Fast Food Review: New Jack in the Box Buttery Jack

The new Jack in the Box Buttery Jack – Redic or Delic?

During the Super Bowl, I saw the commercial for Jack in the Box‘s new Buttery Jack hamburger. In the ad, they picked normal people off the street try a “New Burger” and asked them if they could see this burger at Jack In the Box.

 As expected, they cherry picked folks extolling the golden virtues of the burger and then “shocked”  then they were told that the burger came from Jack in the Box. In one version of the commercial, Jack actually comes out to ambush the unwitting testers.

Does the actual burger live up to the commercial hype?

Lets break this down.

First let’s acknowledge that at the restaurant level, your burger will never look the one on the commercial. In the world of fast food, the actual product you get varies significantly in presentation. See an example of this below based on my experience (left).

Notice that the bun was a little squashed and over toasted. The biggest distraction was the over application of lettuce, I could practically make a side salad with amount of romaine in my burger. With this said, the presentation was as expected. 

 Anatomy of a Buttery Jack Burger “Classic”

The first thing you notice is that the burger is wrapped in a sheath of paper, this is both for your protection and pleasure. Between the beef juice, melted butter and tomato sauce, this burger can get messy. The paper wrapping is the only thing that separates you and a dry cleaning bill. 

Bun

The bun is of much higher quality than your standard fast food restaurant bun, it is akin to something I would get at a sit down casual dining restaurant like Chili’s or TGIF. The bread is fluffy, springy and had a over reaching sweet butter flavor. The bun itself is grilled, so expect some crispiness and inherited butter. 

Creamy Tomato Sauce

The next layer is the creamy tomato sauce that is applied to both sides of the bun. The application is generous, just sitting on the other side of slightly too much. The sauce is sweet and a little tangy, I did not personally pick up that it was a creamy tomato sauce until I did some research. 

Burger Patty

The next layer revealed their special 1/4 pound beef patty (weighed before cooking), which is formed into a slightly squared shape. The meat itself tasted better than the standard Jack in the Box burger meat and it had a better mouth texture. It is still not as good as a Eureka Burger, but still impressive for fast food.  

Garlic Herb Butter

The Melted Garlic Herb Butter was actually impressive and the most memorable part of the burger’s flavor profile. Although the butter is meant to be a flavor multiplier, it actually provided a constant flavor note through the entire flavor palate. The butter flavor was sexy, but it did not dominate. 

Vegetation and Cheese

Like I previously noted, they need to seriously cut back on the amount of lettuce they used in this burger. I like the fact that they are using whole romaine leaf, but the lettuce leaf should be trimmed and reduced  The two tomato slices were fresh, no issues there

The burger features a slice of provolone cheese. I think the provolone adding quite a bit of flavor to the burger and was a great choice. 

 

My reaction to the Buttery Jack Burger

If I were to be ambushed on the street and asked to try the new burger, I would be able to spot this as a fast food burger. With that said, this is one of the best fast food burgers on the market right now. I really appreciated the higher quality meat, fresh produce and bun. The burger’s namesake, butter, really added something and there is nothing like this in the fast food market.

When I first picked up, smelled, and tasted the Buttery Jack,  it had some of the best traits of burgers found premium burger joints. It was as if Jack in the Box Food Scientist went to Mick’s Karma Bar in Irvine and Eureka! to do research. As the Buttery Jack tasted like a fast food version of Mick’s Karma Bar’s “Karma Burger”and the Eureka!’s “Bone Marrow burger.” No there is not a comparison to either of these burgers in terms of quality; although, for fast food, they nailed it. 

Buttery Jack Price

The price of the Buttery Jack is slightly more expensive than their standard premium burger, but I think it was a fair price. 

• The “Classic” Buttery Jack: $4.49 plus tax
• The “Bacon Swiss” Buttery Jack: $4.99 plus tax

Buttery Jack Nutritional Information

If you are eating fast food, you don’t care about the calories because either you don’t care, too young to care, or giving yourself a much deserved post yoga treat.  I pulled up the nutritional, if you really must know. 

CALORIES	816
CALORIES FROM FAT	471
TOTAL FAT(G	52
SATURATED FAT(G)	23
Trans Fat (G)	2
CHOLESTEROL(MG)	128
SODIUM(MG)	1148
POTASSIUM(MG)	484
CARBOHYDRATES(G)	50
DIETARY FIBER(G)	4
SUGARS(G)	12
PROTEIN (G)	37

See my other reviews

The Carl’s Jr All-Natural Burger

Orange County Restaurant Week 2015 Top Picks

Best Burgers in Orange County – Part 1 – South Orange County

50 Shades of Grey Food Analysis

Buttery Jack from Jack in the Box

Best Las Vegas Buffet Bacchanal or Wicked Spoon