Over the past several months, locally sourced burger restaurants have been popping up all over Calgary and the response has been nothing short of bustling.
Restaurant owners Muzzamil Hussain and Rohan Wadhwani are especially feeling the heat after recently opening up their burger joint, iyycburg.
“The community, and the City of Calgary in general is really taking a good step in supporting local,” Wadhwani said. “You’d rather support someone who’s from one of your communities and from your city and back them. Not only does it help the local businesses keep thriving, but also creates more jobs.”
Iyycburg’s second location opened on October 23 in the Sundance area.
The owners say the concept for iyycburg is simple: all the beef and poultry is locally sourced, each menu item should be made fresh to order and leave the customer feeling satisfied.
“Most of our ingredients are Alberta based.” Hussain said. “In constructing our both locations we use local contractors and local suppliers as much as we could to really give back to the community.”
Another Calgary burger hot spot is Saucy Burger, located on 17 Avenue, where they also serve locally sourced ingredients.
The owner and operator of Saucy Burger, Michael Dekker, says supporting locally owned businesses is now more important than ever.
“We’re real faces behind your food.” Dekker said. “We really have a direct impact on a society that’s around us. We’re impacting local families, local people are making your food, and local people are selling.”
Many restaurants have started to switch to using only beef and poultry that is sourced from within the community, which is what Saucy Burger has taken the initiative to do.
“We never seen a great correlation between being local, being real food, being Calgary driven and being fast and affordable,” he said.
