First of all thank you for your comment and welcome to my little blog!

Secondly, I wrote this in response to Alan Richman’s (and Robert Sietsema’s) criticism; I wrote this before Sam Sifton’s judgments were made public. And I can see your point about my post; my attempt at objectivity was remiss.

My goal, with this blog, is not to be so much of a critic as it is to allow other people in on my personal experience and have them make their own decisions on whether or not they want to eat somewhere I might be writing about. Bill’s burger are not the nearly the best burgers I’ve ever had (and, IMHO, neither are Shake Shack’s). It’s just I want my readers to, preemptively, temper their expectations, especially when something gets touted as the best, more so when it regards a generally pedestrian food item as a hamburger.

So to me it is just as odd to call a burger “the best” (that’s like telling someone what the best song is) as it is to lay upon it such damning praise. And a burger that gets so much hype is bound to attract detractors and beg for criticism.

My attempted point was to remind myself that as burgers go—and most of the burgers I have in a year are the ones I make for myself, and they’re always delicious! =)—Bill’s does a decent job of being the familiarly evocative comfort food I only need it to be, and not some complicated dish the needs to be scrutinized and over-evaluated.

Sam and I went to the same high (prep) school on the Upper East Side of Manhattan (he and I and a couple of other students successfully campaigned to get the tuna tetrazzini removed from the school cafeteria lunch rotation! Thought nothing of it at the time…), and I couldn’t be happier for him in his present vocation. He will dine in more popular and boldfaced name establishments in a month than I will all year, and I’ll partly envy him for that.

And not that anyone who really enjoys food should have anything less than high standards when giving a restaurant the business of hopefully feeding one well. But your right; “doesn’t suck” or “I’ve had far worse” is hardly high praise, but I personally enjoyed the burger a lot. I enjoyed making the trip beforehand, and walking around MePa for about an hour after. Making it a bit more personal might make the reader “get” me more: if you like what I like, then you might like this….

People shouldn’t go to Bill’s just to have the “best burger in the city”, but neither should they avoid doing so because a few respected notables publicly expressed their discontent. I do, though, respect that those observations were fair and detail-oriented. And we do need people like you to shoot us the straight foodie 411, so keep up your excellent work!

Would love to meet up at Cascabel, pick your brains, share some eat time. You now know how to get in touch with me!

.kac

PS I’ll be adding your blog to my blogroll, “Eggroll”…!

I wanted to also touch on your comments about Bill’s. I realize you like the burger but I’m still not really understanding why. All I’m reading is that it’s better than a backyard burger made from month-old frozen meat. What exactly is that saying about a place that some critics were calling “the best burger in NY?” I’m no critic, just a huge food lover with high standards, but I proudly stand with Sam Sifton (I’m assuming he’s the “critic” you refer to) when lamenting over my two (yes, two) less than mediocre experiences will Bill’s Classic, the Sunset and Vine and the Fat Cat. The meat is flavorless, the toppings drab, the bun floppy and the burger definitely does not deserve to be mentioned in the same breathe as Shake Shack.

Here’s my review:
http://nycfoodguy.com/2009/11/23/bills-bar-burger/

That being said, hope it doesn’t all come off as sounding crass. After all, we’re bloggers now, this is what we do. Hope you get in touch about Cascabel.

Lawrence@nycfoodguy.com