“Try burger at new Hogg’s Meat Market JFK location. Sit on patio,” was a note I wrote to myself in June of this year. For reasons I choose not to understand, it took me three months to check this off the to-do list. I’m glad I finally did. I didn’t know what to expect, but was confident that a burger from Hogg’s Meat Market would be one with fresh, quality ground beef that hadn’t been sitting in a freezer, because Hogg’s is one of the premier butcher shops in Central Arkansas.
I arrived around 1 p.m. on Thursday and took a seat on the covered patio, which is honestly the nicest patio of any Park Hill restaurant. Come to think of it, it’s really the only patio in Park Hill worth mentioning unless you include the Filling Station, which has a great and underused outdoor seating area in front and behind the former gas station turned food truck yard/farmers market. Bring on the al fresco dining, Park Hill.
Hogg’s has four burgers on the menu: a traditional hamburger, cheeseburger, a Southwest Burger ( avocado, tomato, onion and house-made Southwest Sauce) and a Jalapeno Pimento Cheese Bacon Burger (pimento cheese, apple wood smoked bacon). I’m a burger traditionalist, especially my first time trying a place, so I ordered the cheeseburger with American cheese. It comes with purple onions, tomato, lettuce and pickles on a brioche bun. It came out quick, maybe 10 minutes, tops. Visually, it looked more like the iPhone burger emoji than any burger I’ve had in recent times, so it passed the eye test.
It came constructed with all the toppings, but dry. The server brought out a bottle of ketchup, mustard and mayonnaise. I prefer a burger that’s fully dressed, but fully understand why restaurants put toppings or dressings on the side. I used one of the crinkle cut fries the burger came with to spread the mayo around, and then I happily ate said fry. I like mayo on fries. I also like a mayo/ketchup mixture on fries (also known as the secret sauce at Bronco Burger from “Fast Times at Ridgemont High”).
I also used a drizzle of yellow mustard on the burger. I don’t put ketchup on burgers, but I don’t have a stance against it, like some burger aficionados I know.
The verdict: it was awesome. The burger, about a half pound, was piping hot and it answered any questions about whether or not the meat was fresh. You can taste fresh. Additionally, the lettuce and tomato were both fresh and crisp. The pickles were solid, too. Great burger. If I were making a top 10 list, it would be hard to leave it off.
I should also mention the smoked wings I had on Saturday to kick off the Arkansas Razorback football season. My friend Motley smoked them on his Original PK Grill + Smoker after a one-hour marinade in olive oil, Cavender’s Greek Seasoning, black pepper and yellow mustard. He put coals on one half of the PK with some applewood chips and the wings on the other half of the grill and adjusted the vent on the PK so the airflow would go up and over the wings. He cooked them for 1.5 hours and then moved the wings over to the hot side for another 15 minutes. Afterwards he let them rest for 20-30 minutes before our game day consumption began. Even after a half hour of resting they were still piping hot. He called the wings his best yet, and I won’t argue. The texture was perfect, crisp on the outside but tender, hot and juicy on the inside.
The “dirty sauce” he made for them is inspired by Chicken King in North Little Rock and is 2 parts honey, one part Louisiana Hot Sauce and one part Sriracha. It is an excellent hot sauce and one of my favorite bites of the week was a tortilla chip dipped in white queso, followed by a dip in the dirty sauce, just a phenomenal game day bite. The wings were so good, they didn’t even need sauce.
As for libations, Motley made us an Americano cocktail (Campari, sweet vermouth, soda, orange twist) to ease the stress of the 2nd half. It was my second Americano of the year and it’s become one of my favorite cocktails. It’s red like the Hogs!
P.S. The funniest food-related item I saw this week was in the Arkansas Times office, where our fridge is a consistent source of tomfoolery.
Looks like those ice cubes are still pretty cold, though. Here’s a Diet Coke disaster from last year that I’m responsible for.
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