Major Japanese fast food burger chain Lotteria is celebrating its 40th Anniversary this year.  In commemoration, they have brought back the infamous Tower Cheese Burger, five beef patties with five cheese slices, and introduced a five layered shrimp patty burger— each for only 500 yen (about $6.25 US) !

Sounds like great value for anyone with a carnivorous appetite, and, in case five patties sounds too overwhelming, you can also knock the tower down to three or four. Either way, they stack ’em high!   …or they try, at least… 

As you can probably tell from the picture above, we recently found out that reality isn’t always what the advertisements make it out to be.  Is this supposed to be a lesson in facing up to the truth?

The five hundred yen price is special, but this three to five patty offer is actually available any time on the standard Lotteria “Superb Cheesburger.”

Normally, the price of five patties would break down (pun intended) like this.

・  360 yen for a five patty burger + five slices of “superb” cheese at 250 yen a slice = 1360 yen ( $17 US)
・  290 yen for regular shrimp burger + four more shrimp patties at 120 yen each = 770 yen  ($9.63 US)

Comparing these prices to the 500 yen anniversary price, you can enjoy a savings of 860 yen, or $10.75 US, on the five-patty “superb” cheeseburger, and a savings of 270 yen, or $3.38 US, on the shrimp burger.  That’s all well and good.  But the problem is, the “superb” Tower Cheeseburger is not a tower at all, but more of a blob of meat fused together with melted cheese, definitely subtracting from the ‘superb’-ness of it. A shame considering how well they were able to pull off 30 patties last time…

I guess it depends on what you are willing to put up with, because well, it really is a good price… The taste is not effected by the appearance of the thing, so it really is a chance to get a juicy bite of all that meat with lots of melted cheese.  For meat and cheese lovers it could be heaven!

The shrimp tower fares better stacked up.

The shrimp tower towers a bit more, living up to its name.  It is huge though, so our reporter very cleverly took it apart to eat it.

Take it apart at the second and third patties so that you can get your mouth around it.

In this way our reporter was able to finish the whole thing.

Isn’t it nice to know that even after the special price offer you will still be able to sink your teeth into the tower burger of your choice… for a price.  Happy eating!

Mmmmmm!


[ Read in Japanese ]