow to cow and season to season, and that every new hire suggests a chicken burger, which she compares to an accounting firm starting a record label (Restaurant). Celine Raeburn cooked the bacon double to the overall win at the National Burger Awards in February 2024, the company's second after 2020 (Time Out).
Bleecker is still independent at ten London sites, and the tenth opened in Camden Market on 27 August 2026 (Hot Dinners). Kaufman keeps every room small on purpose and has said she never wants one with sixty seats.
Order this / avoid
- Order: the bacon double cheeseburger, the award winner, and Michelle Trusselle's advice is to add a plain cheeseburger as a chaser. The Blue Burger swaps the American cheese for Saint Agur, and it is what James Lowe and Richard Foster order. Angry Fries come under blue cheese and hot sauce. Kitty Drake's 2017 caution stands: the burgers run rich, so take the ketchup and mustard (Time Out).
- Avoid: expecting a room. The Spitalfields kiosk has a few tables in the stall traffic, and Richards wrote
don't expect much in the way of comfort or ambience. But is that what you're here for? Of course it isn't
(Time Out). Skip the Bloomberg Arcade branch on a weeknight evening, where delivery orders come first and the hygiene register is below the rest of the chain.
What locals & experts say
- Michelle Trusselle, founder of Myristica, asked for her burger:
I love [Bleecker] Burger. As you know, next time you order from them, have a bacon double cheeseburger and have a cheeseburger chaser. It tastes so good and one is never enough, so you might as well just have a cheeseburger chaser, get it out of the way and just double up.
11 - James Lowe, who ran Lyle's for a decade, asked for his favourite burger:
The Blue Burger at Bleecker.
10 - Richard Foster, executive chef of Ibai:
Best burger? [Bleecker] Burger. I'm actually a big fan of the blue burger.
14 - Kaneda Pen, chef-owner of Mamapen:
Best burger: [Bleecker]. I prefer thick and juicy. Just kind of want people to know there's life before and after smash patties.
15 - Justin Chang, London chef:
Best burger: [Bleecker] Burger, without a doubt. The [Bleecker] seasoning, unmatched.
16 - Akwasi Brenya-Mensa, founder of Tatale:
Best burger: [Bleecker]. I really want to do a collaborative surf and turf burger with them.
17 - Budgie Montoya, chef-owner of Apoy, asked the same question, answered with the name alone:
Best burger: [Bleecker].
18 - Laura Richards, Time Out, July 2024, five stars out of five, on the Spitalfields kiosk:
Show-stopping dry-aged beef cooked pink is complemented by Bleecker's 'secret sauce' that tastes every bit as peppery as McDonalds' Big Mac mayo (but more upmarket, obvs). Cheese is as orange as the Waterloo sunset and seeded buns are toasted to perfection, perfectly mopping up those excess patty juices without ever compromising your vice-like burger grip.
1 - Kitty Drake, Time Out, March 2017, four stars out of five, on the Victoria shop:
There are two kinds of burgers in this world: the posh kind (neat, relish-y, found on gourmet pub menus) and the fairly dirty kind (juicy, greasy, found on 'Man v Food'). Oh, and there's a secret third kind. The Bleecker. It's pure filth.
2 - The Infatuation, January 2022, scoring the Victoria shop 7.0, the low vote:
Their cheeseburger is simple but well constructed. It won't change your life but serves its purpose as a quick, tasty refuel well. A milkshake should be on your order too—the Black & White gives big Oreo energy and isn't sickly sweet.
9 - Harden's readers, 2026 survey, with the caveat on the City branch:
they get the simple stuff right: quality of meat, how the patty is made, doneness, ratio of meat to bread, and it adds up to a serious burger
, andexpect delays if you want to eat in the evening at the Bloomberg building outlet as they can be too busy fulfilling the constant Deliveroo orders
.8
Good to know
- Where: the kiosk inside Old Spitalfields Market off Brushfield Street, E1 6AA, the original permanent site. Time Out's other favourite is the Seven Dials Market kiosk on Short's Gardens.
- Timing: open every day from late morning into the evening at Spitalfields. No bookings anywhere in the chain.
- What it costs: on the July 2026 menu, a cheeseburger is GBP 10.50, a double GBP 14.95, a bacon cheeseburger GBP 11.50, the bacon double GBP 15.95 and the Blue Burger GBP 11.60. Fries are GBP 4.75, Angry Fries GBP 5.50, and most shakes GBP 5.95.12
- The other doors: Victoria at 205 Victoria Street, Bloomberg Arcade, Westfield White City, London Bridge at 104 Tooley Street, Seven Dials, Baker Street at 195, Soho at 33 Old Compton Street, and Camden at 45-46 Middle Yard from August 2026. Westfield, Baker Street and Soho serve halal beef.
- Hygiene: the Spitalfields kiosk holds a Food Standards Agency rating of 5, Tower Hamlets, inspected 18 June 2025, with hygiene, structure and management each scored 5 on the register's scale, where 0 is the best mark (FHRSID 731075). The Bloomberg Arcade branch was rated 2, improvement necessary, by the City of London on 5 February 2026, with hygiene scored 15 and management 10; Soho holds a 4 from July 2025; Victoria, London Bridge, Baker Street, Seven Dials and Westfield each hold a 5; Camden is awaiting its first inspection.13
Verdict
should-visit — Order the bacon double cheeseburger and eat it standing in the market, because that is the format and the room will not improve on it. Zan Kaufman has cooked one product since a 2012 truck: a whole-muscle blend of 40-day aged Aubrey Allen beef, cooked pink, under orange cheese in a toasted seeded bun, and in 2026 the World's 101 Best Burger Places put it first on earth, two years after the bacon double took the National Burger Awards outright. Seven London chefs name it as their burger, two of them for the Blue Burger. The Infatuation calls the cheeseburger a quick, tasty refuel that won't change your life, and that is fair too: it is a fifteen-minute meal done about as well as the form allows, and the reason to plan around it is a burger, never a room.