20 Burgers To Eat Before You Die

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The 20 Hamburgers Yo u M u s t E a t B e f o r e Yo u D i e

A l a n R i c h m a n traveled 23,750 miles and consumed more than 150,000 calories while taking the measure of 162 burgers across the country—with one goal: to find you the

★ ★ T h e h a m b u r g e r is a symbol of everything that makes America great. Straightforward, egalitarian, substantial, and goodnatured, it is also a little bloody at times. It may come big and ungarnished, the East Coast ideal, tender and untroubled by bones or gristle, everything you look for in a filet mignon but seldom find. It may be the West Coast model, swelling with vegetation, brimming with health and well-being, piled high with all that a seed catalog can provide. A great burger, regardless of regional di≠erences, instills a sense of optimism and fulfillment, that all is right at the table or the counter or the woodgrain, screwed-to-the-floor, fast-food booth. At its best, it eliminates the need for conversation or the urge to glance up at the TV over the bar. If you find yourself eating silently, eyes closed, ignoring everything around you, even the unavoidable burger-joint din, you have come upon a burger that can be pronounced a success. Of course, it must be molded by hand, artfully seared, and o≠ered medium-rare. If that’s too much to ask, not overcooked would be nice. Whose idea was it anyway that serving desiccated burgers to Americans would enable all of us to spring back to health? Excessive reliance on condiments is another alarming development, especially in the matter of ketchup, the burger Band-Aid. Ketchup is valuable only when an emergency jolt of moisture, sweetness, acidity, and flavor is required. No hamburger is inedible if you put enough ketchup on it, but no hamburger that has ketchup on it can be considered great. Mustard is a mistake, unless you’re French and welcome a vinegary jolt with your food, while pickles, those subversive little sweet and sour instruments, fill me with dread. When I find pickles furtively inserted into my burger, I generally look to the heavens with a clenched fist and sob, “Why?” I’ve always claimed I’d go a long way for the right burger, and indeed I did. I traveled 23,750 miles—that’s just 1,152 miles short of encircling the globe at the equator—looking for the best ones in America. I consumed more than 150,000 calories but resisted drinking a can of soda with every burger, saving more than 22,000 calories that way.

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I ate crazy burgers, Kobe burgers, bison burgers, longhorn burgers, ostrich burgers, onion burgers, lamb burgers, and of course, cheeseburgers. (Note that cheese goes so well with burgers that the word is assembled di≠erently, with no space in between.) I tried fast-food burgers, and while there’s a sameness to them that overwhelms any attempts at excellence, I found some mighty fine values on those dollar menus, assuming you don’t mind your burgers hard and dry, like the smiles on the faces of the teenagers who take your order. I visited Burger Heaven. Actually, I went to a few places called that. I was also in burger hell, which is Milwaukee, home of the butter burger, essentially meat saturated with grease. My goal was to find the twenty best burgers, and with apologies to all the restaurants, stands, bars, and grills I missed, I’d like to believe I did well. I ate 162 burgers in ninety-three establishments. Some of them were fancified, pro≠ering foie gras–stu≠ed burgers costing as much as $29. Some were dumps, with burgers hovering near a buck. At no time, despite pleas from loved ones, did I have a physician standing by. I found no correlation between price and tastiness, nor did ambience count for a great deal. A burger requires only a cook of modest accomplishments, one who knows enough to remove it from the fire before it has lost its juiciness and not to press down hard with a spatula—squishing might work with grilled cheese, but it’s fatal for burgers. Waitresses who work in burger joints can have scars and tattoos, as long as they’re not self-inflicted. Motorcycles are fine, provided they’re not parked inside. To be precise, I visited ninety-five places, but I didn’t eat at two. In Boston, I attempted lunch at Tim’s Bar and Grill, which features a huge rubber garbage pail in the dining area. The waitress was so surly (“If you don’t like the service, you can leave”) that I walked out. Where’d you find your decorator, Tim, at the sanitation department? I also undertook a 360-mile round-trip drive to Little Compton, Rhode Island, to try the burger at the legendary Commons Lunch, only to find that it had burned down.

O P P O S I T E : S T E V E L E G ATO

best damned assemblage of ground beef and buns this country serves up

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The Rouge

Philadelphia’s

Rouge Burger is the cheeseburger at its best.

