My friend A. recently told me about the best hamburger in Sofia.

Now you can't tell me something like this and not grab my attention.

The best hamburger in Sofia?! We live in a kufte and kabache loving country. Heck, in Bulgaria beef is by far the least popular of the the three big meats: beef, chicken and pork. So I figured that <em>best</em> must be relative. It's the best hamburger in Sofia because well, we're in Sofia.

The first time we went to Brown Bakery in Mladost we failed to get a hamburger. Apparently the kitchen was closed. Interesting problem for a, um, <em>restaurant</em>. Don't get me started on this problem. I think it's enough to say: these things happen here and leave it at that. So we had a drink and headed over to a different restaurant for dinner. And I found myself hamburger-less.

Of course, ever since, I've been thinking about hamburgers.

This week, we decided to take-two on the hamburgers. A. was determined to call the Brown Bakery and to confirm that the kitchen was actually open. Only the phone numbers on the Brown Bakery's website aren't correct so the line rang and rang and no one ever picked up. Kind of makes you wonder how they're running a restaurant but that's probably also something I shouldn't spend a lot of time thinking about.

So, we met up and headed over <a href="http://www.inyourpocket.com/Bulgaria/Sofia/Restaurants-and-Cafes/Modern-European/Brown-Bakery_86134v" target="_blank">Brown Bakery in Mladost 1 </a>on Yerusalim 6.  The restaurant was open but at 7pm we were one of maybe three tables. The place was pretty empty. A. double checked to make sure the kitchen was open and serving hamburgers. I wasn't close enough to hear what exactly he asked but the girl he asked asked looked at him incredulously--as if asking was a ridiculous question. Given our first experience it wasn't.

This time around we didn't even get menus. Who are we fooling? We're clearly ordering hamburgers.

By the time my hamburger arrived I was starving. That's the problem with being a teacher and eating lunch at 11:15 am. By 7:30 pm you're crazy hungry.