I know many of you think what you read here every Saturday is a work of fiction fuelled by illicit substances with a few added drops of nitromethane, dinitropropane, acetone, propylene oxide and nitrobenzene.
It’s easy to come to that view given Phil King loves Land Rovers and Mark Southcott drives a Moke. But no. Earlier this year, regular reader and petrol (and diesel but not hybrid) head Howard S (we’ll call him Howard S because I have forgotten his last name) took a road trip across the US to check out some of the must-see sights in soon-to-be Trump land.
Naturally these included the home of the world’s best burger, Rehab Burger Therapy on 2nd Street in Scottsdale, Arizona, not far from Scottsdale Fashion Square where Dave Gooding has his annual car auction.
As you remember I recommended the PBJ & Bacon Burger ($16), saying that it “freaks your mouth out with a ridiculously delicious American flavour combination of peanut butter, grape jam, bacon and sriracha hot sauce (so hot it ranks in the 1000-2500 heat units range). Lucky I was there for happy hour (11am to close every day) so the frozen margaritas, cooling to the burnt-out tongue and for speech therapy, were only $13.”
Howie writes: “We had to check it out — and it was great! God bless America and the PBJ burger.”
Howie and his mate backed up for a Hangover Burger ($18), “a sure cure for every tummy tainted from the night before. Fried egg, bacon, Colby jack cheese and hatch green chilli”. Rehab Burger Therapy guarantees you “reach a rehabilitated state with every bite”.
Last month’s Barrett-Jackson Palm Beach auction flooded the South Florida fairgrounds with 65,000 would-be bidders. If you are a muscle-car lover and you weren’t there, you missed out on an experience nearly as good as the PBJ burger.
After selling $30 million worth of metal, Barrett-Jackson boss Craig Jackson told me that “one of the biggest stories was the strong demand for original American iron this year. Customs, especially trucks were popular, too. But the pristine, matching-numbers American muscle and sports cars were particularly coveted.”
One of those pristines was a heart-achingly beautiful 1969 Ford Mustang Boss ($750,000), pictured. Corvettes were strong with a 1967 Corvette roadster bringing $230,500 while another Bloomington Gold certified 427 convertible topped $200,000.
I lost out on both Heritage Edition Ford GTs with frantic bidding seeing one go for $600,000 and the other bringing $550,500. There were lots of famous people there, particularly from the country and western caper. I had never heard of most of them but I did recognise Bill Shatner autographing his 2002 Aston Martin DB7 and 2004 Volkswagen Phaeton after they had sold.
OK, talking about entertainment products, on to our new food and drink section. Just under 1km from the auction is, wait for it, Connolly’s Sports Bar & Grill, “shamrockin in the USA”. No, the owner is not related, but when I went on a Monday night there was free pool, 40c wings and $7 pitchers of beer. Who said American restaurants were expensive?
Anyway, the wings are probably the best in the world. Made fresh to order with blue-cheese celery and carrots, you can have them Irish rubbed or Connolly rubbed (nup, I’m not going there.) Follow the Jumbo wings (extra blue cheese 75c) with Connolly’s Burger (500g, $11) and a side of Connolly’s Fries ($6.50).
Talking of quality entertainment, if you’re around Mackay next Saturday join the Weekend Australian motoring team down at the waterfront for the start of the 2016 Shit Box Rally.
This is a shortened version of the original article. Read the rest at: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/life/motoring/classic-mustangs-corvettes-and-worlds-best-burgers/news-story/5ae498f9d1e475afe2028320eced0c35
