Very strange. The best cheeseburgers in the town I grew up in were from the…
(Dramatic Pause)
HORSESHOE LOUNGE
Cool. I remember going to Swenson’s when I was a kid/teen in Cleveland. I’m glad they’re still in business.
However, the best cheeseburgers in New York City (which, of course, means the best in the world) may be found at the Astro Coffee Shop on the northwest corner of West 55th Street and Sixth Avenue, midtown Manhattan. God knows WHY they’re so good there, but they are.
A hole-in-the-wall called “Five Guys” - located in Arlington, Virginia. I lived in the Washington, D.C. area for three years and these burgers were divine. (Good fries too.)
Oh my God, I’m hungry just thinking about them. God, I miss them.
Peter’s Drive-In, in Calgary, Alberta. I’ve sampled cheeseburgers around the world, and no one else even comes close.
You gotta give credit to the pioneer of weirdly good burgers. If you’ve passed near Sedalia, MO and haven’t had a gooberburger, you should be be tarred and feathered.
A regular hamburger with a big gob of peanut butter slabbed over it. Mmm…I’m getting hungry.
The best cheeseburgers I have ever had (and my family considers me an expert at these things) are from Litton’s in Knoxville, TN. I was in grad school for 2 years at the Univ. of Tennessee and learning of Litton’s cheeseburgers may have been the most important thing I picked up there. When we go back to visit we have been known to stop there and eat before we let anyone know we are in town. Friends can wait; those cheeseburgers can’t.
Here in Chicago I’d have to go with Muskies on Lincoln (across from the Elbo Room). Their burgers are so fantastic they make you weep.
mmmmmm… unfortunately, I work a good 25 miles N of there so it is a rare treat during the day but on the weekends oh yeah.
P.S. they use Merkts cheddar cheese spread which is IMHO one of the finest uses of cheese on this planet (outside of a really good brie)
White Castle. I buy them by the bag (12) and eat them all at once. It’s the grilled onions that make the difference. I hate raw onions.
And where was this town, Frank? We need to know for research purposes!
The finest cheeseburger I have ever tasted is a product of Boonches Tavern on 9th St. in Columbia, MO. Next time you speed down I-70, desperately trying to get out of Missouri (I kid! I kid! I’m just homesick! Don’t hit!) pause in Columbia and pick one up. Your stomach will thank you.
Ahhh, Booches in Columbia. Another place with great hamburgers (although Litton’s are still my favorite as I said above). I went to grad school at Missouri too and I spent some time at Booches. The thing about Booches is the atmosphere. It looks like an old pool hall from 75 years ago. Not much has changed. It is narrow and deep with the restaurant tables in front and the pool tables lined up down the back. The only restaurant equipment there is a grill. All the food is either grilled (burgers, etc.) or prepackaged (chips, etc.); no french fries there. It is all served on pieces of waxed paper; there are no dishes to wash. Definitely worth a stop if you ever have a reason to visit Columbia.
The Box, formerly The Band Box.
It used to be a biker bar where they’d put sheets of plywood over the pool tables at lunch.
Dripping with hot pepper cheese and grease…
Damn it boys, it’s lunch time!
The best burgers I’ve found are at Jackson Hole. There are a couple here in NYC. Burgers the size of grapefruits…mmmm. Great pickles too.
Council’s pool hall, across from the courthouse in Bradenton, Fla. 1930-40 circa, very dusty stuffed animal heads and mounted fish from who knows where. The original gas oven with griddle topproduces uncomparable flavor. At lunch, you’ll know whereA Cheese-A (c-burger all the way) with a bowl of their chili and a frosted mug of Bud is my ‘Cheeseburger in Paradise’ place.
IN 'n OUT has to be the best chain burger, mmmmmm, sauteed onions.
oot and aboot, you gotta be kiddin! While I agree thata White Castle fix is hard to ignore, the only really good thing about them is the tear to the eye farts they produce when coupled Strohs beer!
later, Tom.
In Middeltown, Ohio there was a biker bar called the Band Box, (not sure about the burgers but they did have strippers) and the Horseshoe Lounge where the owner was rumored to have murdered a stripper, although there was not enough evidence to indict, all the witnesses left town.
But the best burgers were at the Anchor Restaurant. Downtown, a hole in the wall bar where the meat was pattied by hand they used real cheddar and the buns were fried in the hamburger grease;they were so tall you could barely get the thing in your mouth to take a bite, and the juices ran down your arms.
That was before a “professional cook”(notice I did not say chef) decided he could make the process more efficient with frozen patties, proccessed cheesestuff, crappy buns and minimal salad stuff. The place was nearly bankrupt in 3 months. The former cook bought it and reverted to “the old ways” and is now making a go of it. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.
There’s a place in Memphis called Huey’s. The best burgers in the world-
The best burgers in the USA are at Canada Steak Burger on 36th Street and University Ave. in San Diego
My favorite burger is from the Last Chance Saloon in Columbia, Md. They’re thick, flame broiled, available with an astonishing number of toppings, and on Monday nights they’re half price. (Also, they’ve got 50 beers on tap.)
A little place called Tookies, in Seabrook, Tx.
Don’t know if they are still open, been a few years since I have been there, but they mixed the cheese with the meat before cooking.
Out here in New Mexico (where a cheeseburger MUST have green chile on it, the Owl Cafe in San Antonio (east of Socorro, near the White Sands Missile Range (could be the radiation from Trinity Site) has the best burgers on the planet.
My apologies for drunken, gratuitous use of parentheses.