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In the course of my travels, I learned to love the bun. Bunless, a burger is merely a chopped steak, the food of mess halls and chow lines, prisons and cafeterias. The roll makes the burger, although it must not be too large or too obtrusive; a common error of steak houses, which rarely o≠er memorable burgers, is that they buy buns so big, fat, and tall that their burgers assume the dimensions of wedding cakes. A bun may be lightly toasted or grilled, but it is vital that it be fresh. I am also possessed of newfound respect for the onion, which is rarely esteemed. A few thin circles of mild raw onion add sweetness and crunch. Nothing else is needed on a burger, although cheese has its place.

me: Medium-rare, please. him: All our burgers are well-done. me: The menu says they’re cooked to order. him: That means we don’t start cooking until you order it.

I had a cheeseburger anyway, and it’s a shame the cook had to ruin it, because the concept was a good one—a wide, flat burger with gooey cheese. I believe I’ve made my feelings clear about the medium-rare burger, but if the meat is particularly lean, it should be eaten rare. A well-done burger is a badly done burger, food for the meek, and if that’s the way we’re going to have our burgers, then we might as well give up trying to enjoy ourselves and make green salads our national dish. Although I endured occasional disappointments, I never wearied of life on the hamburger highway. No matter how many burgers I ate, and I believe my daily consumption never exceeded six, no matter how full of chopped beef I was at the end of a long but satisfying day, I always woke up the next morning eager to begin again.

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Le Tub

The Top 20 Burgers in America (in order of greatness)

01 Sirloin Burger L E T U B H O L LY W O O D , F L This is a dream of a dump, located on the site of a former Sunoco gas station. Outside there’s assorted porcelain—toilets, sinks, tubs. Most have plants in them, and a lot of the plants look dead. Inside is a pool table, a jukebox, and tables reminiscent of the ones at highway rest stops. The view is magnificent, the Intracoastal Waterway at its broadest and most dramatic. Le Tub doesn’t take credit cards, and it has signs everywhere reinforcing that rule. I’m surprised anybody who eats here qualifies for a credit card. The menu is big, and the food isn’t bad, except for the Sirloin Burger, which is magnificent. It’s slowly seared on an indoor grill, crusty on the outside, juicy inside, always perfectly cooked. At eight to ten ounces, it’s ideal big-burger size, and it’s shaped like a pincushion, with sloping sides, which means you get a nice gradient of doneness. The bun has a few poppy seeds and looks like a kaiser roll, but it’s smaller and softer. It’s just right for enveloping the meat, which is judiciously seasoned and spiced, mostly with salt and pepper, I suspect. That’s all it needs. No cheese or condiments required. I don’t understand how this spot came to have the best burger in America, but it does. Regardless of where I am in South Florida, I always make my way here for lunch. I sit at the bar and watch yachts that cost millions drift by, draped with women who cost more, and I think to myself how lucky I am to be at Le Tub.

KNOW YOUR CUTS OF MEAT I’ve always believed this about burgers: The best beef is chuck, which is particularly flavorful. Ordinary ground beef is bland. Sirloin is magnificent but perhaps overly aristocratic. Ground round is almost always too dry. I also believe in the hand-formed, loosely packed burger. Preformed patties are useful but never great, because compressed meat is incapable of rising above mediocrity. Here are a few words you’ve never heard spoken at the conclusion of a meal: “That pressed food was mighty good.”

BOTTOM : TOM SCHIERLITZ

★ ★ ★ I t o o k m y f a t h e r to a roadhouse specializing in burgers in South Miami, a decision I regretted. The parking lot was practically rubble, overgrown with weeds. He was unable to use his walker, but we finally made it into Bill & Ted’s Tavern with me halflifting him and apologizing for being an inconsiderate son. We ordered, and I’ll never forget the glow when he bit into his burger after years of assisted-living cuisine. I thought the burgers were slightly overcooked, but the onion-relish-pickle package was brilliantly balanced, a condiment tour de force, and when I asked him why he was so happy, he said, “I never get to eat food like this.” The burger, fare not favored by institutional nutritionists, invariably inspires a≠ection. It brings back memories of backyard barbecues and family gatherings, and it comes in all sizes, adding to its appeal. Burgers can be as small as a couple of ounces or as large as a full pound, although it seems that whenever restaurants dish up the largest size, they feel obligated to issue warnings. (“Try our new 1lb. burger…if you dare,” read the promo for the Burgerpalooza at the Jolly Trolley in Mamaroneck, New York.) The oversize burger is a haunch of ground meat, hand-formed, upon which the diner happily gnaws. It is an exaggeration of America’s plenty, the banana split of sandwiches. Smaller burgers are essentially platforms for unlimited embellishments. Piled high with extras, this breed of burger is a piñata at a birthday party, a festival miniaturized. Everybody who loves beef has a favorite burger, but hardly anybody agrees on which is best. Before heading o≠, I consulted food Web sites, food experts, and food writers. I was persuaded by a fellow I met at a food festival in Virginia to visit a restaurant outside Lawton, Oklahoma, that he promised had the best burger in America. I drove up from Dallas, more than 200 miles, to eat at Meers Store & Restaurant, located next to a bison preserve. The menu read: “All steaks & hamburgers cooked to order,” and I had this conversation with my waiter:

