The burger joint that will close when its single cow runs out

A bullock called Maraschino was slaughtered in December. He is now manifesting as the meat used in Humbug, a burger pop-up in Manchester, which opened on Friday and has been sending people into tizzies.

Humbug is the work of one of my favourite chefs, Sam Buckley, who owns Where The Light Gets In in Stockport and built a community allotment on the roof of a multi-storey car park. He’s had to close his restaurant for three months while the building it’s in undergoes a restoration.

And so he is “performing” in Manchester: food as art; art as food. It is also a way to keep his skilled team of 15 – chefs, a sommelier, a creative director and front-of-house staff – employed while WTLGI is closed.

The first act was a bar in December, which has now closed. The second is this burger pop-up which uses the meat from Maraschino, a Cheshire-bred Red Poll cow. When he’s gone, it’s gone: there’s a burger counter in the dining room moving from 1,200 to 0 and that is when Buckley will move onto act three (more on this later).

Buckley sourced Maraschino from Helen Arthen, a highly regarded farmer in Malpas, Cheshire, who he has worked with for many years. The bullock was slaughtered, hung for three weeks, then broken down by Buckley and a local butcher.

I find this part really fascinating: Buckley is mixing all the meat together, so traditionally expensive cuts such as ribeye, sirloin, and fillet will be combined with cheaper ones like flank and chuck. The offal is also going in.

It will be done in three batches, dividing up evenly the prime cuts with the cheap and balancing both with a little offal. Customers will be told what part of Maraschino they are ordering. There is also a photograph of the bullock on the wall.

Provocative, much? That’s the whole point. Buckley told me: “I’m not trying to gentrify food. This is a play on food in four acts. We’re just commenting on the state of the food system and how disconnected we are with what we eat. I don’t hate fast food, a lot of it works. Look at the dabbawalas in Mumbai. This is just a narrative. We’re selling burgers until the cow runs out.”

I suspect some people will scoff at the £12.50 price. What about some oyster popcorn for £9, a portion of £4.50 fries or soft serve ice cream for £8?

Again, sort of the point. Buckley wants to challenge people. Should a burger ever be two quid? Probably not.

“If you’re not paying for it in the restaurant, it’s costing us somewhere. The NHS, the environment, someone in a developing nation,” said Buckley.

I saw a video online where Buckley tries to condense all this into about two minutes. A line he uses, “the social and historical context of fast food” was always going to be ridiculed by some. “Just put the burger in the bag, mate” was one comment.

Maybe I’m too London, but I think £12.50 is reasonable for a good burger, not least one containing prime meat, the origin of which is hanging on the wall (I also love how Buckley hasn’t used the phrase, “farm to table”.

The chef’s beef-based socialism is intriguing indeed. Everybody gets a bit of fillet, for example, just as everyone gets a bit of kidney or liver. Maybe that’s how the world should be. I don’t know.

I do know that Buckley’s cooking is immense. He told me the flavour in the patties is amazing (he would do, but I believe him). They’re topped with Sparkenhoe Red Leicester and put in a bun from a Manchester bakery.

He also told me he and his team are having quite a lot of fun doing this and while the point is serious, they’re also having a big laugh. “People can come and talk about food systems if they like, or just have a burger. Whatever.”

Okay then: how do we feed ourselves in cities? With Maraschino, apparently. At least until act three, a bistro named based on a plot of allotments outside Moscow; act four is all about a Georgian tablecloth.

But I won’t spoil the fun. I’ll just hoof it to Manchester before Maraschino runs out.