Why the Tom Selleck Comes Back Every November

From 12pm on Saturday 31 October to Sunday 29 November, the Tom Selleck is back at both our shops, Queen St and Wynyard, with two beef patties and onion cut so paper-fine it's translucent before it ever meets the griddle, then pressed into the beef until it becomes part of the patty, American cheese melted over the top, pineapple, home made teriyaki sauce, lettuce and mayo, all held together in one bun. RAD Club members earn double points on every one they order, mo or no mo.

There's a group chat somewhere in Auckland that hasn't had a real message in it since winter. It's mostly memes now, the odd thumbs up, a photo of someone's dog and a plan for drinks that got as far as "we should" before everyone went back to work. Nobody's fallen out, and nobody's said anything is wrong, but it's been a while since the lot of you sat at the same table long enough to get past "yeah, good, busy" and onto how things are actually going.

That's the reason the Tom Selleck comes back every November, and it's what this post is about. It isn't a health lecture and it isn't a sales pitch. It's a burger with a moustache, back on the board from Saturday 31 October at both our shops, one on upper Queen Street at 1/492 Queen Street in the Auckland CBD and one at Shop 1, 12 Jellicoe Street in Wynyard Quarter, and it's our way of giving that group chat a reason to turn into a booking.

Why a moustache in November

If you weren't in front of a TV in the 80s, Tom Selleck is the actor who played Magnum, P.I., and for a lot of us his moustache did about as much work on that show as he did. November is also the month plenty of men grow one to get people talking about men's health, the stuff that tends to get put off, like the check-up that's been due since last year or the phone call to a mate who's gone a bit quiet.

We're not doctors and we won't pretend to be. What we can do is put a decent reason on the table for a group of men to sit down together, and in our experience the real conversations rarely start when someone announces it's time for one. They start halfway through the second beer, when somebody mentions work's been heavy, and the mate next to him asks the follow-up question instead of changing the subject. That's the whole idea, and the moustache is just there to get you in the door.

We'd be lying if we said this one wasn't personal. Fat Puku's is run by G and V, two mates with mos who are friends and business partners, and they're the two who keep putting the Tom Selleck back on the board each November. They don't leave the check-in to the burger, either. They ask each other the follow-up question too, and the burger is their way of passing that habit on to every table that orders one.

What's on the board

The burger starts with onion sliced so fine it's translucent and you could almost read through it, then pressed into the beef on the griddle, where it works its way right into the patty, so by the time the beef comes up there's no telling where the onion ends and the crust begins. American cheese goes over both patties and melts down into every gap, then the pineapple and our home made teriyaki sauce go on, with lettuce and mayo to cool it all down. Our home made teriyaki sauce is salty and savoury with a glossy sweetness that pushes the beef crust further. What makes it is the bite where everything lands at once, the home made teriyaki sauce running into the mayo, the pineapple's acidity cutting through the melted cheese and the beef fat, and that savoury, onion-crusted beef underneath holding the whole thing together, so you get sweet and salty and rich and fresh in the same mouthful. It's the kind of burger that makes a table go quiet for a minute, which is fine, because there's plenty of time to talk after, and if anyone wants to see what else is on the board before you come, the full menu is up online.

It runs at both Queen St and Wynyard from 12pm on Saturday 31 October through to Sunday 29 November. If you're a RAD Club member, every Tom Selleck you order earns double points for the whole run, mo or no mo, because the moustache is a bit of fun and nobody at the door is checking your top lip. If you're not a member yet, ask the crew when you order and they'll sign you up on the spot.

Bring the whole group chat

Both shops take groups of up to 20, and both have a bar, so the first round can be sorted while the last of the group chat is still finding a park. For a group of under eight you can book online or just walk in, and for eight or more, flick us an email at contact@fatpukus.co.nz and we'll sort the table. If Wynyard is the plan early in the week, keep in mind it closes at 2pm on Mondays and Tuesdays, so make that one a long lunch, and the rest of the hours for both shops are on our locations page.

When we built both shops, our dads were the ones painting the walls and running the data cables through them, so these rooms were built by the people we'd want to check in on first. A table like that is a good place to ask someone how they're going, even when nobody calls it anything more than lunch.

Somewhere in that quiet group chat, someone just has to be the one who sends the message. Make it you, pick a day after the 31st, and do what G and V do. Ask your mate how he's actually going, then pull up.

Team Fat Puku's