Field Cut to 32 After Stiff First Round of Burger Cup

Only the juiciest, tastiest, most mouthwatering burgers survive in the brutal (but fair) Burger Cup and with your votes now in from the first round of voting, the field has been slashed to 32.

As always, all the venues put up a good fight and we were sad to see the first half go. Unsurprisingly, back-to-back winners Slow Boat Brewery sailed through, as did former trophy holders Home Plate BBQ and other top seeds Great Leap, The Local, Blue Frog, and Q Mex.

Cannon's Burgers, a favorite at the Burger Cup festival, has emerged as the strongest new entrant this year, seeding third in Bracket D.  

We would also like to take this opportunity to give a shout out to Common Burger, who had an outstanding showing but, unfortunately, had to be excluded from Top 32 consideration as they do not have an open restaurant and their reopening date has not yet been set.

Be prepared for more stiff competition as we move into the next round, voting for which will close at noon on May 31.

Vote now in the 2017 Burger Cup Round of 32 by scanning or extracting the QR code below

Here are the brackets going into the Round of 32:

BRACKET A
Seed

1. Slow Boat

2. Blue Frog
3. The Local
4. Lily's American Diner
5. Burger Break
6. 4corners
7. Paddy O'Shea's
8. Grandma's Kitchen

BRACKET B
Seed
1. Q Mex
2. Fatboy's The Burger Bar
3. North Capital
4. Katchup
5. Lush
6. XL Bar
7. High Town
8. VSports Bar and Restaurant

BRACKET C
Seed
1. Great Leap Brewing
2. Let's Burger
3. Plan B
4. Stuff'd
5. Biteapitta
6. Ramo
7. Kenny's Burgers
8. 1F

BRACKET D
Seed
1. Home Plate
2. Jing-A
3. Cannon's Burgers
4. The Big Smoke
5. Feast
6. Caravan
7. Tim's Texas Bar-B-Q
8. Morton's of Chicago

And what of the people voting? Well, it looks like we have a fairly educated burger populace, with the average voter having tried at least seven different burgers in Beijing. However, that also means there's a lot of room for improvement; we expect you to use this list of 32 as a starting point to educate your palate: most of you have 25 additional burgers on this list to try, so get out there and do some eating before you cast a ballot in the next round.

Our voters are active foodies too, eating out on average 30 times a month. One in three eat lunch out five or more times a week, and one in four eat dinner out five or more times a week. Certainly that means many of you have room in your dining out schedule for a few more burgers.

As for top toppings on burgers, cheese was your runaway favorite, with almost half selecting it as a must-have on your burger. The favorite toppings (in order) are:

You guys really love cheese on your burgers

1. Cheese
2. Bacon
3. Onions
4. Avocado
5. Pickles
6. Tomatoes
7. Fried Egg
8. Mushrooms
9. Lettuce
10. Jalapeños
11. Spinach
12 Arugula

Perhaps unsurprisingly, beer was by far and away the favorite beverage to accompany burgers at any time of the day. Check out the beverage rankings below:

Burgers and beer, the perfect alliterative combination

1. Beer – 33 percent
2. Carbonated soft drinks – 14 percent
3. Iced tea – 11 percent
4. Lemonade – 8 percent
5. Milkshake – 8 percent
6. Juice – 8 percent
7. Water – 6 percent
8. Mixeddrinks/cocktails – 4 percent
9. Wine – 3 percent
10. Milk – 2 percent

Stay up to date with all the Burger Cup-related happenings here: thebeijinger.com/2017burgercup.

Images: the Beijinger, picserver, pixabay

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