( Photographs by BOBBY FISHER )

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02 | Luger Burger

04 | Rouge Burger

P E T E R L U G E R S T E A K H O U S E B R O O K LY N

ROUGE PHILADELPHIA

The legendary Peter Luger is celebrated for its porterhouse, which is buttered, seared, and sliced. But consider this: Its burger (available only at lunch) may be even better than the steak. At first glance, the roll seems too large, as it is at most steak houses. It isn’t. The half pound of beef, so charred on the outside it appears overcooked, isn’t. The magnificent roll settles beautifully around the succulent, juicy burger, assembled from prime aged-porterhouse trimmings and prime chuck. You can get raw onion. Don’t. It comes with steak sauce. Superfluous. You can have cheese. Unnecessary. There’s a bacon option. Hold on. The bacon, three-eighths-inch thick, slightly blackened, smoky, and chewy-tender, complements the beef the way mustard accents a hot dog. I can never decide: With bacon? Without bacon? Both ways are just right. The fries are among the best in America. One warning: While you’re waiting for your burger to arrive, try not to eat the entire basket of irresistible bread.

The clientele appears to consist primarily of aging men of means, each one accompanied by an Eastern European model/actress. (Who knew that white slavery lived on in stuffy old Philadelphia?) Do these people care that they’re eating the best cheeseburger in America? Rouge is so chic I’m surprised that anybody pays attention to the food. I’m sure they admire the staff, all in black. They probably enjoy sitting outside, right on Rittenhouse Square. Back when I was growing up in the city, outdoor dining didn’t exist. How is a simple, plump cheeseburger able to compete with all this stylishness? The Rouge Burger does just fine. The aged Gruyère cheese is strong, nutty, and pungent. The caramelized onion is judiciously applied. The bread is toasted brioche. The fries are good. The well-salted sirloin is very lean, so it’s best ordered rare. I could swear the hostess, to stand out from her minions, was wearing pink pajamas, but maybe I was dizzy with pleasure from dining at Rouge and encountering a Philadelphia I never knew.

03 | Not Just a Burger S P I C E D P E A R R E S TA U R A N T A T T H E C H A N L E R H O T E L N E W P O R T, R I

05 | Kobe Sliders

This burger doesn’t taste like a burger. It’s more in the North CarB A R C L AY P R I M E P H I L A D E L P H I A olina pulled-pork family, even though it’s all Kobe beef. (Kobe beef A slider is the small and rather grotesque (but nonetheless tasty) burger bagged by the bunch at White Castle. The has a lot of the qualities of pork—it’s soft and sweet.) Chef Richard Hamilton, who has big-time talent, makes the best high-concept meat in a genuine slider is square, steam-fried, overdone, burger in America. His roll, which is a bit towering, and punctured with tiny holes, as though it had been attacked by a vampire. Hamburgers worried me at first, but it flattened beautifully and BEST didn’t get in the way. The burger, which consists of on naval vessels are sometimes called sliders. ONION RINGS barbecued Kobe brisket surrounded by chopped All in all, sliders aren’t esteemed in the gastro1 nomic firmament. Kobe beef, is topped with enormously complex but Red Mill Burgers, not overpowering coleslaw and sits on a tomato-onAt Barclay Prime, a new steak house, the Seattle ion jam that’s sort of a cross between ketchup and small burgers are inexplicably referred to as 2 sliders, but they’re not sliders at all. They’re barbecue sauce. Krazy Jim’s The twelve-ounce creation isn’t so much a a mighty three inches tall. Each is made with Blimpyburger, juicy burger as a mouthwatering, heart-stoptwo ounces of Kobe beef, and they come two Ann Arbor, MI ping, wildly rich chopped-beef sandwich every to an order, on miniature, exceptionally but3 tery brioche buns. One is topped with sliced bit as satisfying as the best sandwich you’ve ever New York eaten down south. It’s a burger breakthrough, tomato and marinated shallots, the other Burger Co., and the accompanying garlic-basil-Parmesan with caramelized onion and Gruyère. They New York City may be the most succulent burgers in America, potato chips are awe-inspiring.

