Midtown Lunch

For those of you who are missing the original (albiet faux) black label burger from the now shuttered City Burger, A Hamburger Today brings the news that HB Burger (on 43rd btw. B’way+6th) has just added a new “prime steak” burger to the menu. It’s twice as expensive as their regular burger ($17!?!), but features dry aged meat from Pat LaFreida in the blend.  At $17 this thing is definitely not a Midtown lunch, but we imagine there are some burger/La Frieda fanatics in Midtown who would be interested in checking it out…

Related:
HB Burger May Not be a “Midtown Lunch” But It’s a Damn Good Burger

If you make a burger in this town with meat from Pat La Freida’s you are pretty much guaranteed some automatic hype from certain bloggers.  But apparently now you also get this nifty bumper sticker!  I spotted this one on the front door of HB Burger (on 43rd btw. B’way+6th).  Clearly the La Freida bumper sticker holds far less gravitas than, say, the “Recommended by Midtown Lunch” stickers you might have seen- but I suppose it couldn’t hurt.

Related:
HB Burger May Not be a “Midtown Lunch” But It’s a Damn Good Burger
Apparently It’s Not La Freida’s, It’s What You Do With It

Got this email from the founder of HB Burger (on 43rd btw. B’way+6th) on Friday:

Zach, I want to thank you for making the special combo promotion available to your readers. I was concerned about our ability to manage the flow to maintain the quality of our guests’ experience. Now that I know that we can do that and accommodate Midtown Lunch readers, I’d be happy to make this same promotion available to your readers only, through Labor Day. Of course, this is completely your call, but I am making it available.

Done and done, right? Any objections from the gallery? [Assumed sound of crickets.] Very good. We accept. (FYI, Labor Day is September 7th.)

Related:
HB Burger Offers Up Midtown Lunch Special
HB Burger May Not be a “Midtown Lunch” But It’s a Damn Good Burger

HB Burger (on 43rd btw. B’way+6th) has decided they want to be considered a bona fied Midtown Lunch for one more week! Today was supposed to be the last day for their $9.95 Midtown Lunch special, but they’ve decided to extend the deal for one more week. That’s a cheeseburger plus fries, tator tots, or onion strings for just under $10. Plus, according to this post by Blondie and Brownie, they’ve improved the tator tots. (Or I just got a bum order.) Either way it’s great news! (Now good until July 24th, M-F 11:30am to 5pm.)

Related:
HB Burger May Not be a “Midtown Lunch” But It’s a Damn Good Burger

I fully admit that my Midtown Lunch pricing rules have always been a little vague. Under $10 is the rule, but does that mean with or without tax? Does it have to include a drink? And how much food do you have to get for your $10? The answer to all those questions is… uh… maybe? The truth is, it’s all about feel. You could easily spend over $10 at many of the places that are written about on this site, and there are places I refuse to write about that have items under $10. Sometimes it just comes down to instinct.

My original instinct about HB Burger, the newish Heartland Brewery owned burger spot on 43rd btw. B’way+6th, was thumbs down. Even though their burgers are well under $10 (in fact, they boast that everything on their menu is less than $9), it is a sit down restaurant where a burger *and* fries will cost you well over $10. I will occasionally write about sit down restaurants on ML, but the bar is much higher for those places, and the ideal Midtown Lunch spot is a place where take out is the norm or they have a free seating area for once you get your food at a counter. Heartland Brewery (and by transitive property HB Burger) is not one of those places. In fact, it’s the kind of place this blog was created to combat: the slightly-overpriced-for-what-you-get, tourist magnet, that might also appeal to the type of Midtown worker who doesn’t want to walk the extra few blocks for something more interesting.

But in the end taste and price can go along way to help me ignore a bunch of tourists, so when HB Burger decided to offer that $9.95 Midtown Lunch special for one this week only- I figured it couldn’t hurt to give it a try. It’s only fair.

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The awesome burger news just keeps on coming today. From HB Burger (on 43rd btw. B’way+6th): “This week only (July 13th through July 17th) from Noon to 5pm, get a beef cheeseburger with french fries, tator tots, or onion strings for $9.95. Limit one per customer, and you must mention Midtown Lunch to get the deal.” Take all the great reviews this place is getting, and combine it with my love of onions strings and tator tots, plus charge under $10 (the Midtown Lunch limit) and the writing is on the wall: I clearly need to try this place.

Nick Solares, from A Hamburger Today, joins Josh “Mr. Cutlets” Ozersky as the latest blogger to bestow praise on the 4 month old HB Burger (on 43rd btw. B’way+ 6th).  I was pretty quick to write off this sit down restaurant/burger joint owned by Heartland Brewery simply because of their prices (everything might be “under $9″, but order anything but a burger and you are going to be spending well over $10.)  But now that the two most esteemed burger bloggers in the city have weighed in with nothing but praise, I’m starting to reconsider my stance.  I mean, hell, if I can spend $7 on this burger, I suppose spending $7.50 is not that much more of a splurge. I still think that at its core HB Burger is not what anybody would consider a real “Midtown Lunch”, but whatever.  Good food is good food, right?  Anybody else been?  What do you guys think?

A Fantastic New York City-Style Burger from HB Burger [A Hamburger Today]

Related:
Heartland Brewery’s New HB Burger is Now Open

Both Grub Street and TONY’s Feed Blog give you a first look at the newly opened HB Burger (on 43rd btw. B’way+6th) in the old Spanky’s BBQ space.  The owner brags that “nothing on the menu tops $9″ (good, I guess), and they have sauteed onions (for free), tator tots, homemade sodas, and milkshakes with liquor in them (also good).  But I just can’t get excited about a burger place that is owned by the Heartland Brewery. Is that wrong?  (Admittedly I’m still mad about the onion ring incident.) Plus, items individually may cost under $9, but a burger, fries, and a drink will altogether cost you quite a bit more.  Any ML early adopters willing to take one for the team, and let us know how this place is?  Either that, or we’ll just wait for A Hamburger Today to weigh in. (I’m pretty sure they are legally obligated to go to all of these places…)

HB Burger, 127 W 43rd St. (btw. B’way+6th), 212-575-5848