Bunsen (Wexford Street-Dublin 2) - Best burgers in Dublin? The kids said so...

Saturday, 2:00pm... we're in the city centre (near St Stephen's Green) and we're very very very hungry!

Different places come to mind and we're discussing which would be the best place that would please us all - highly difficult task for us to reach an agreement :-(

SUDDENLY (and I highlight the word, because this is how it happened), Dad stops and says: "my friend xxxxx told me about Bunsen the other day: he says they serve the best hamburgers in Dublin!". We looked at him.... "really??? and how come we have not heard about this place before? and is it family friendly??"

"Well-says Dad- I say let's give the place a try! It's literally round the corner and we're all hungry and tired".

Ummmm, OK, let's give it a try!... And we did:

The place is small -long and narrow- and there is not much to say about the decoration: bare walls (only a blackboard indicating drinks and prices), some exposed copper pipes and long lamps give the place an industrial very functional look, an "eat-and-go" restaurant. No kids...

The first (not last) positive comment about the place is how nice and helpful the waitresses were: there was no table available when we arrived but they informed us it would take only some minutes to have a table ready for us and so it did!

We were expecting a menu, but it never arrived; instead there were some little cards on the table: would those be the menus?

Good good, so let's try theeeeeee burger (difficult choice, eh?) some of us asked for the plain one, others for the complete one (all toppings including lettuce, tomato, onion, cheese...nothing super fancy but we were not asking for the re-invented wheel), the kids just wanted the cheese burger and we also ordered different types of chips: handcut, shoestring, sweet potato chips... Basically we tried everything in the menu!

After a little waiting time that we used to rest our feet and have our drinks (we were also thirsty), the food arrived: each one had our individual metallic tray with our burger of choice and our chips. Nice size, lovely smell - it took us seconds to jump on them! they were goood!

(tried to take the pictures when the burgers were nicely wrapped and the chips had no ketchup on, but everybody was too hungry to wait for my camera!)

In mine, the meat was well done (as I had asked for), but still juicy, full of flavour. I loved the bun: it wasn't huge but it was nice, soft and fluffy, thick enough not to break while I was eating the burger:

The boys did not speak for a while: they just ate and drank in peace and harmony: good food has that magical soothing effect on them - very rarely happens though!

It all went very fast (good sign!), no long conversations, just some deep philosophical comments: "really good", "love the chips", " can I have another smoothie?", "are you going to eat all your chips?", or the most common: "how didn't we know about this place???".

Had a little accident: one of the boys dropped his smoothie and the smiley waitress that helped us order brought another smoothie without any problem or extra charge (no bad faces, or sighs  like you get in other restaurants). That made me feel real love for her and for the restaurant!

Half an hour after we had set foot on the place we were saying goodbye with the best of smiles in our faces and full happy stomachs - right after we left, the boys said "best burgers ever!" and they're very tough judges

So here's our vote to one great child-friendly restaurant which offers really good quality food (also to take away), not too cheap, but not too expensive either and with very nice staff - we'll be back!

PS: Ah! Before I finish: if you liked what I wrote but have started your own personal bikini diet to get ready for the summer, be informed that Bunsen offers right the perfect option for you: a burger wrapped in lettuce leaves! sounds weird, but looks yummy!

PS2: just heard that a second Bunsen has opened in Temple Bar: a review soon!