Hungry Dane
Hungry Dane is the only kitchen in the world serving burgers prepared using the sous-vide confit technique. Our burgers have been praised by Michelin chefs and are among the most award-winning burgers in Denmark.
Awards and recognition
2024 – Runner-up, Denmark’s Best Burger
2023 – Runner-up, Denmark’s Best Burger
2022 – Winner, Denmark’s Best Burger
2021 – Winner, Denmark’s Best Burger and representative of Danish fast food at World Expo Dubai
2020 – Winner of Denmark’s Most Innovative Burger at the Copenhagen Burger & Beer Festival
2018 & 2019 – Voted Best Burger in Copenhagen
Hungry Dane burgers are served with sous-vide prepared and freshly ground beef, signature chicken, and classic duck confit.
From the first Hungry Dane burger joint until today
Hungry Dane opened its first restaurant in Copenhagen on March 3, 2017.
During the first five years, Hungry Dane won Denmark’s Best Burger three years in a row, tested the concept successfully as pop-ups in both Holland and Sweden, and represented Denmark at the World Expo in Dubai.
After five years marked by organizational challenges and global economic uncertainty, Hungry Dane began a new journey in 2024 – version 2.0, now with a clearly defined profile, strategy, and direction.
Expansion plans currently include new locations in Copenhagen as well as openings in Zurich, Dubai, and Palma.
The burger and its origins
The story of the burger goes back centuries.
As early as the 4th century, the Roman cookbook Apicius described a dish called Isicia, consisting of bread filled with a mixture of minced meat made from beef, pine nuts, peppercorns, and white wine.
Later, in the 12th century, the warriors of Genghis Khan ate early versions of what we today know as steak tartare, prepared from various types of meat such as camel, horse, beef, or goat, often mixed with milk. The meat was sometimes tenderized by being placed under the riders’ saddles while traveling. In many ways, this may represent one of the earliest practical uses of minced meat.
This type of food ensured that warriors received the protein needed to maintain their strength. The explorer Marco Polo later learned of these practices and estimated during his travels that one pony could feed 100 soldiers.
Over the following centuries, and until around 1895, when the Dane Louis Lassen is believed to have used the word burger for the first time, there were many variations of bread served with meat.
We are all familiar with steak tartare and steak sandwiches, but until Louis Lassen, no one had turned the concept into what we now recognize as the modern burger.
The meat used at the time typically came from trimmed cuts of higher-quality steak, and it is worth noting that the meat was originally cut rather than minced.
Louis Lassen began shaping the buns flat instead of round and systematized the ingredients. Lettuce and tomato became the classic additions, although today creativity sets no limits for what can be included in a burger.
Around 1920, the supply and demand for beef became unbalanced during a time of economic crisis. Creative butchers began experimenting with alternatives. Inspired by the mixed meats used by the warriors of Genghis Khan, producers in Newport, New York developed a substitute they called the hamburger, named after immigrants arriving from Hamburg, Germany.
The product looked almost the same and tasted similar — especially when heavily seasoned. This is also when tomato ketchup gained popularity, as its strong flavor helped mask the differences in taste.
Naturally, the product was cheaper, since it used meat that might otherwise have gone unsold or close to being discarded.
Interestingly, the same logic still applies in modern meat processing today: first roasts, then steaks, then cut meat, and finally minced meat. Nothing wrong with that — simply a fact.
If we summarize the story, the burger is the original product, much like Ford or Mercedes are to cars, while the hamburger is more like the pastry world’s version of a student cake. Nothing wrong with that either — just a fact.
The Hungry Dane philosophy
At Hungry Dane, we have chosen a different path.
Hungry Dane is the only burger concept in the world preparing all of its meat using the sous-vide confit technique, carefully building each burger in harmony with the placement and characteristics of the taste buds.
In simple terms, enjoying a Hungry Dane burger is a bit like driving a Mercedes Super Turbo AMG — powerful, refined, and unforgettable.