FRIES DON’T FLY If burgers are the great triumph of casual cuisine, French fries are the major disappointment. The perfect fry, medium thick, made from fresh potatoes, crisp, and golden brown, is a rarity. Most fries are thin and taste of little but oil and salt, or they’re thick and taste of freezer burn. And they’re rarely hot. The best fries come from Peter Luger in Brooklyn. I know women say a good man is hard to find, but a good fry is harder. J U LY. 0 5 . G Q .1 2 9

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and they’re automatically prepared medium-rare. I asked our waiter why a steak house would have a need for sliders, and he replied proudly, “They’re like little protein appetizers. It’s amazing how perfectly they get the palate ready for a big steak.”

WORST BURGER Solly, may he rest in grease, is credited with inventing the butter burger, a much loved, much praised regional specialty. I walked into Solly’s Grille near Milwaukee and asked for my burger with sautéed onion. I’m guessing, but I’d say it came with close to a half stick of butter that soaked into the bun and the burger and finally pooled on the plate. It was like slurping dairy drainage. Wisconsin, the Dairy State, should be renamed the Death-by-Dairy State.

06 | California Burger H O U S T O N ’ S S A N TA M O N I C A

When you figure how many millions of burgers emerge from chain-restaurant kitchens, it’s not surprising that one of them gets it right. Houston’s, a big, bustling, commercial spot, nails its California Burger. This burger had no flaws. Zero. The roll: soft and sweet, almost like brioche. The meat: coarsely ground and flavorful. The red onion: mild and crunchy. The cheese: fully melted Monterey Jack. The condiment: a touch of mustard-honey dressing. Avocado and arugula are another great touch. Houston’s California Burger is a rainbow of colors, and it’s comforting, perfect for soothing Santa Monica working stiffs after a hard morning at the macramé shop. And talk about burger engineering. I asked the manager about the sliver of greenery under the burger, and he said it was cabbage, put there to avoid untoward sogginess at the base of the bun.

07 | Buckhorn Burger BUCKHORN SAN ANTONIO, NM

No burger has bigger flavors than the legendary New Mexico green-chili cheeseburger. Basically, it’s too much of everything on a bun: ground beef, green chilies, mustard, tomato, lettuce, chopped onion, and pickle. Such a combination makes no culinary sense, but at Buckhorn, which makes the best green-chili cheeseburgers in a tiny town devoted to little else, the result is spectacularly tasty and eminently coherent. The too strong onions, hot-pungent chilies, and potent mustard all battle to a spectacular draw. The cheese is the binder and the pickle the crunchy refresher, while the lettuce and tomato hang on for dear life and the coarsely ground beef acts as a solid, sensible underpinning. Buckhorn tavern, which naturally calls its green-chili cheeseburger a Buckhorn Burger, offers a great mouthful of hot, sweet, juicy, chewy flavors. It’s the ultimate in a burger with a burn.

08 | Hamburger MILLER’S BAR DEARBORN, MI

Miller’s is a blockhouse of a bar, gloomy outside and not much better inside. It appears to be a place where people vanish and don’t reappear for days, but locals don’t come here to drink. The day I visited, everybody was bellied up to the bar, eating burgers. They’re made from ground round, which is lean and usually flavorless. Here it’s been used for burgers since the ’50s, so I was willing to try one, figuring Miller’s might know something I didn’t. I ended up eating three. I ordered the first medium-rare, and it was very good, made from the juiciest round I’ve ever tasted. I ordered the second rare, and it was sensational. The cheeseburger, topped with Velveeta, a variation on American cheese, was darned good, too. When I asked my waitress what made the burger so special, she suggested it might be the well-seasoned grill, which had been replaced only once in the fifteen years she’d worked there. Miller’s has no menu, no tomatoes, no lettuce, no plates, no utensils, and no check—it’s all on the honor system. When I asked the bartender to explain the fortress-like look, he told me with a straight face that cars speeding down Michigan Avenue were always crashing into the building, so the owners decided to make it impregnable.

