Calamar may have been my best burger in Geneva if my medium burger hadn't come out medium-well. The…read moreother minus was that the fries were just ok --they would have passed any negative notice any other time, but I've been having a really good french fry streak, so it had a lot to live up to.
Otherwise, Calamar was delightful. I had heard it was a bit college-town, and the website insinuated an SM-underground-brit-goth ambiance. I found it to be surprisingly grown-up, with the only hints of rebellious youth being our tattooed waiter and the reasonably-priced burgers.
Between four of us, we had two cheeseburgers, a rimini burger, and a calamari steak. So, funny story about the calamari steak, one of my dining mates, thinking that the "calamari" was referring to the adjective form of the restaurant's name, ordered the "steak of calamar." Needless to say, my meat-loving Ukranian friend was quite disappointed to find that his dish consisted of a slice of squid instead of a slab of meat.
Ukranian friend, gazing sadly at his dish: "no wonder the waiter looked confused when I said medium rare..."
Anyway, the burgers were a good size, with a big fat beef patty and shredded onions. They use mozerella cheese, which was a bit unusual, but worked pretty well. The rimini burger was a towering pile of beef, zucchini, eggplant, cheese and pesto. Perhaps it was a bit too much, dining mate 2 noted that she would prefer it without the cheese. The sesame buns were nicely toasted and almost a bit crunchy. Any burger joint that toasts their buns gets extra points from me. As for the calamari steak...well...that was a mistake to begin with.
At CHF16-19, I'd say the burgers are a steal, especially since they come with fries and a huge salad. The wine was a bit pricey in comparison, at about CHF6/glass, and CHF40-55/bottle.
This is a burger joint I'd actually return to, but next time, I'm skipping the wine and going medium rare. Highly recommended, but be careful at night, as we had a minor scuffle with a local drunk (presumably) pick-pocket on our way out, and it was only 9pm!