Salt Bae’s No Good, Very Bad N.Y.C. Burger Joint Has Closed

Tori Latham
·2 min read
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Salt Bae is no longer the viral phenomenon that he once was. And that, unfortunately, isn’t good for business.

The New York City burger restaurant run by the internet sensation (real name: Nusret Gökçe) has closed, Eater NY reported on Monday. The creatively named Salt Bae Burger shuttered earlier this month, and while a sign on the door says it’s moving to a new location, it’s actually just Salt Bae’s preexisting steakhouse, Nusr-Et Steakhouse. (A spokesperson for the brand told Eater that the steakhouse will serve the burger chain’s menu.)

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The closure of Salt Bae Burger follows the restaurant’s tenuous run in the city over the past three years. It opened near Union Square Park just a month before the pandemic began, serving items like a Wagyu beef burger wrapped in gold foil, $99 “golden milkshakes,” and a vegetarian “ladies burger” that was free for women. While Salt Bae himself may have been beloved by the internet, Gothamist called the butcher’s burger joint “the worst restaurant in NYC.”

Salt Bae Burger was a follow-up to Nusr-Et Steakhouse, which first hit the city in 2018. It now has two locations in Manhattan and more than 20 spots across the globe. In 2019, the restaurant’s parent company, Nusr-Et, faced lawsuits alleging a range of offenses, from wage theft to sexual harassment. But the group’s CFO dismissed those complaints in 2020, saying there was “no problem whatsoever” at Nusr-Et restaurants.

Now, if diners want a taste of Salt Bae Burger, they’ll have to travel all the way to Dubai, where there’s the only existing location of the restaurant (a Los Angeles outpost was in the works but never opened, Eater noted). And while the burger joint’s stint in the U.S. has come to an end, it’s a good five years after we predicted that Salt Bae would disappear from the restaurant scene.

In that sense, it seems like the real-life meme has created strong enough of a brand to carry him through the volatile restaurant scene, as long as he stays away from trying to make one of New York’s best burgers. The city already has plenty that fit the bill.

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