09 | Cheeseburger B U R G E R J O I N T, L E P A R K E R M E R I D I E N H O T E L NEW YORK CITY

This spot is supposed to look like a small-town ’50s burger hangout, but it doesn’t. It looks like a small-town ’50s pizza hangout. (Burger joints had more chrome.) Still, it’s masterfully geeky, with hideous fake-wood paneling. I thought a particularly nice touch was a Christmas wreath in June. The burgers, however they’re ordered, will have you dancing the jitterbug. The day I stopped in, a hotel chef by the name of Rudi—the name was stitched on his fancy chef’s whites—was cooking, and he got them exactly right. The plain burger on an Arnold bun was the essence of classic simplicity. The cheeseburger with the works—tomato, lettuce, onion, pickle, ketchup, mayo, and mustard—was even better, especially when the counterman didn’t overdo the mustardmayo-ketchup amalgam. (Very few restaurants leave the

L E F T: C H R I S TO P H E R J . S C A LI S E . R I G H T: CO U RT E SY O F B U R G E R J O I N T, L E PA R K E R M E R I D I E N H OT E L .

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20 Louis’ Lunch

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cooked on an indoor mesquite grill, and not much food is more delicious than that. Sure, you can charcoal-grill at home, but then you have to worry about famished neighbors climbing over your fence.

C LO C K W I S E F R O M TO P L E F T: DAV I D T S AY ( 2 ) ; B O B B Y F I S H E R ; DAV I D T S AY; B U R K E / T R I O LO P R O D U C T I O N S / P I C T U R E A R T S

vital job of accessorizing to customers.) The burger joint has quickly become a Manhattan icon, where persons of all economic stations gather to eat in peace. Or maybe it’s more like a jungle watering hole, where the animals wait until they’ve departed before they start tearing one another apart.

12 | Hamburger

10 | Number Five

B O B C AT B I T E S A N T E F E

Although Bobcat Bite is famous for its green-chili cheeseburger, its best burger comes unadorned and is a mix of chuck The lady in the red Lexus that was parked alongside me leaned out the window and said, “If you come here with a and sirloin, the perfect blend. My admiration for this burger may also have been elevated by the tiny restaurant’s unsurfriend who has a convertible, you can sit all night. It’s better passed ambience. It stands between the Jemez Mountains than going to a nice restaurant.” Keller’s, out on Northwest Highway, is the best drive-in I’ve ever seen, and I try not and the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, which glow red when reflecting the setting sun. While I was waiting for a table, some to miss many. Flash your lights and out come the carhops, who aren’t dolled up and aren’t on roller skates, although kindly locals pointed out the high-desert flora to me. Or maybe they will call you “sweetie.” They’re also strong enough to it was the fauna. I think one is meat, the other condiments. lug cases of beer out to waiting cars. (Not many restaurants specialize in beer by the case.) 13 | Cheeseburger Keller’s is filled with guys hanging out. They sit on the tailWHITE MANNA HACKENSACK, NJ gates of their pickups, feet up on coolers. The burger of choice The burgers here are small, and when I asked what the record was for the most eaten at one sitting, the grill cook is the Number Five, made exactly the way hamburgers were back when drive-ins first appeared, about a half-century ago. told me that some guy had managed thirty-two. I was awed, At $2.38, it’s not priced a whole lot more than it would have not because somebody ate thirty-two burgers of about two ounces each but that this superhero also ate thirty-two been back then. The Number Five includes two beef patties, potato rolls, and they looked full-size to me. New Jersey is shredded lettuce, tomato, American cheese, and a Thousand Island–style “special sauce” on a soft grilled poppy-seed role. one manly state. It’s also a legendary diner state, boasting some of the best in America. White Manna is a 1930s artifact The meat’s overcooked, but that doesn’t diminish the nostalgia, maybe the best in the burger world. Keller’s even has a with a horseshoe-shaped counter that seats twelve. In the galvanized tin roof to protect cars. I suggested to my waitmiddle of the horseshoe stands the grill cook, behaving like ress, Lana, that it probably sounded awfully loud a sushi chef, molding, cooking, handing out the burgers. Ask for cheese and onion and the toowhen it rained. “It’s not so bad,” she replied, “but you should hear it when it hails.” BEST MILK big roll fills up amazingly well. KELLER’S DRIVE-IN DALLAS

11 | Grilled Bistro Burger B I S T R O D O N G I O VA N N I N A P A , C A

Although this supremely cute spot does everything skillfully, I don’t recommend ordering your burger any which way but plain. It’s just too good to dress up with grilled onion or cheese or garlic-mayonnaise. The meat is chuck, and the roll a subdued version of focaccia, which is bread brushed with olive oil and sprinkled with salt. The burger is perfectly

