In this month's Home/Eco issue, girl-about-town Iris McCarthy sets out to find out how a young man in Ottsville is blending farm-to-table dining, local ingredients and a simple cooking philosophy in an effort to change the fast-food game. Oh, and he's making one helluva burger along the way.
My cell phone's GPS was working just fine until I made a left turn on the winding stretch of road that runs along placid Lake Nockamixon in Bucks County. It was a cold, rainy afternoon as my car plunged deeper into the wooded thicket and my phone's signal decided to finally disappear for good, leaving me alone to figure out exactly how to find my destination. It may have been wreaking havoc on visibility but the downpour was doing little to discourage me from the task at hand.
I was trekking to Ottsville for a burger. Yes, a burger. There's no shortage of chain restaurants where I live and most of them offer their version of a burger—usually some flaccid, tasteless patty of dubious origins peddled by a suspiciously friendly, red-haired clown or some creepy guy in a king costume encouraging you to “have it your way”—but that day I was on a singular mission to find Evan Asoudegan's out-of-the-way burger oasis. Though his Persian surname may not roll lightly off the tongue, most people are familiar with the moniker of the young man whose food truck MOO used to set up shop at Carousel Village in Wrightstown and draw huge crowds of folks wanting to get their hands on his seriously good grub.
Before the ink dried on his application for The French Culinary Institute, Asoudegan quickly changed his mind and decided to bypass culinary school in favor of his mother's idea and soon his own concept was born.
The 20-something has grown up since his days as a 14-year-old dishwasher at the venerable Hamilton's Grill Room. Obviously, he hasn't strayed too far from his culinary roots, not that he could escape them if he tried—his mother was a baker and his father owned a café so food is never too far from his thoughts. He credits his mother, Gina, an integral part of the Bucks County Foodshed Alliance (a local organization that promotes sustainable eating), with developing the idea of MOO. Before the ink dried on his application for The French Culinary Institute, Asoudegan quickly changed his mind and decided to bypass culinary school in favor of his mother's idea and soon his own concept was born. In its first incarnation, MOO was a mobile food truck started with limited funds and a vision of serving local, sustainable and uncomplicated food.
Last winter, the enterprising Asoudegan halted his successful mobile service (the food truck is still available for catering and private events) and put down roots in modest Ottsville; the moment MOO became a full-fledged brick-and-mortar outpost and the tiny 46-seat eatery opened its doors, it became an instant classic. The sparse space, along with the large portraits of farm scenes and local produce that adorn the walls (taken by Asoudegan himself), is the kind of bare-bones establishment that lets you know this place is serious about its food. Though he had found new digs, Asoudegan was intent on changing little else; the same seared, slightly crispy burgers, griddle hot dogs and made-to-order fries still screamed a siren call to both locals and out-of-towners alike and people looking to satisfy their burger fix proved they were willing to slog to the backwoods for his tasty fare.
On its surface, MOO is a fast-food joint but at its heart, it's a progressive crossbreed of new and traditional American fare whose pedigree emphasizes its respect for community and locally sourced ingredients.
“We are 99% local with a few exceptions,” says Asoudegan, a guy who looks more like a college-aged hipster than a savvy burger guru.
Clearly, there's no “passport produce (or meat)” here—he can rattle off an ingredient's birthplace like a proud papa. Potatoes that will eventually become those glorious hand-cut fries come from Tallman Family Farms in Tower City, PA; bacon and hot dogs come from Applegate Organic and Natural Meats in Bridgewater, NJ.
The greens that find themselves in a number of creative salads unlike anything you'd find at a typical fast casual restaurant are grown at Blue Moon Acres in nearby Buckingham. Where's the beef, you ask? The star of MOO's show comes from appropriately titled organic farm Simply Grazin' in Skillman, NJ.
The restaurant's homegrown menu may have a limited offering of burgers, hot dogs, fries, salads and shakes but there's something magical in its simplicity and the fact that you can actually watch Asoudegan and his staff hand-roll and season each sphere of meat before cooking them to perfection on the flattop, or hand-cut potatoes before turning them into a jumble of French-fried matchsticks. It shows the amount of care and mindfulness that goes into everything at MOO. Asoudegan, a self-proclaimed locavore, professes his love of Bucks County and continues to pride himself on sourcing all of his ingredients locally.
There's no mile-long manifesto plastered on MOO's walls nor is there a complex, convoluted philosophy driving its success—Evan Asoudegan's objective is absolutely eloquent in its simplicity: to support the community that supports him. And make pretty awesome food while doing it.
Until we eat again…Iris
