Food trends come and go, but some trends have been here all along, just waiting for a long-deserved spotlight.

The smashburger was always ready for its close-up.

The smashburger is, as best as anyone can tell, is a Middle American variation on the standard griddled burger of diners, drive-ins and dives coast-to-coast.

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It’s now having a moment, and that moment has come to Memphis. 

The ongoing local burger pop-up, Secret Smash Society, has built a following whenever and wherever they set up a griddle. Bain Barbecue has recently added a smashburger to its menu of Texas-meets-Memphis ’cue. And even Huey’s, perhaps the quintessential Memphis burger chain, now has a smashburger on the menu. 

But a particularly tasty addition to the growing scene can be found at a yellow food truck that launched in the spring: The Smash & Grab Burger Lab.

Inside that truck, co-owner Kidd Martin is cooking up what’s instantly one of the city’s best burgers.

Because the super-thin patties cook quickly and generally aren’t loaded with toppings — they really only need a bag of fries as accompaniment — the smashburger would seem to be a particularly good fit for a food truck.

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But the business-plan attraction of fast turnover in a tight space wasn’t the sole appeal for Martin.

“It’s my favorite style,” Martin said. “The thicker burger is just not me. I’ve never liked thick burgers. You can’t be too sure if the middle is gonna be done, and you don’t want to poke the beef because it lets the juices out. So the smashburger. I love the crispy edges, and it was just something that I felt like the city would appreciate.”

The idea of pressing a burger to keep the juices in might sound counterintuitive, but the smashing is done just as the beef begins to cook, creating the shape the moment it hits the griddle.

“First, we roll them,” Martin said. “Every patty begins as a ball and is then flattened on the griddle. Smash ’em.”

The fast, intense sear on the griddle minimizes moisture loss and adds flavor.

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Smashburgers provide not just a higher ratio of delicious crusty, crispy, salty, caramelized surface but are almost all delicious crusty, crispy, salty, caramelized surface. 

The thinness of the burger patties, matched typically one-to-one — which is the case at Martin’s truck — with slices of melty cheese makes the implied equal billing in the term “cheeseburger” truth in advertising.

While these burgers cook quickly, they are also cooked-to-order. So you won’t quite walk up to the window and immediately get a burger. 

“I tell people it’s not fast; it’s fast-casual. You’re going to have to casually wait, maybe about 10 minutes. But it’s coming fresh off the grill. It’s coming fresh off the grill every single time.”

Toppings are minimal: Cheese, grilled onion, pickle and the truck’s home-brewed creamy-spicy “wavvy” sauce. 

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“You know, I don’t believe in throwing a lot of different things on the burger because we had to search high and low to get this grade of beef,” Martin said. 

He called the truck’s meat source “proprietary” but said the meat is locally sourced and cooked fresh, not frozen. (It’s hard to smash frozen beef.)

Tasting is believing. 

Fast food or fashion food?

The Smash & Grab Burger Lab may have quickly leapt to the first ranks of Memphis food trucks, but there it has company.

On the other hand, it can perhaps boast of being the only Memphis food truck that grew out of a fashion brand.

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The side of the truck notes that the “burger lab” is “Engineered by Odds.”

That would be Odds Atelier, the South Main clothing-and-culture store/fashion brand founded by Martin and partner (in the shop and the truck) Matthew Roumain.

As designers, they’ve created streetwear in collaboration with the Memphis Grizzlies and other brands.

Odds Atelier opened in 2021. It’s currently closed to the public as Martin and Roumain work on their own debut streetwear collection. The space has recently been used for pop-up and private events, and the truck was initially conceived as an extension of the fashion brand.

If that may or may not make sense to you, it does to them.

“It’s streetwear. It’s art. It’s all about cutting-edge, growing community,” Martin said of Odds. “We felt like one of the most slept-on sectors of art is culinary. We look at food, like music, as a universal language. Music brings people together, right? Well, so does a great meal. When we set out our brand ethos, it was to bring people together. 

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“We wanted something great but simple that the people could appreciate. I’ve seen people gather around the truck and have conversations about the burger, meeting new people, and the burger brings people together.”

Another thing you’ll read on the side of the text-heavy truck is the slogan, “Where Culinary & Culture Collide,” and whether that collision happens in the burger, it definitely happens on the menu.

Burgers are available as a single, double or triple.

The single is called “OG1.”

“Which makes reference to the vintage, hype OG1 Jordan sneaker,” Martin said.

The double is “The Old ‘Ye.’”

“The old Kanye (West), where it was all about the art,” said Martin.

The triple is the “Triple Beef Mafia,” natch.

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“Local hometown heroes who made it big, like we want to,” Martin said of Three 6 Mafia. “We want to bring a taste of Memphis to wherever we go.

Want to add bacon? Make it a “hype beast.”

“‘Hype beast’ is a streetwear term that’s just what’s hot at the moment,” Martin explained.

“Instead of being called combos, they’re called collections. It’s like what we’re talking about now in the clothing, like we’re dropping a collection. And that’s what it’s about with the wavvy sauce. That’s one of the words we use in fashion. Stay wavvy at all times.”

What’s in the wavvy sauce? That’s also proprietary. 

This bounty of hip-hop and streetwear lingo adds extra fun. Or maybe not. Depends on the customer. 

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But you don’t have to be able to recognize the Wu-Tang Clan reference on the menu to appreciate these perfectly crusty smashburgers, the savory sauce and gooey cheese oozing out. Even if you’re more conversant in Chef Boyardee than Raekwon the Chef, this burger is still for you.

The truck’s roll-off-the-tongue name? A joke on an issue of recent local concern?

Not quite. 

“It’s like a double entendre, but it was mistakenly done that way,” said Martin. “You know, our place (on South Main) was burglarized. When I named it that, my business partner said, you know they’re gonna think that. 

“It is what it is. It’s a play on words. We smash it. You grab it. You know what I mean?” 

The Smash & Grab Burger Lab posts its locations each week on its Instagram page, @odds_smashxgrab. While locations vary week to week, they’re typically at Yorkshire Liquors (5669 Quince Road) on Wednesdays, 4 p.m.-8 p.m.