PrintOpenings: BLT Burger
BLT BURGER
Address: 470 Sixth Ave., New York NY 10001 [map]
Getting There: F/V trains to 14th Street
Cost: $7 for burger with lettuce, onion, tomato, pickles; cheese, ¢50 extra; cash and credit accepted
Short Order: A respectable fast-food style burger; beefy flavor, pleasantly salty taste
You Want Fries With That? Beats me. They offer hand-cut fries made from Idaho potatoes, but I opted for the Vidalia onion rings, which could use some work—a little too much batter
Eater put it on its BurgerWatch. Friends IMed me about it. But when an AHT reader wrote, asking if we had any reports on BLT Burger, I was duty bound to act. I hightailed it down to Sixth Avenue and 12th Street for some quick B-search™
BLT Burger is Laurent Tourondel's new burger joint in the Village. (That's BLT as in Bistro Laurent Tourondel.) Although reports were that it was to open next Tuesday, it actually opened yesterday, apparently to the surprise of even the wait staff—if tipsters are to be believed.
Despite my assumptions that this would be a fancypants burger, it's actually a fast food–style burger more in the vein of New York City's Shake Shack or Burger Joint. Eyeballing it, I'd say the patty is about five ounces. The beef is "certified Black Angus" and is a combo of sirloin, short rib, chuck, and brisket, with a medium-coarse grind.
It's a good burger. Plenty beefy, nicely salted, and with an adequate amount of crunchy charring on the exterior. I ordered mine medium-rare, and it arrived at table cooked to order, complete with a cute little plastic doneness marker in the shape of a cow.
It's sandwiched in a soft hamburger bun, as close as you can get to any sort of regulation hamburger bun. I had been expecting brioche or ciabatta or some such fancy-ass thing and was mighty happy to find quite the opposite. The bun is toasted but could probably use some more attention as BLT Burger fine tunes its game. Mine was a little floppy and cold by the time it reached me. Lettuce, tomato, and pickle were high-quality and as fresh as you'd please.
There are anywhere from three to six burgers on the menu, depending on whether you count lamb, turkey, or veggie patties as "burgers." Traditional burgers include a Kobe burger made with Snake River Farm Kobe-style beef; the "classic burger," which includes iceberg lettuce, tomato, onion, pickles, ketchup, mustard, and mayo; and the "BLT" burger—a second patty, Applewood smoked bacon, and green peppercorn sauce differentiate it from the "classic."
The "classic," which is what I had, costs a whopping $7 for the burger alone. Want cheese? Cha-ching: ¢50; extra (blue, Vermont cheddar, American, Swiss, and Monterey Jack are your options). Why this burger costs 71 percent more than a comparable Shack Burger is beyond me. The BLT classic burger is very good, but for the price, I don't know if I'd opt for it with the Shack just a 10-minute walk away.
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12 Comments:
I'm surprised I didn't finally make an Adam the Slice K spotting. We headed over there to try it for ourselves and were sorely disappointed. Another women on Gothamist agrued that paying $33 for a burger, fries, and two bears were justified because "this is Manhattan." For the love God!!!! PLEASE. Our honest review was that the burgers were good, the fries sucked, the onion rings were as you say with too much batter. How was your Coke? Ours were pretty flat. Also the waitress was a bit annoying trying to sell me on salads and then had the nerve to push spicy chicken wings on my palette. I told her: "Are you trying to blow out my palette? If I order the chicken wings, I'll never be able to taste my burger." It's one thing to sell someone something but at least the staff should know what their talking about. ESPECIALLY for $47.00 for a party of 2. We left calculating how many of our friends we could have taken to Shake Shack for that price. Answer: 5.875.
Hamburger conduit group at 5:09AM on 10/27/06
Palate? ;p Mm, delish pictures, nice getting the one up, guess that's why you're AHT and others... aren't. Hehe. Ah well, I'll pass, though I happened to see Mr. LT himself last night ... on Food Network, battling Mr. "I like corn" Flay.
Hamburger Yvo at 9:06PM on 10/27/06
It's true that the Shack is only a 10 minute walk away... but you seem to be forgetting the 30-minute line, and the 15 minute wait to actually get your burger once you've ordered it...
