There's more to Bar Ume than excellent burgers

Once upon a time, on this little patch of Bourke Street, there was Bistrode. Then, after many delicious brisket and mustard-filled years, chef Kerby Craig took over and it became Ume – a destination for young, fun and refined Japanese food that combined neighbourhood vibes with a menu that straddled fine-dining sensibilities with straight-up izakaya good times.

But then, not too long ago, Craig and Co dropped the single-edged knives, picked up the spatulas and started flipping burgers. Sure, the sense in giving up the ghost on a more challenging restaurant concept menu to make burgers (all-but-guaranteed turnover and spend) is not lost on me at all.

Check out Warren Turnbull's Chur Burger. Neil Perry's Burger Project. Even David Chang has opened up Fuku – the fried-chicken sandwich shop flipping the bird to fine dining in NYC. But I miss that Little Restaurant That Could and Did.

Still, it's busy as hell and also extremely accessible to a pretty broad spectrum of Sydney, while maintaining some of the more interesting non-burger gear for the people who want it. So really, it's a win for everyone.

There's a steady flow of punters throughout the night, some just dropping by for a bacon cheeseburger with its soft seeded bun, lettuce on the bottom, cheese melted evenly and correctly over patty, bacon, raw vinegar pickles, onion. It's not quite the ultra-soft, yielding, sweet and trashy American-style burger we're expecting, but all the better for it.

While the burgers are the reason people are talking about Bar Ume, and the reason they've opened a second outpost down at Barangaroo, there's more.

Baby asparagus, lightly grilled, is covered in a shower of musky, house-cured mullet roe, livened up with a squeeze of lemon. Jerusalem artichokes are fried and served with mayonnaise strewn with thin ribbons of nori.

And if you've been missing the sake lees (which sounds much more romantic than "yeasty byproduct") dressing from the Ume days of yore, check out the deep-fried brussels sprouts, dressed in the stuff. There's karaage chicken, too, if you must (we do, but we don't need to).

If burgers are your mission, consider the Ume special, which is something like a cross between a loose meat sandwich (a la Roseanne) and a straight burger where a regular patty is covered in wagyu mince sauce, tomato, onion-spiked mayonnaise and melted cheese. Five napkins, please.