Hans im Glück

Thomas Hirschberger, who had already built the Sausalitos cocktail-bar chain, opened the first Hans im Glück in Munich’s Neuhausen district in 2010. The name comes from the Brothers Grimm tale of Hans, who trades a lump of gold for ever smaller things and ends up happier with nothing, and the restaurants lean into the fairy-tale mood: dark furniture and a forest of bare birch trunks standing among the tables. The look was distinctive enough to end up in court, in a copyright dispute with a designer that was settled in 2016.

Every burger comes with lettuce, red onion, tomato and the house sauce, and a choice of sourdough, multigrain or brioche bun, or no bread at all. The names are playful German words rather than descriptions, and a large part of the menu is vegetarian or vegan: the chain won PETA’s Vegan Food Award in 2020. In 2019 it even ran a burger made with buffalo worms for a few weeks.

Close to a hundred restaurants, most of them in Germany, with branches in Austria, Switzerland and the Netherlands.

• Max Burgers (Sweden, since 1968). The Swedish chain from above the Arctic Circle that beat McDonald’s at home. Also built on beef and cheese.
• Hesburger (Finland, since 1980). The Finnish chain that outsold McDonald’s in the Nordics and the Baltics. Also built on beef, a special sauce and cheese.
• MEATliquor (United Kingdom, since 2012). A burger van turned into a dark, loud London bar famous for the Dead Hippie. Also built on beef and cheese.
• Quick (Belgium, since 1971). The Belgian burger chain that took on McDonald’s across the French-speaking world. Also built on beef and cheese.