Japan’s Mos Burger discontinues old teriyaki burger and rolls out new recipe, but is it as good?

Japan’s favorite domestic burger chain, the one that introduced the teriyaki burger to the country, launches seventh-generation sandwich.

Mos Burger is Japan’s favorite domestic hamburger chain, and not only was it the creator of the rice burger, it was also the first chain in Japan to sell teriyaki burgers. Mos’ teriyaki burger made its debut in May of 1973, but while it’s been on the menu ever since, the teriyaki burger it serves today isn’t the same as the one it sold 53 years ago. As a mater of fact, it’s not even the same as the teriyaki burger they sold last week.

That’s because Mos Burger is using a new recipe for its teriyaki burger as of March 18. This is actually the seventh generation of the Mos teriyaki burger, and its first update since four years ago.

▼ A sign announcing the new teriyaki burger, with an excited “Renewal!” (リニューアル), which is used in Japanese to describe renovations and reformulations

With Mos’ reputation for excellent quality, the idea of a new teriyaki burger was both intriguing and worrying. On the one hand, the chain has a strong track record of cooking up tasty chow, but on the other, with their teriyaki burger already being a hit, you could argue this is a case of a company trying to fix something that’s not broken. Still, Mos said that it has “updated the flavor” of its teriyaki sauce “to fit with the current times.” Slightly more specifically, they said that the new teriyaki sauce has “a gentle sweetness within a sauce packed with rich umami flavor that leads to a clean finish.”

Drawing taste-test duties this time around was our Japanese-language reporter P.K. Sanjun. Since there was no overlap between the availability of the new and old sandwiches, P.K. headed to Mos Burger for one last old-teriyaki burger dinner on March 17, then hit the chain up again the next day to try the new version.

Appearance-wise, the new Mos teriyaki burger, which at 470 yen (US$3) us 10 yen more than its predecessor, keeps the same overall look: nice fluffy bun, crisp lettuce with a dollop of mayo mixed with teriyaki sauce, and a teriyaki-slathered patty.

Having securely input the flavor of the old teriyaki burger into the part of his brain for food memories the night before, P.K. took a bite of the new version…and it tasted very good!

However, it didn’t taste very different. He could perceive a little extra sweetness in the sauce, but not so much as to majorly shift the balance of the flavor profile, and he might have only been able to notice it because he was specifically looking for it, since Mos had said that “gentle sweetness” was going to be the biggest difference between the new teriyaki sauce and the old recipe’s. Being the biggest difference, though, doesn’t automatically make something a big difference, and P.K. thinks that many people, unless they’re also armed with prior knowledge that Mos has changed its teriyaki sauce, probably won’t notice that anything has changed.

However, this isn’t a criticism. Like we mentioned earlier, the old Mos Burger teriyaki burger was already awesome, and it’s hard to imagine how they could have strayed from its recipe very far without making the results worse. At the same time, P.K. isn’t upset that Mos Burger has made a subtle shift in its sauce. That kind of incremental evolution may not be the most dramatic way to update your menu, but it’s just the sort of fine-tuning that makes Mos Burger one of the most reliably satisfying burger options Japan has, and with a final verdict of “Yep, new Mos teriyaki burger tastes pretty much like the old one: delicious,” the last part is really what counts.

Photos © SoraNews24
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