A Hamburger Today
Amid the Kitsch, Trailer Park Lounge Serves a Solid Burger
[Photographs: Robyn Lee]
Trailer Park Lounge & Grill
271 West 23rd Street, New York, NY 10011 (b/n 7th and 8th; map); 212-463-8000; trailerparklounge.com
Cooking Method: Grilled
Short Order: Solid, beefy, well-charred cheeseburger
Want Fries with That? The tater tots are great; sweet potato fries are worth trying too.
Prices: Burger, $8.95; cheese, +$1.75; Double Wide Burger, $13.95
We are always on the prowl for a good burger within walking distance of Serious Eats world headquarters, yet somehow I had never made it to Trailer Park Lounge & Grill, which is a mere four blocks away. Robyn heard by way of Burger Conquest that Trailer Park actually made a pretty good burger, so this past week we hit the road to the kitschy storefront that is Trailer Park.
Us being us, we ordered a regular cheeseburger and a double-wide cheeseburger, one with sweet potato fries, the other with tater tots. Why? Because there were three of us, including Burgermeister Kenji. Actually, we also ordered a chicken salad sandwich, some chili, some mac and cheese, and a cheesesteak, figuring we would take our leftovers back to the folks at HQ. And you know what? We should have just taken Robyn's advice and stuck to burgers, because they were surprisingly good.
Kenji was surprised that adding American cheese to your eight-ounce burger ($8.95) costs $1.75 extra at Trailer Park. I was, too. But since it turned out to be a really solid burger—beefy, well-charred, and cooked as ordered, medium rare—it was easier to swallow the tariff.
The one-pound Double-Wide burger ($13.95) was basically a double cheeseburger club sandwich. Think of a Big Mac on steroids due to the third bun in the middle of the two patties. Though the Double-Wide is a ridiculously thick sandwich (think Carnegie Deli pastrami sandwich-thickness), it's also mighty tasty because the meat juices saturate all the bread matter.
Trailer Park's tater tots were perfectly cooked (aren't they always?), and the sweet potato fries were also mighty fine.
As for the rest of the food, meh—nothing worth the calories or the carbs.