$25. In the real world that can get you a lot of things. You know, like 25 items from the McDonald’s Dollar Menu or a tank of gas (Prius FTW). But at The Spotted Pig in New York’s West Village it will get you a single burger (with fries though!) And that is the sole reason I set off for The Spotted Pig. As a meat blogger and burger connoisseur, I had been eying the burger for years, waiting for the chance to strike.

I sidled up to the bar and didn’t even need to look at the menu, except to check if any vegetables normally came on the burger. In fact, there were none and the burger was only topped with roquefort cheese. The menu did call out that the burger is chargrilled and comes with shoestring fries, though, so at least there is a bit of explanation. I ordered mine medium-rare and waited.

To say this burger is basic is to underscore the amount of preparation that must have gone into conceiving it. The blend of beef, for example is allegedly some mix of brisket, sirloin and chuck – and it was prepared to perfection with my burger, as there was a visible line of pink around the whole burger, with the innards done just right. The bun had spent some time on the grill as well, giving this burger an odd sensation of backyard barbecues. Apparently the buns are made just for this burger, and do an impressive job of maintaining a whole lot of juiciness without falling apart or distracting from the main event. The roquefort cheese adds some tanginess to pair with the savoriness of the meat. It’s unquestionably a well-crafter burger and worth trying out.

Oh and then there are the shoestring fries, which are prepared with rosemary and delicious little fried slivers of garlic. They are a great companion to the burger, but even though the mountain of them towers over the entire burger (bun and all), they are a distant second fiddle on a plate where the burger reigns supreme.

So is The Spotted Pig’s burger the best in the world? In the category of turning something seemingly simple into a work of art, perhaps. Compared to all other burgers, perhaps not. But I can happily report that it is unquestionably worth every penny of its hefty price tag.

LA’s Koreatown is a place of legend, filled with all-you-can-eat BBQ, karaoke spots, and seedy places you’ll never know about unless you know about them. It also covers the area seemingly as big as Manhattan. New York’s Koreatown, on the other hand, covers just more than a city block and is built vertically like much of the rest of Manhattan. It is there that I went to dinner at Jongro BBQ.

Walking into Jongro is like what I imagine walking into a market in South Korea is like, as the design gives off the impression that you are outside. The surprise for me, however, was the long ventilation tubes hanging from the ceiling over every table. This ensured that the place was well-ventilated and did not have the musk of other Korean BBQ places I have been to. In another strong contrast to LA’s Koreatown, everything seemed shiny and new.

When we were seated, we ordered up some Marinated Kalbi and our waiter set to work. While there was a degree of DIY to this meal, the staff actually took care of almost everything – including retracting the ventilation tube when it was time to eat the meat off of the grate it was cooking on. As for the Kalbi, it was fantastic. Perfectly seasoned, super tender and cooked just right thanks to the waiter.

At the risk of over-comparing, I have to admit that I am spoiled by Korean food in LA. Jongro was great, no doubt, and probably some of the best Korean that New York has to offer. Plus, the meat was on par with some of the better spots I’ve been to. The trouble that it was not all-you-can-eat, which is almost a prerequisite for me and Korean BBQ. And I don’t mean this in terms of gluttony, but just in terms of being able to try more than one or two different things in a meal, because variety is the spice of life (along with gochujang). Regardless, Jongro succeeds in bringing great Korean food to the mean streets of New York, and for that it is to be commended.

When you’re in New York, it’s probably not the best idea to decide where you are eating based on the proximity to your hotel. Yet, when I walked by Black Iron Burger, right around the corner from my hotel in Chelsea I was immediately drawn in. The place claimed to have been voted as one of the best burgers in New York, and I was in no position to disagree.

I sidled up to the bar and began with a beer, but quickly moved on to the Ai-Oli Fries, which were topped with scallions, bacon and a special aioli dressing. They were definitely a tasty way to begin my meal, with a healthy hit of garlic and bacon. Plus, the fries did a good job of staying crispy in the fray of dressing.

As for my burger, I had a tough time making my decision. You see, the Black Iron Burger and the Masterpiece both had my attention, but when I asked the bartender for his recommendation he fairly quickly told me to go with the Black Iron Burger. This burger was prepared with two 4 oz. patties, horseradish cheddar, caramelized onions and horseradish mayo. I got mine without the onions, of course, and ordered it medium-rare.

The result was one melty and messy burger. Black Iron Burger did not go light with the cheese and the burgers were both cooked to a delicious and juicy medium-rare. If you’re not into horseradish, this is obviously not the burger for you, but if you’re on the fence it really wasn’t overkill. If anything, Black Iron Burger managed to find a healthy balance of horseradish and savory.

