Salty Buns, a smash-burger shop a block back from Manly beach

A smash-burger shop a block back from the beach, doing the takeaway thing properly.

Pittwater Road is the side of Manly most people walk through on the way to somewhere else. Salty Buns sits on it at number 148, a block off the beach, and has quietly become the burger shop people in Manly mention first.

The smash

The thing it does is smash burgers: thin patties pressed hard on the flat top, so the edges go lacy and the middle stays juicy. The beef versions are the reason to come. The Truffle and the Baconiser come up again and again, and the word people reach for is melts. The chicken side holds its own: a Nashville chicken that stays crisp, and a Korean chicken with a sweet, spicy, savoury sauce and a slaw with some crunch in it.

Built for takeaway

What sets it apart from the beachfront burger places is that it has solved takeaway. Wrapped tight, still hot after a fifteen-minute drive, bun not soggy. If you are eating on the sand or taking a box home up the hill, that matters more than the room.

Portions are generous and the prices are fair for Manly, which is not something you can say about everywhere on the strip.

Find Salty Buns

148 Pittwater Road, Manly. Closed Mondays. Lunch and dinner the rest of the week, with a break between 2:30pm and 5pm on Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday; Thursday to Sunday it runs straight through. Last orders around 8pm, 7:30pm on Sundays. Order ahead for pickup on their site.