SHAKE 1

Burger Joint, San Francisco 2

The Counter, Santa Monica 3

Soup Burg, New York City

14 | Hamburger J.G. MELON NEW YORK CIT Y

“The best burger is the one you want the minute your plane touches down after you’ve been in Europe for three months,” said a friend of mine, an Upper East Sider with the money to do exactly that. “For me, this is the one.” J.G. Melon’s burger is a Manhattan benchmark. The bun is nicely toasted. The (continued on page 180)

BEST BURGER-JOINT BARMAID I told her I didn’t care for beer, which is true. She asked me what I liked to drink with my burger. I said, “Champagne.” She drew a Craftsman Saison, telling me it was like sparkling white wine. She was right. She worked her way down the bar, turning weak Perrier men into strong beer drinkers. Christmas Collins, bartender at Father’s Office in Santa Monica, is the burger’s best friend. J U LY. 0 5 . G Q .1 3 1

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THE GQ& A: CAPTAIN AMERICA CONTINUED “Tell me about American humor. What should I know?” He was my coach. Milton Berle was your humor coach? Yes! Insane. What did he teach you? Timing. Rhythm. How to deliver jokes. Did he give you jokes? He gave me thousands of jokes for every occasion. Birthday parties, this party, that party. He had a whole file in his head. Yes, I was really serious about learning jokes. I knew I had to make people laugh. Did he write them down for you? Yes. Then we’d sit down and he’d say, “Here’s how you deliver this line.” So he gave you a master class in jokes? Oh, I was over at his house all the time. Because I was interested in American humor. And Austrian humor is… Wait, Austrians have humor? Very funny. Yes, great humor, but it’s quite di≠erent. The more south you go in Europe, the more they like to joke and drink and sing. The more north you go, the less it’s like that. Just like America. It’s with the temperature. It’s all weather related. What’s a good Milton Berle line? This is not one he gave me, but I remember at my engagement party, he said, “Arnold is the illegitimate child of Gloria Allred and Kurt Waldheim.” All this crazy stu≠.

“Ja, raus, Schwein!” It’s like, what’s this all about? So I had to make people more familiar with it. In the ’70s, when they tested my accent for movies, 60 percent of the people were scared. That’s why I couldn’t get a commercial. I was supposed to do a 7-Up commercial with Loni Anderson, Diet 7-Up, in like ’78, but in the test, people always said, “This voice gave me the chills.” [laughs] But I decided what I have to do is make people not afraid of it, so I would go to as many interviews as possible and get them familiar with my way of talking, and maybe then they will accept it. And at some point they will love it. It has turned out that it has become a big asset. It’s one of those things where I am in an elevator talking to someone and someone doesn’t even see me, but they turn around and say, “This must be Arnold!” It’s so identifiable. It is me. That’s pretty wild. And then Hans and Franz come along, but they took it so much to the extreme that I started imitating them. I’m going around saying to people, “Yah, yah, girlie man with your love handles. Look, I can pull your love handles over your head and use them like a little shopping bag.” So what I did is just be out there and make my voice, my accent, part of America. How do you think history will remember you? I don’t care. You? That’s crap. I never put that much time on that. One thing is clear: Whatever I do, I rattle the cage. With bodybuilding, I took it on myself

to make it as respected as any other sport. We went after that. Books. Promotion. High society in New York. It really shook up the sport and its image. Same with movies. I created a whole new niche for action movies, and the same in politics. You know the line from Conan the Barbarian, about “What is best in life?” “To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentations of their women.” [laughs] Do you, in your heart of hearts, think, Fuck yeah, that’s right? Well, I think that one has to translate it into today’s terms. Because “crush” is something we shouldn’t do anymore. It’s not p.c. The method today is to neutralize your enemies. And no one would want to hear the lamentations of women. You know, the root of neutralize is “to neuter,” which means to cut o≠ the testicles. So it’s really the same thing. Really? I don’t know. Sounds right, though. The great thing I have is a gift that I can see where I’m going and need to be. Like when I sat down and said, “I want to be Mr. Universe.” I saw myself onstage, holding the trophy, hundreds of bodybuilders below me. This is the vision I had. The same when I got into movies or ran for governor. And people told me I’d never make it, with the accent. But I had no doubt whatsoever. I just calmly move forward. michael hainey is gq’s deputy editor.

