NITRO BURGER
Hoppen Hierarchy: 6.9
Location varies
Lincoln
Pros: Great size of burger, meats are delicious, plenty of creative offerings, friendly service
Cons: Longer wait time, can be difficult to locate/odd hours, very messy
There are plenty of fun food trucks in Nebraska.
I can say with solid confidence that Nitro Burger is the only bus.
Nitro Burger started running in 2011, making it one of Nebraska’s longer running food trucks. What started as a humble trailer graduated into the red bus, and the owners hope to open a brick and mortar location in the near future.
For now, Nitro Burger can be found at local events (keep an eye on its Facebook page for updates) or requested for catering. The truck prides itself on using fresh ingredients and scratch-made sauces to craft its unique menu (which is conveniently posted on the side of the bus).
There are four staple burgers, and they’re not exactly your standard burger fare. Each burger starts with an enormous 8-oz. patty that seems heftier than advertised. Also available are hand-cut fries and sweet potato fries.
Nitro Burger isn’t afraid to get wild with its burger creations. Take the Purple People Eater, which features a blueberry BBQ sauce, cream cheese, and crispy onion straws. If you fancy other animals to go with your beef, there’s the Jeremiah Johnson, piled high with smoked chicken and bacon and smothered in an onion aioli. Keep an eye on Nitro Burger’s specials, as these often prove to be a real treat.
Before we break down the burgers, let’s address the elephant in the room: these things are a MESS.
As mentioned before, the patties are huge, and there are plenty of other ingredients topping them. Each burger includes some kind of sauce or aioli, which is liberally added. All these factors would test the wills of the heartiest of buns—which, unfortunately, Nitro Burger does not employ. As you can see, the buns are a bit flaky and sometimes are cracked even upon arriving.
It only takes a few bites for them to sop up grease and/or sauce and dissolve into a giant napkin sacrifice.
Fortunately for Nitro Burger, the flavors truly come to life. The beef itself doesn’t stand out, but the toppings do their part, and then some.
Take, for instance, the Gunslinger, a special that combines jalapeños, caramelized onions, cheddar cheese, and whiskey barbecue sauce. There is a lot going on here: sweetness from the onions and sauce; tang from the whiskey; heat from the jalapeños. But somehow, it all comes together and just works.
That’s even more evident in the BYOB (Bring Your Own Barbecue), another special that tops the patty with rib meat, caramelized onions, and BBQ sauce (also featured in the header photo). It quickly dissolves into a hot mess, and the BBQ sauce overwhelms a bit.
I think that’s the main thing that bothers me a bit about Nitro Burger; there’s just so much going on in the burgers. It’s a double-edged sword: the multiple flavors are quite tasty, but they also drown out the patty itself and cause the poor bun to disintegrate in your hands. These burgers either force you to knife and fork the burger or use a tree’s worth of napkins.
The owners, who also man the truck, are incredibly friendly. Burgers take about 15 minutes to arrive, which is a bit longer than a regular food truck, but to-order burgers take time.
Ultimately, I think Nitro Burger delivers a high-quality product, and I can’t wait to see what it’s future holds. If it could just scale back on the sauce and select a heartier bun, these burgers could really go places.