Hamburger Frankenstein at 10:46PM on 10/27/06
Frankenstein: Yes. Good points. Though now that I walk by the Shack daily, I have to say ... almost never a huge line. Both the weather and the hype have cooled off for this season, leaving the wait much shorter.
Adam Kuban at 11:08PM on 10/27/06
Stopped by over the weekend. I found it strange to find Chef LT himself at the bar with friends at 9pm on a Friday with Burger, Prime, Steak and Fish all in the midst of the prime-time of the week. Oh well...must be nice to be a celebrity chef. The house special "BLT Burger" came out as requested. The 2x patties were not too much to handle. With the peppercorn sauce on this burger the flavorings were a bit over the top, but I liked it very much. When it comes to flavor, think of a better balanced and more forcefully flavored Lucky Burger. Juices were everywhere and the bottom of my bun was already a soaked sponge when the burger reached the table. Juices were running down my hands, into the fries, etc. Given that there was not enough space in the little basket they give you and given that the juices were coming out so fast and furiously...I felt forced to wolf down the burger as quickly as possible. That was a shame. I really liked this burger. I even found myself dwelling on the flavors a full 24 hours later. The regular fries (they have a few varieties) were thin and crisp. No complaints there. LT (or, should I say LT's staff) need to: 1. Beef up the bun a little b/c mine was overwhelmed by my 2 super-juicy patties, and 2. Give you more room to work by providing a bigger basket or even a plate With those things taken care I think this has the potential to be the best burger in NYC.
Hamburger Tango at 1:58PM on 10/30/06
Well, we all need an alternative to Shake Shack once they close for the season, so perhaps this may be it. I'm not a fan of LT but I'll give his burger a try since I'm in the nabe. Thanks for the review. It leaves me (slightly) hopeful.
Hamburger Lisa (Homesick Texan) at 3:05AM on 11/02/06
Went there this past weekend on Saturday at 2:30....15 minute wait for a table...no big deal...bar staff was very nice....4 of us ordered 4 burgers....a fry...a ring...a shake...its like this: WORK ALL THE BUGS OUT NOW!!!!!!!! Burger King does it much better at the moment, and thats an opinion shared by all 4 of us..... The buns disintigrate shortly after arriving at the table, leaving quite a mess when a person tries to grab the burger.... All of us asked for medium well....all the burgers were the consistency of very, very hard hockey pucks, albeit expensive ones...the BLT special burger we requested came to us, minus the BLT portion(bacon, lettuce, tomato)....the fries were...wow.......pitiful....small portion....overcooked....just terrible.....the onion rings were UNDERcooked......very battery. Let me tell you, undercooked batter leaves a person feling less than thrilled about the onion rings. When we told the waiter, he just said, "sorry to hear you're not happy...hope you come back again!". My ratings on a scale of 1-10????? Number 2. : ( JJ
Hamburger JJ at 6:26PM on 11/06/06
THNAK YOU.
Hamburger Anonymous at 10:42PM on 11/09/06
THE ONION RING'S S.U.C.K T.K.Y
Hamburger Anonymous at 10:45PM on 11/09/06
I TRY K/BURGER WAS TO SMALL FOR $16 TO BITES IT DONE. WERE TO FIND "A" GOOD TASTE BURGER IN NYC. LIFE GOES ON.
Hamburger Anonymous at 10:51PM on 11/09/06
Price aside I really like this place. The beef and lamb burgers are very good and super consistant, all the sides are great too. Seriously, some of the best fries (for this type of place) in the city, o-rings as well. SP frieds are particularly awesome.
Been going before the dinner rush to eat at the bar. Nice tab selection, almost always featuring something "differnt" on one of the lines. Was the Brooklyn Abby for a while and a nice Bluepoint Blueberry last week.
the trick here is to go with 2 or 3 people so you can share fries... or the combo plates work iof alone. either way, it is possible to have food and a beer for under $20, so long as you are not a big eater.
Abe Froman at 2:11PM on 07/17/07
Abe Froman! Thanks for the comment. BLT gets dinged quite a bit, but I think it's pretty good.
Adam Kuban at 2:13PM on 07/17/07