Has the pope called you yet? No. But aren’t you guys all in the same club? Powerful, Germanic… I’m Austrian. Austrian, German, it’s all the same to me. Do you guys ever get sick of World War II jokes, the Colonel Klink shtick? No, because I understand it. I use those jokes myself. I think there is a history that can go two ways. You can look back and get upset about it, or you can make fun of it. I remember when I used to walk into the gym, the owner, Joe Gold, would say, “The Boys from Brazil are here.” People would click their heels or make the Nazi hand gesture, and it took me a while to catch on to what they were doing, but I did. Did you ever think about losing the accent in order to blend in better? Not that a guy built like you could blend in.… Yes! The German accent was the evil accent. It’s one thing when you have the French accent and women go, Ooh. But with German,

20 HAMBURGERS CONTINUED FROM PAGE 131 meat is juicy but doesn’t drip. The red onion is thinly sliced. Like well-to-do people with manners, the burger is perfectly correct. The bar scene is a bit annoying—too many yuppies on cell phones, reminding one another how well they’re doing—but otherwise democracy prevails: no reservations, no credit cards, no playing favorites.

15 | Build Your Own Burger T H E C O U N T E R S A N TA M O N I C A

I asked the young girl taking orders if she had ever seen a burger duplicated. “Not really,” she replied. “You think it might happen, and then somebody adds avocado.” By the owner’s calculations, this spot offers more than 300,000 possibilities. At the minimum, you can ask for a one-thirdpound plain burger on a regular bun. At the extreme, you can have, for example, a twothirds-pound veggie burger topped with herbed-goat-cheese spread, roasted-cornand-black-bean salsa, hard-boiled egg, and

dried cranberries on a honey-wheat bun. At least you can. I wouldn’t.

16 | Hamburger & Fries BURGER JOINT SAN FRANCISCO

No place looks less like a joint. It should be renamed the Obsessive-Compulsive Café. It’s neat. It’s scrubbed. The decor is fake ’50s, with overhead Jetsons-style light fixtures plus red vinyl and stainless steel. The burger is so artistically presented it could be Japanese. (Do the Japanese have burger joints?) Neatly set on a stainlesssteel plate is a sheet of waxed paper, and atop that rests a deconstructed burger, with a dollop of mayo on the top half of the grilled sesame-seed bun and a burger made from Niman Ranch beef on the bottom half. Lettuce, tomato, red onion, and pickle sit in one orderly pile, fries in another. The people who run the Burger Joint have gotten everything right, except the name.

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20 HAMBURGERS CONTINUED

17 | Double Bacon Deluxe with Cheese R E D M I L L B U R G E R S S E AT T L E

I got up to leave. My friend, a Seattle resident, yanked me back. I’d just finished eating the basic Red Mill Burger, which is an overdone quarter-pound patty with lettuce and a light, spicy mayo dressing that turned the meat white. Just in time, she remembered what she loved: the burger with everything. The American cheese is artfully melted, the thick pepper bacon superb, the soft roll pretty wonderful, the red onion sweet, the lettuce and tomato good enough, and the mayo dressing just right with this pile of ingredients. It’s a first-rate burger, provided you ask for your meat rare. It won’t come rare, but it will be juicy.

18 | Hamburger P OA G M A H O N E ’ S C A RV E RY A N D ALE HOUSE CHICAGO

The television, tuned to a Cubs game, was so loud I had to scream my order several times, and all I was trying to say was

“hamburger.” I know everybody in Chicago is depressed because the Cubs never win. I never realized they were also deaf. I’d be disheartened, too, if I had to eat burgers in Chicago—Poag Mahone’s was the only place I found that did burgers right. Good bakery buns, soft and sweet. Tasty ground sirloin given a nice char on an indoor grill. Even a “Burger Eater’s Bill of Rights.” Poag Mahone’s lived up to most of its promises, although the pickle spear, guaranteed “crisp and cold,” was a tad warm.

19 | Our Famous Burger SIDETRACK BAR AND GRILL YPSILANTI, MI

Here is one of my core culinary credos: The closer you come to a college campus, the worse burgers get. Sidetrack Bar and Grill— named for its location next to an old railroad siding—is an exception. This modern-looking pub, around since 1850, doesn’t seem concerned with pleasing undiscerning Eastern Michigan University freshmen. “We don’t get much of a young crowd,” my waitress

said. The meat, a secret blend, tastes like chuck. The sesame-seed bun is small, soft, and grilled. I recommend a visit to the automobile museum across the street, although they won’t let you play drive-in and eat your burger in a vintage car.

