Many people go to certain restaurants for a certain thing. The amazing breakfast place. The one with perfect pizza. The place for ribs. The place for fish and chips. You always know what the safe menu-bet may be. From my very fancy and super accurate experiments where I asked about 6 people what they thought – Hudson’s is known for their burgers and the vibe. It’s the place you go to for a drunken dinner or hungover lunch.
The Hudson’s Obsession
People LOVE Hudson’s. They LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE it. They love the vibe, the atmosphere, the décor and the menu. Hudson’s customers’ brand loyalty is leaps and bounds above other restaurants in Cape Town, so I went to find out why.
The vibe is unquestionable. Pretty much whenever they’re open you’re bound to walk into a full restaurant full of very happy, very loud people. It’s contagious – you’re instantly in party mode.
To start we shared grilled BBQ Beef Ribs (R52), which were some of the very best ribs I’ve had in a long time. It’s not often that a restaurant chooses to serve beef over pork ribs, and I’m so very glad that they do. They were meaty and tender, with barely any fat. Just divine.
We also had Triple Cheese Chilli Poppers (R35) served with a cold tomato relish. They were enormous and had a delicious, rich cheesy centre. The batter could have been a little crisper but overall they were thoroughly enjoyed.
For mains we had The Cab Driver Pizza (R67) – a thin base topped with mozzarella, tomato, oregano, chicken strips, creamy peri-peri sauce, chilli and rocket. If you know anything about me, you’ll know that I could eat chilli for breakfast – so the heat wasn’t enough for me. Luckily there was plenty fresh chilli on the table, which I smothered on my half of the pizza with. It was really divine. The rich, creamy sauce balanced beautifully with fresh, peppery rocket. Just my kinda thang.
We also decided to try the much-famed Sliders – 3 mini burgers for R57. We had the TriBeCa Combo:
The Player: Beef patty topped with streaky bacon (minus the bacon for me), feta and avo. I can imagine that the smoky, salty bacon would make this burger quite something as it was quite bland compared to the other two.
The Boom Boom Burger: Beef patty topped with tomato relish, biltong dust, chilli cream cheese, and sliced beer battered jalapeno rings. This little guy was amazing. The beer battered onion gave it that beery warmth, which along with the creamy cheese and acidic tomato relish – was a combo made in heaven.
The Shroom: Beef patty topped with cheddar cheese and a creamy mushroom sauce. One word: SAUCE. I love sauce. I love sauce more than most things. And this burger had lots and lots of it. It was juuuuust right. I could have done with a few more.
Lastly we shared (lies, I pretty much ate this on my own) – Chocolate Brownie with ice cream and chocolate sauce (R36). While the presentation didn’t really do it for me, the flavour of this moist brownie was phenomenal. It was warm and nutty, the perfect companion to vanilla ice cream. The chocolate sauce could have just been left off the plate completely and wouldn’t have been missed.
Hudson’s have something really great going. This tweet sums it up perfectly:
They know what their customers want and they give it to them. To judge whether their burgers are the best in Cape Town, I think I need to go back to have a whole, full-sized one – and I will happily do it. It’s the kind of place you want to go back to again and again and again and again and again…
Directions to Hudsons Burger Joint
CNR Portswood and Somerset Road
Green Point
Cape Town
Tel: 021 433 1496