The Cherry Cricket’s meticulous, months-long taste test trial to perfect its Denver Burger Battle contender paid off once again this year.
More than 1,500 Denver Burger Battle attendees helped crown the Cricket’s over-the-top Cry Baby burger as the People’s Choice award winner last week on the Auraria campus’s Tivoli Quad. The Cry Baby featured a half-pound burger topped with a toasty crostini blanketed with cave-aged gruyere, bone marrow caramelized onions, crispy cheese frico, and onion strings on a rosemary potato bun with a schmear of French onion dip and a French onion soup sidecar.
This is the fifth Denver Burger Battle in a row that the beloved local burger institution has taken home a trophy. Every winning burger gets permanently added to its menu, including last year’s rich Cricket Royale short rib burger with bone marrow and 2022’s 983 Big Cheesy with mac and cheese, bacon jalapeño jam, crispy poblano, and Jalapeño Cheddar Cheetos.
“We can’t overstate how appreciative we are for this honor,” Cricket’s general manager Heidi Ziepperecht said. “Thank you to every single person who tried our burger and thank you to everyone who voted for us. It means the world to us.”
Spanish tapas restaurant Ultreia earned the Judge’s Choice award for its first-ever submission: the Jamonburguesa, a double cheeseburger, with Portuguese Thousand Island dressing, lettuce and pickles. Ultreia placed second in the People’s Choice award.
That’s no surprise, since Adam Branz, who took over as the sole owner of Ultreia last week, also serves up what The Denver Post considers to be one of the best burgers in town at Split Lip, an Eat Place, which operates inside Number Thirty Eight, a bar in the River North Art District.
“We put our trust in this Ultreia classic – it’s been a fan favorite and on our menu for seven years – and we put our trust in the right place,” said Ultreia culinary director Gabe Wyman. “Our secret sauce is the Peri Peri we put into the Thousand Island Dressing.”
The Denver Burger Battle kicked off in 2010, and this year’s competition hosted 20 participants, including newcomers like South Park Hill’s The W with its smoked pulled pork belly bacon burger and returning contestant Blue Moon Brewery with its take on a Pueblo slopper.
The panel of eight judges included “Top Chef” alum Manny Barella, “Bachelorette” alum Blake Horstmann, “Love is Blind’s” Giannina Gibelli, James Beard Award semifinalist chef Kenneth Wan of MAKfam, and couple Noah and Sean – who got married at Denver Burger Battle in 2019.
They ranked 20 burgers on a scale of 1 to 10; a 1 means that “the Hamburgler had the opportunity to steal this burger, he’d decline and go to the KFC across the street,” according to last year’s rules, while a 10 meant “I would sell my house, my spouse, and my children just to taste this delicious masterpiece again.”
The Cherry Cricket begins its annual quest for victory months ahead of the annual beefy brawl, when chefs from each of its three locations submit two to three options as possible contenders. They consider texture, acidity, how toppings complement the beef and what ingredients are efficient for high-volume servings. The Cherry Creek location created The Cry Baby, and after multiple taste tests, the team of 15 chefs, general managers and corporate staff from the Cricket’s parent company, Breckenridge-Wynkoop, unanimously landed on the behemoth.
“It’s the perfect marriage of a French Dip, French onion soup and a French onion dip,” Ziepperecht previously told The Denver Post.
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