Restaurant News

Chur Burger, Brisbane and Up on Constance

Brisbane's burger-lovin' bar-hoppers have meaty decisions to grapple with...

Chur Burger, Brisbane
Brisbane's burger-lovin' bar-hoppers have meaty decisions to grapple with this weekend. Do they take the shiny Tryp Hotel lift five storeys skywards and nab an ottoman at Warren Turnbull's stylish new rooftop eyrie, Up on Constance? Or camp down at street-level among the freshly finished graffiti, and get stuck in to a Chur burger?
The first northern outpost of Sydney's smash licensed burger bar Chur Burger (and the only one currently burgering-up breakfast) fired up its grills in Fortitude Valley yesterday. Up on Constance, Turnbull's eye-catching, rooftop bar is due to start easing out the first corks today.
Up looks likely to become a buzzy post-work haunt. Simple plates are on offer Thursday to Sunday from five: grilled lamb cutlets with mint chimichurri, say, or the likes of chicken rillettes and chicken parfait with PX-soaked raisins. For the rest of the week, Up will be available for functions and for these Turnbull is promising a return to dishes more in the style of his late fine-diner, Restaurant Assiette.
Downstairs, the famed $10 burgers run the gamut from crisp pork belly to beef and pickle numbers. A trio of main courses sees jerk chicken paired with corn salsa, grilled sirloin sauced with chipotle butter, and blackened salmon partnered with guacamole. Snacks include the likes of brisket tacos with pickled cucumber, chicken wings done Chur-style with blue cheese, fingers of prawn-toast and more.
If trawling the breakfast menu makes Sydneysiders eager to wake up and smell the cheesy grits with creamed mushrooms, or keen to spread avocado butter and tomato jam on a cornbread muffin or two, there's good news.
Chur Express will début at the end of February at the CBD Wintergarden Food Court on the corner of Bent and O'Connell streets. Turnbull says Chur Express will open only for breakfast and lunch, Monday to Friday, and Brisbane will act as its proving ground. "I've thought about doing breakfast at Surry Hills but it's just too small and too busy to add anything extra," he says. "If I can't make breakfast work here with the kitchen we've got, then I can't make it work anywhere."
Chur on Constance, 20 Constance St, Fortitude Valley, Qld, (07) 3319 7890
Up on Constance, 20 Constance St, Fortitude Valley, Qld, (07) 3319 7899