It was all pretty good, but didn’t live up to my hopes of being one of the best burgers in New York. I can’t speak from a ton of New York burger experience, but I have had at least three better burgers and one worse in the boroughs. Nonetheless, if you are on a burger quest it is worth stopping in, because while it might not be the best burger, it was a far cry from bad.

Sometimes when you’re traveling you just have to eat in. When you do, you should hope you’re staying somewhere like Le Parker Meridien in Midtown New York. Because if you do, you’ll be lucky enough to have Burger Joint downstairs. Burger Joint isn’t just some typical hotel restaurant, it’s a no-frills spot with a small menu consisting of only burgers, fries, and a pickle with prices that are pretty typical for New York.

I ordered up a double cheeseburger with just cheese. It could have come with lettuce, tomato, onion, pickles, mustard, ketchup and mayo, but I assumed if it was cooked to the right medium rare I wouldn’t need any condiments and I don’t need to give a reason for not having any of the veggies.

It turned out I was right and this was a solid burger. Each patty was pretty huge and smothered with cheese. Yet, while the patties were more reminiscent of fancier burger spots, the flavor was all greasy goodness that you’d expect more from a diner. Moreover, they were plenty juicy.

We were pretty lucky to have Burger Joint right downstairs, but I would have been happy even if I had to move my body to get there.

The Park in Chelsea is quite literally a beautiful place to eat. It isn’t an actual park, but the marginally glassed-in courtyard area is so full of growing green things that a bird took an actual crap on my mother-in-law before we had the opportunity to order our food. No joke. But this was brunch, so we laughed it off, took down some Bloody Mary’ses and pressed on.

Our group was limited to smaller version of the brunch menu designated the “Large Party” menu. If the reasoning was to make the service more efficient then The Park completely failed in that regard, because despite how nice the staff was they took an absurdly long time to do about anything and continuously forgot drink orders. The good news was that the company and setting were enjoyable, but it eventually got so bad that they started offering us free stuff.

Nonetheless, I wound up ordering the Classic Park Burger (because the waiter told me it was better than the Breakfast Pizza). This was simply topped with cheddar and served on an English muffin with fries on the side. Or at least that’s what the menu said. I asked the waiter if it came with any veggies and when he said it did I said, “No thanks.”

When it was eventually served, it looked pretty good and I dove in. It was cooked to a perfect medium rare and aside from that it was pretty good. Unfortunately, that’s about all I can say about it. There wasn’t really anything special and the English muffin didn’t really change the game at all. Considering how long it took, I would have been better off just hitting up Shake Shack. Or, better yet, I should have just gone with the pizza, which I tasted and was a step up from the burger.

After a long evening of drinking in New York City, the only reasonable thing to do is grab at least one slice of pizza. Such is what I did in the East Village when I essentially stumbled into Baker’s Pizza. As fate would have it, I ran into my drunk friend on his way out (he had left the bar five minutes before), which convinced me that I was in the right place. Just like all pizza by the slice places in New York, there was a display case showcasing the available pies and my eyes wandered to the one topped with meatballs and ricotta.

It took a few minutes to heat up in the oven and then it was good to go. The crust was super thin, with a bit of a crunch to it, and the tomato sauce was slightly sweet and also thin. This allowed the taste of the meatballs, ricotta and the sprinkles of parmesan to stand out. After all, a lot of good pizza is simply a conduit for toppings. Was the pizza amazing? For a drunk, of course. For a discerning New Yorker? I can’t really say. But I can say that it got the job done and tasted delicious while it was doing that job.

At some point, the world decided that the best bagels in the world are in New York. As with the pizza, the claim is that it has something to do with the water. I, however, think this does not do justice to the quality of cooking that goes into the production of these things. Obviously not all bagels and pizza in New York are good, so there is much more going on than meets the eye. In my own search for a tasty bagel, I was sent to Murray’s Bagels in Chelsea.

I ordered my usual: salt bagel with strawberry cream cheese. In a rush I chose to forego a toasting and figured I wouldn’t be missing much since the bagels seemed to be quite fresh. Turned out I was right. This was definitely a delicious bagel, and better than others I have had in New York. It was nice and dense on the inside and little bit crunchy on the outside, plus the mix of sweet and salty is always a win in my book.

Not all bagels are created equal, even in New York, but Murray’s is a bagel worth eating.

You know that feeling when a musician you “discovered” finally gets some radio playing time? In the food world, the equivalent is finding out that one of your favorite restaurants was featured on an awesome Travel Channel or Food Network show. I’d like to say this has happened to me before, but certainly it happened to my brother-in-law in New York. While I was visiting in Brooklyn, he took me to his favorite local BBQ place, which had just been featured on Drivers, Drive-Ins and Dives. It’s called The Smoke Joint, and as soon as I entered I felt at home.

