Hudson Grille is receiving some press so I decided to see what all the hub-bub was about, and after my burger today I still have the same question. Yes the place has a great location, yes the place is incredibly cool inside and yes the staff is extremely nice, but at the end of the day the food draws me; if the hamburger is any indication, there are too many other places around that do it better.

I ordered the HUDSON GRILL (sic) BURGER with Comte cheese, caramelized onion, bacon aioli, brioche roll and fries. This sounded like a tremendous combo. The requested doneness was medium rare.

As you can see from my photo the delivery is picture-perfect, nicely stacked, fries in a pretty neat cone and a little cup of ketchup. The cheese sat atop the meat and there was a modest amount of onions. The bacon aioli was missing.

The fries still had their skins and were piping hot which meant freshly cooked so a positive, and the salt was applied in the kitchen. They were good but there was something weird with the texture, very grainy on the interior. They were the best part of the meal and can only give them an “OK.”

Now onto the hamburger. The meat was pretty basic meat, nothing special. It was cooked to my requested medium rare and had a good char on the exterior. When I cut it in half, not one ounce of juice flowed out of the burger, not a good sign. One taste confirmed my fear, no juiciness; it was bland, not seasoned at all and dry.

The accompaniments were equal to the meat. The “caramelized” onions were not; probably raw twenty minutes earlier, they were crunchy, pungent and were basic grilled onions, why restaurants call grilled onions “caramelized” baffles me, please just call them grilled. The Comte cheese was also not as expected. It was lacking flavor and added nothing to the overall taste. Likewise the bun could have been fresher. I ate half of the burger and decided that it was just not worth the effort.

Maybe some of the other items are better, but I would not make a special effort to go to Hudson Grille for the Hudson Grill (sic) Burger.