Skateboarder, star chef team up to make burgers on Las Vegas Strip
A skateboard star and a Michelin-starred chef walk into a kitchen — and emerge hoisting a badass burger. With biceps.
On July 10, NADC (Not a Damn Chance) Burger is opening for a three-month residency at Resorts World, adjacent to the Conrad lobby in the Suns Out Buns Out space, on the Las Vegas Strip.
NADC is a collaboration between professional skateboarder and entrepreneur Neen Williams and chef Phillip Frankland Lee, known (with his wife, Margarita Kallas-Lee) for the Michelin stars awarded to restaurants in their Scratch Restaurants Group.
Stacking up
The namesake burger stacks two wagyu patties with grilled onion smashed into the meat, American cheese, pickles, jabs of jalapeño and house secret sauce, all between the halves of a toasted potato roll. A Vegas-only Breakfast Burger (available all day) layers a wagyu patty, American cheese, pickles, special sauce, bacon and a fried egg.
Beef tallow fries — or the fries in Beast Mode loaded with cheese, pickles, jalapeños and special sauce — come aboard to ride sidecar.
NADC Burger and Sushi by Scratch, with a lavish 17-course nigiri tasting menu, popped up in June 2024 at Resorts World for World’s 50 Best Restaurants week.
“Coming back to Las Vegas with NADC Burger feels like a full-circle moment,” Lee said. “I grew up visiting Vegas with my parents and always dreamed of opening a restaurant in a casino. To see that dream begin to take shape — starting with a pop-up at a premier Strip destination like Resorts World — is a milestone moment.”
Bro’ing down
Williams and the chef met at the Sushi by Scratch in Austin, Texas.
“He grew up skateboarding. I grew up cooking,” Williams said. “So, we bro’d down really fast. From then on, we were hanging out a lot, and we kept the relationship going.
“We first started this up as a passion project for fun. On weekends, we would meet up and say, ‘Hey, do you want to make burgers today?’ We would prep them at his restaurant, and then we would show up at a comedy club or a skate park and give them away to build attention.”
A burger, first and always
The first NADC Burger location opened in October 2022 inside Idle Hands, an Austin bar. The first stand-alone restaurant opened in December 2023 in Austin. Today, NADC has expanded to another Austin shop and to locations in Fort Worth, Denver, Chicago (two) and Manhattan.
NADC was always going to be a burger, Williams said, and not, say, Not a Damn Chance dogs or hot chicken.
“It was literally only a burger — that’s what we wanted to do, one burger, one way. It’s about balance. It’s about the ratio, the care, the attention to details. The acidity that cuts through the fattiness of the wagyu, giving you a perfect balanced bite every single time.”
The NADC pop-up will be open 24 hours daily. Visit nadcburger.com.
Contact Johnathan L. Wright at jwright@reviewjournal.com. Follow @JLWTaste on Instagram.