In fact, the worst thing about the place was choosing what to order. Since I couldn’t get everything, I decided upon the Baby Back Ribs. This was a wise choice, as they were delicious, but not the wisest. The wisest was the BIL, who ordered the Beef Short Ribs (pictured up above). I usually avoid beef ribs at BBQ places because they are typically low on meat. These, though, were nothing short of stellar. I’m not complaining about my ribs, but the babies really had nothing on the shorties.

But we didn’t stop there. We also ordered the Brooklyn Wings for the table. They came with a choice of sweet and/or spicy, so we went with the and to get a taste of both worlds. The combination was pretty beautiful and one that I would recommend for any lover of fine chicken wings. I wouldn’t have minded a bit more spice, but these were wings that catered to a wide range of spice resistance and did their job well.

And a delicious BBQ meal would not be complete without Mac and Cheese. Or at least that’s what we thought as we ordered it. Like everything else, the mac was simply awesome. Seriously, I do not know how they managed to fit so much awesome under one roof.

Honestly, it seemed impossible to go wrong at The Smoke Joint. My only real complaint was that the service was a bit spotty. Although I had never been before, this seemed to be due to the bump in customers from being featured on national TV. I’m not sure if that’s true, but what I am sure of is that the food is worth putting up with almost any degree of bad service.

While Artichoke represents the new trendy side of New York pizza, it wasn’t really quite New York style pizza. You know, the kind you have to fold a bit to eat and everyone says tastes better because of the water. Yeah, Artichoke wasn’t that type of place, but Lombardi’s sure was. Apparently Lombardi’s is a pretty big deal and they claim to be the first American pizzeria. It is quite a boast, and apparently it does a good job of filling the seats, but we got there around 3:00 (on the way to Uniqlo of course) and only had to wait about 10 minuted for a table to open up.

We knew we were getting pizza, but had to decide what kind we wanted. From their pretty sizable list of toppings, we decided to get pepperoni and ricotta cheese on top of the mozzarella, sauce, romano and fresh basil. Although the pizza was going to be pretty big (a small is 14″ and a large 18″), I was surprised by the cost of the toppings. $3 for just one topping? It got cheaper the more toppings you got, but that was a little surprising considering we were already paying $19.50 for the large. Oh and they don’t take credit cards, so you have to bring enough cash for those pricey pies.

Anyway, back to the actual pizza. It came out pretty quickly and looked quite nice. There were huge dollops of ricotta on it, which was great for someone like me who doesn’t know the meaning of too much cheese. I took a slice from the pie, and as I did I realized this was the way New York pizza was meant to be. This, of course, was because I had to fold the thing to get it anywhere. But folding alone doesn’t make a pizza great. I started eating and it was definitely good. The cheeses were good, the sauce was good, the pepperoni was good and the dough was good. Yet, that was really all it was, just good, and nothing really more.

I don’t know if I had built up New York pizza too much (in truth, I had never even heard of Lombardi’s), but I definitely didn’t feel like this anything amazing. If there is something in the water, I couldn’t really tell. I’m glad I went to Lombardi’s, but now I know that being the first pizzeria doesn’t mean you are also the best.

On stop two of our late-night food binge (after Pommes Frites), we headed to a little pizza shop called Artichoke. Here they specialized in, wait for it, artichoke pizza. Apparently therseI felt uncomfortable just being there, but I was told that this was some of the best pizza in New York. That it quite a claim, and after a stern talking-to, I was convinced to try some of the artichoke pizza, even against my better unvegan instincts.

Since we had just eating a ton of poutine, we managed to convince the place to slice one piece of their artichoke pizza into three. The slice ran for 4 bucks and after a short stint of reheating in the oven, our triple-slice was ready for eating. I swallowed my fear and bit in. It was surprisingly good. the cheese was so flavorful and buttery that I hardly even tasted the artichoke. I really do feel like the key to this pizza was the fact that they covered up the artichoke flavor with all the cheesy and buttery goodness. And the dough tasted great, although it was thicker and harder than the typical New York pizza.

Since the pizza tasted great, I really just had to question why the artichoke was necessary on it. Could they have not created the same pizza and left the artichoke out? It seems to me that it would have tasted just as good, without the unnecessary sacrifice of vegetable life. Nonetheless, this place is definitely worth a visit on a late-night romp through Manhattan. And make sure to stop at Led Zeppole next door for a little deep-fried dessert.