Twitter-burger, and the Chancellor - Published in the South Shropshire Journal - 5/7/13

My editor at the SSJ wisely removed some McDonalds-related material from this piece that potentially could have seen him and me in a whole lot of hot water. Therefore I will print the article almost as it appeared in the paper. I don't need Ronald taking me to the cleaners. Sorry. 

Georgie Porgie, pudding and pie, kissed the girls then took a photo of himself eating a burger and chips. The Chancellor was just trying to appear normal, so tweeted a picture of himself tucking into a midnight snack - a ‘Shamburger’ as the Sun decreed – whilst he was finishing off his spending review. Poor George.

I couldn't really give two hoots about George, after all he’s right up there in the Top Ten List of People who Currently Make our Lives a Misery, but what really got my back-up about this is that he got pilloried in some darker corners of the press for not buying the offending patty from McDonald’s. Where he went wrong apparently was by choosing to get his burger from Byron, a small independent chain owned by a friendly chap called Tom, who source their meat from British farms.

Silly, silly George. What he should have done in order to please the electorate would have been to go to a massive global behemoth and spent 99p on one of their burgers instead. Why? For goodness sake, he’s the Chancellor of the Exchequer so can probably afford to treat himself to a glamorous takeaway once in a while (George’s meal cost him just shy of a tenner apparently – flash git) Good on him I say, for setting an example. Reports initially told us that George’s burger was delivered to Downing Street, even though Byron don’t actually do deliveries. I asked Tom from Byron myself if there was any chance he could deliver a burger to Ludlow. He firmly but sweetly told me they wouldn’t. Turns out George got no special treatment either and one of his elves popped out to get it for him.

I like that. Blanket rules. Let one person get away with it, and everyone else starts taking the Mick. Stick to the policy. Bravo Byron!

We should follow Byron’s (and George’s) lead and pay a bit more attention to burgers. A good hamburger shouldn’t be cheap and nasty. It will be made from good bits of cow and lavished with the attention that it deserves. If, unlike Mr Osborne you’re making your own, make sure you use mince with plenty of fat in it. Burgers, like most good things benefit from decent lubrication and this is what fat does. Keeps ‘im nice and moist. Yum. Buns. You need good buns. Search out the best, or do them yourself. I’ve got a book that suggests adding a little Bird’s custard powder to your bun mix, and this is inspired. You get that slight sweetness that they do at Maccy D’s, but you’ve done it yourself.

Thanks George, for making us think about burgers again.