Coming through in the Smash

The rich get richer as yet another exceptional smashburger joint opens up in Houston, a.k.a. Hamburger City

2025 has been some kind of year for my endless pursuit of the finest hamburgers known to man. There were 12 new-to-me burgers on my recently published Top 30 Hamburgers in Houston list — many of which will make my annual year-end Best-of list, which in and of itself is getting crowded (here’s the 2024 wrap-up).

Proper. Gastrocraft. Boo’s Burgers. Wagyuru. Q’s Deli. Smashed Society. Lone Star Market. Narwhal Jousting Club. Moon Tower. Bad Buns.

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All enjoyed by me for the first time in 2025, and all uniformly outstanding — and somewhat absurdly, 50% of those names listed above opened in 2025.

It’s one thing for a city to enjoy one or two world-class additions to its hamburger scene in a given year. But five new spots, all boasting burger offerings rating between 4.5-5 out of 5, is wild, and further cements my contention that Houston is the Best Burger City in America, and by a wide margin at that.

With that, I suppose it should come as no surprise that the latest entrant to the scene — Smash City, which, like many of its smashburger brethren began life as a food truck — has come out of the chute on absolute fire.

Smash City delightfully hit my radar in ideal fashion: posts featuring the truck suddenly started appearing in my Instagram feed out of nowhere, touting the food truck’s upcoming new brick-and-mortar location, on Westheimer in Uptown/Galleria. It literally could not have been better situated for me.

In some regards the marketing plan was eerily reminiscent of Juicy Joint’s entry to the market, with multiple videos from both the company and local food influencers hyping the brand spawning seemingly overnight, which is clearly the playbook for getting in front of your desired audience. It got my attention and I subsequently decided to eat there less than two weeks after learning about its existence, so the plan appears to have worked.

But enough with the preamble. You’re here to know what I thought about the burger.

I ordered the Jalapeño Jackpot, which comes with two smashed Angus patties, melted American cheese, grilled jalapeños, smoky beef bacon, signature sauce, and grilled diced onions, on a very tasty (and sturdy) potato bun branded with their logo. Noting the heft of the bun is important, because I also added a third patty (of course), an egg, bacon, truffle mayo, mushrooms, lettuce, tomato and pickles, and oftentimes my custom burger towers overwhelm their foundation. I did find it slightly silly that the latter three fixings aren’t standard issue, but a minor quibble. I also enjoyed how I was lamenting that I seldom see mushrooms as a topping option after enjoying them on Lone Star’s Smash last week, and now here we are with our favorite fungi two visits in a row.

From the moment I sank my teeth into it to prevent the burger from toppling sideways — I recogize that I just lauded the bun, but trying to hold these overflowing beef towers up with one hand for the photo while sauces and hot juice are dripping down my hand is quite a bit more difficult than it looks — I knew I was in for something special.

I am well aware that Wagyu is all the rage (and rightly so), but these classic Angus patties sang all the savory beefy flavor notes I could want.

Sometimes my abundant topping selections can overwhelm the flavor of the beef, but everything was perfectly in sync here. Just delicious, well-prepared and thoughtfully cooked on the execution.

Those that have broken bread with me know I am the fastest eater around, so my consuming something quickly isn’t necessarily notable in and of itself — but I literally inhaled this thing, and given its generous proportions, that’s among the highest compliments I can pay a burger.

So there you have it — Smash City out of the gate with a no-doubt Top 15 and possibly/probably Too 10 smashburger in all of Houston. The rich get richer, indeed. 4.75 out of 5 patties.