20 | Hamburger Sandwich LO U I S ’ LU N C H N E W H AV E N , C T

The crew numbers two. A young man takes your order and makes change. An elderly woman in elastic-waist slacks makes the toast, forms the patties, broils the meat, assembles the burgers (with a schmear of something like Cheez Whiz, a tomato slice, and raw onion), slices them in half, sets them on the counter. She’s fast, real fast. In a senior-citizen table-tennis tournament, I’d put my money on her. There are no buns, no fries, no ketchup. Louis’ Lunch claims to have made America’s first hamburger sandwich, back in 1900. If it’s true, it was as significant a moment as the discovery of fire.

alan richman is a gq correspondent.

LEAVING REALITY CONTINUED FROM PAGE 159 self-reflexivity, more uniform complicity in the falseness of it all—it made things more real. Because, of course, people being on a reality show is precisely what these people are! Think of it this way: If you come to my o∞ce and film me doing my job (I don’t have one, but that only makes this thought experiment more rigorous), you wouldn’t really see what it was like to watch me doing my job, because you’d be there watching me (Heisenberg uncertainty principle, interior auto-mediation, and so forth). But now dig this: What if my job were to be on a reality show, being filmed, having you watching me, interior auto-mediation, and so forth? What if that were my reality, bros? Are your faces melting yet? This is where we are, as a people. And not just that. No, the other exciting thing that’s happened—really just in the past few years—involves the ramping acceleration of a self-reinforcing system that’s been in place since the birth of reality TV. See, because the population from which producers and casting directors can draw to get bodies onto these shows has come to comprise almost exclusively persons who “get” reality shows and are therefore hip to the fact that one is all but certain to be humiliated and irrevocably compromised on such a show, the producers and casting directors, who’ve always had to be careful to screen out candidates who are overly self-aware and therefore prone to freeze up and act all “dignified” in front of the cameras, are forever having to work harder and harder to locate “spontaneous” individuals, people who, as the Miz says approvingly,

“just can’t help being who they are.” Well, the e≠ects of this sequence—by which casting directors must get crazier and crazier with their choices, resulting, once the show has aired and had its effect on the country, in a casting demographic in which one must scrape the barrel that much harder to find people who’d even go near a reality show—remained, for many years, gradual and nearly imperceptible. But now…bros, have you watched TV recently? From what can be gathered, they’re basically emptying out group homes into these studios. It has all gotten so very real. Nobody’s acting anymore. I mean, sure, they’re acting, but it’s not like they’re ever not acting. That’s what I’m trying to say. And I just don’t see how you can’t love it. They’re all there, all the old American grotesques, the test-tube babies of Whitman and Poe, a great gauntlet of doubtless eyes, big mouths spewing fantastic fountains of impenetrable self-justification, muttering dark prayers, calling on God to strike down those who would fuck with their money, their cash, and always knowing, always preaching. Using weird phrases that nobody uses, except everybody uses them now. Constantly talking about our “goals.” Throwing carbonic acid on our castmates because they used our special cup and then calling our mom to say, in a baby voice, “People don’t get me here.” Walking around in a huggable T-shirt with a kitchen knife behind our backs. Telling it like it is, y’all. (What-what!) And never passive-aggressive, no. Saying it straight to your face. But crying, crying, crying. My God, there have

been more tears shed on reality TV than by all the war widows of the world. Are we so raw? It must be so. There are too many of them—too many shows and too many people on the shows. And I just get so exhausted with my countrypeople—you know the ones, the ones you run into who are all like, “Oh gosh, reality TV? I’ve never even seen it. Is it really that interesting?” I mean, I’m sorry, but go starve. To me that’s about as noble as being like, “Oh, Nagasaki? I’ve never even heard of that!” This is us, bros. This is our nation. A people of savage sentimentality, weeping and lifting weights.

***

the club appearance wasn’t enough. I asked them to dinner—the Miz, Melissa, and Coral—because I had to know for myself if they were real. If all those years spent being themselves for a living had left them with selves to be, or if they’d maybe begun to phase out of existence, like on a Star Trek episode. But then I got distracted. You know how it is, when you’re kickin’ it. I got to telling them about some of my all-time fave moments. I talked about the time Randy and Robin were drinking on the upstairs porch— it was the San Diego season. Big Ran was telling Robin about his personal philosophical system, involving a positive acceptance of epistemological uncertainty, a little thing he liked to call “agnostics.” When Robin (I thought very sweetly) complimented Ran on his philosophical side, which she hadn’t noticed up till then, Big Ran goes: “I have a lot of knowledge to share.” J U LY. 0 5 . G Q .1 8 1

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