‘Vital but fraying’: Five Guys reviewed

Five Guys is a burger house from Arlington, Virginia, based on the premise that if you can serve a drink, cut a fringe, or make a hamburger, you will always make money in America. Thirty years and 1,700 restaurants later, it sits on Coventry Street off Piccadilly, soaking up the alcohol of a thousand British stomachs. If central London is a strip-lit bin alley between palaces, this is its restaurant: vital but fraying.

I am here because I will not eat at McDonald’s, even when I am sad. I do not think my McDonald’s burger is all from the same cow, and this disturbs me: I can eat one cow happily, but a multitude frightens me. McDonald’s doesn’t fill you either, no matter what you eat: is it just an idea? So I am here – though I do not know how many cows constitute each Five Guys burger either – and at some point you will be here too. If you haven’t the wit to book set lunches, or the energy to queue in Soho for suave nibbles in dark rooms, you will wash up at Five Guys eventually. It eyeballs the Angus Steakhouse opposite: a perfect storm of cow angst. It is vast, glass-plated, decorated in red and white tile and plastic. I think of the Nite Owl in LA Confidential, clean and bloody.

The atmosphere changes with the time of day in a restaurant like this: atmosphere is weather. On a weekend lunchtime in London – a child’s sitting – it is panic. I blame inflation: normal parents walk around London patting their wallets these days. There are queues to browse at the Lego Store and a glance from a souvenir hawker feels like theft. They pile into Five Guys with relief, because it is as noisy as a football game and as bright as dawn.