DONE-ovan’s? Revamped Donovan’s Pub of Bayside tarnishes top-Burger rep

November 23, 2007

Though it was always the Woodside branch of Donovan’s Pub that garnered Top Burger in NYC Ranks from Time Out New York, I lived closer to the Bayside branch, which prior to this past summer, served an equally delicious Bacon Cheeseburger with fried onions.

I returned to the re-opened Bayside branch with low expectations even after our waitress assured us the burger recipe had remained unchanged. But deep down I knew, just from the look of the new place, that it would never be the same and boy was I right…

Bacon Cheeseburger ($9.95)

Donovan’s Pub is gone. What now exists is Donovan’s Grill & Tavern, a place where ambiance and setting are valued over a top-notch burger.

Before I get all nostalgic, here’s my one complaint that pretty much kills the burger for me:

Despite the new owners claim that the burger recipe remained the same, the one thing that did not was the fried onions. The change resulted in frizzled onion strings with a taste reminiscent of Outback’s Bloomin’ Onion. Here are the new Donovan’s onions:

We also ordered some sauteed onions which were long, flimsy strands of Vidalia onion spiced with salt and a little black pepper. It didn’t hurt the burger but it didn’t add the deliciousness of the old onions.

A word on the formerly perfect onions (you can sort of see them here): The old onions were finely chopped, fried until the edges were dark brown and caramelized, yet crispy and oniony in the middle. Delicious enough to eat on their own when you’re burger was finished. The onions were cooked in a way that you could mush them all together into a wad of fried onion if you wanted to. The best part was probably the post-meal burp which stuck with you for a few hours; oniony, meaty, bacony, fire-grilled beefy, french fry-ee (got carried away) and overall, you guessed it, delicious.

Back to the present day burger:

Joe Donovan owned the Bayside Branch for 28 years before selling it this past summer. His burgers were comprised of a custom blend of meats (possibly sirloin and brisket) procured from local butchers. When cooked on the broiler to a perfect medium rare and combined with bacon, cheese, and fried chopped onion, it was pretty much heaven on earth. All the flavors melding together in a heavenly confluence of bacony, oniony, flame-broiled goodness.

The present burger remains meaty, but it’s an overpowering meat flavor. Gone is aforementioned heavenly confluence of flavor. The bacon, formerly hearty, crisp, and deep fried in the spirit of Corner Bistro, now seems merely griddled and kind of brittle.

One thing they did do right was cook it to order, medium rare all the way baby. Look at the juice on the bottom of the bun.

The fries were solid. Puffy and potatoey yet still crispy, just like I had asked for.

Overall I would not recommend going out of your way for this burger. If you live near Bayside and you used to go to pre-renovation Donovan’s, you’re going to be disappointed with the burger. The waitress also pitched the French Onion Soup, which was also awesome at old-Donovan’s but I couldn’t vouch for the new one. I was told some of the kitchen staff stayed on but apparently not the right burger personnel. It seems like the new Donovan’s is aiming for style and ambiance over a quality burger, a casualty that’s blatantly obvious just by looking at the name change: Donovan’s Pub (Tim Allen “Tool Time” Grunt) is now Donovan’s Grill and Tavern (dainty sigh).

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