Best Burgers Near Me

Tag: burgers

  • JLB Eatery yet another winner in Katy’s increasingly exceptional burger scene

    JLB Eatery yet another winner in Katy’s increasingly exceptional burger scene

    Saturday, February 17, 2024 — With my birthday coming up I knew I wanted to knock a few more new burger spots off of my to-do list. Not that I ever need an excuse to seek new hamburgers out, but the celebratory vibe of one’s day of birth ensured my attention was focused at the top of my spreadsheet to see which highly-regarded joints would make the cut. 

    At a 4.8 on both Yelp and Google, JLB Eatery (which has 12 Houston-area locations) is the highest-rated burger place in Katy. The only reason I hadn’t been sooner is that, in some regards, I figured I’d already had their food. Being the burger obsessive that I am, naturally I’ve previously eaten at Joy Love Burger numerous times (and have always loved it), but JLB Eatery appears to technically be a separate entity from Joy Love Burger. 

    I’m generally a pretty successful internet sleuth, but information around what exactly occurred to lead Chef Joon Jeon to leave the restaurant he founded — the original Joy Love Burger — and open a new one called JLB Eatery is surprisingly hard to come by, but as best I can tell the two establishments operate independently and despite Chef Jeon’s utilization of the JLB acronym, appear to have completely distinct ownership groups. Aside from that, the menus are very, very similar. 

    Which means I wasn’t surprised for one moment that I absolutely loved JLB Eatery! The only slight hiccup was that ordering at the counter and the subsequent arrival of the food was a bit more sluggish than I’d prefer (would definitely order ahead online next time), but the staff was so lovely and accommodating during what was clearly a busy Friday night that it was no big deal.

    I ordered the Crazy Burger, which consists of two MASSIVE double certified Angus beef patties, double cheese, mayonnaise, lettuce, pickles, tomatoes, bacon, grilled onions, and thousand island dressing. This thing is absolutely GARGANTUAN (unfortunately my photo does not do it justice) — no joke it is probably a 2,000-calorie hamburger sandwich.

    And holy crap was it delicious! Everything I recall loving about Joy Love Burger is beyond represented in JLB Eatery’s loving ode to beefy extravagance. I know I keep mentioning the size, but if you like gigantic, juicy melt-in-your mouth hamburgers, I’m not sure you’ll find a happier place than JLB. I thought the beef flavor might get overwhelmed by all of the delicious accoutrement — the thousand-island dressing is off the charts, and it is absolutely slathered in bacon, pickles and onions — but it remained the star of the show throughout, resplendent in savory, soft, beefy deliciousness. Texturally exquisite and cooked to perfection. And no conversation about JLB Eatery is complete without highlighting the bun — in addition to cooking insanely great hamburgers, Chef Jeon is also a pattisier and so JLB bakes all of their buns fresh daily. We’ve all had experiences where the bun can occasionally be an afterthought, but at JLB it’s almost as big a draw as the meat itself. I inhaled this thing and didn’t look back. 

    And I also ordered the Steak Fries, because how can you not when they come smothered in philly steak, cheese, onions, lettuce, and jalapeños? Similar to Crypto Burger’s Spicy Metaverse Monster Fries, this enormous side could easily be a meal unto its own, and I took the whole thing down as well (thank goodness I knew I had an 8-mile run ahead of me the next morning 😂). 

    Overall, I was utterly delighted (and beyond satiated!) by my experience at JLB Eatery, and it absolutely lives up to its aggregated online ratings as Katy’s best burger. Just make sure you go there on the emptiest stomach possible! And my goodness is Katy currently flush with exceptional hamburger choices these days—between Old School Burger,  Fusion, Kowbell, JLB (and even original Joy Love), elevated options for the beef-loving denizens of Katy are plentiful. 

    Five out five patties. 🍔🍔🍔🍔🍔

  • Don’t miss hype Houston food truck Crypto Burger’s crave-worthy FOMO sauce

    Don’t miss hype Houston food truck Crypto Burger’s crave-worthy FOMO sauce

    Friday, February 9, 2024 — Traveling Houston-area burger purveyors Crypto Burger hit my Instagram feed last fall with mouth-watering photos of their delicious-looking burgers, and I finally popped over to the food truck park on Chimney Rock in the Galleria to see what all the fuss was about.

    Anticipating a line, the entire park—which also features another burger food truck catty corner from Crypto—was instead surprisingly barren for lunchtime on a Friday. I debated between their fan favorite Bunque Burger and the Bull Run, and ended up ordering the latter. 

    Bull Run is described as a “Homemade beef patty, topped with Serrano peppers, beef bacon, fried onions, cayenne pepper hot sauce, shredded Colby jack cheese, and our spicy FOMO sauce.” 

    It took a bit longer for my order—which, because I am a glutton for all things meat, also included the Spicy Metaverse Monster Fries, a gigantic platter of fries that could easily serve as a meal unto its own absolutely smothered with ground beef, grilled jalapeños, and FOMO sauce—to be completed than I expected, though you can’t quibble with a fresh-grilled burger.

    As you can see by my photo, the patty is drenched in the FOMO sauce and it is truly the star of the show. A pleasant zippiness, but not overwhelmingly spicy where it blows your palate out. The beef blend itself was enjoyable, though the overall flavor got a little lost amidst all of the other awesomeness accompanying it. The bun was fluffy and also hefty enough to stand up to the onslaught of toppings—always a plus.

    Overall I was glad to have finally checked Crypto off my neverending list. While I don’t  think it cracks my top five in Houston—though in fairness, that’s a difficult list to enter!—and food trucks seem to be the recipient of a generous grading curve by the review-leaving public, I would definitely eat it again. 4 out of 5 patties.

  • Champ-ing at the bit: Is this Houston’s best hamburger?

    Champ-ing at the bit: Is this Houston’s best hamburger?

    Friday, January 26, 2024 — Champ Burger is Houston burger royalty in this city, having first flung its doors open 61 years ago. It jumped toward the top of my to-eat list when I began compiling my Houston burger rating tracking spreadsheet a couple of months ago, standing out as the 8th-highest-rated burger in the entire Greater Houston area (if you go by Yelp) or tied with three others for 2nd (if you prefer Google ratings). For added context, this is a spreadsheet that currently features nearly 120 places in and around Houston to grab a burger, and almost certainly isn’t an exhaustive list!

    Right out of the gate, its well-worn neighborhood feel and overall vibe — lengthy line at the order window and mostly outdoor seating — are immediately evocative of fellow Houston burger institutions Lankford Grill, Bubba’s Texas Burger Shack, and Stanton’s City Bites (eagle-eyed readers will recall that the former two made my Best Burgers of 2023 roundup, while the latter also would’ve been on there had I extended the list past a mere five slots). It’s also no coincidence that each of these venues all trade in exceptional beef stack assembly, sharing a like-minded ethos of “more is more” with regards to both patty size (no smashburgers to be found at these spots) and generosity of toppings.

    So let’s get to it. The Champ burger was, at the risk of overstating things, about as hedonistically thrilling a consumptive experience as one can hope to attain. Everything about this sandwich screams love, deliciousness, indulgence, excess, and yet still care and attentiveness. The patties are expertly seasoned and the 81/19 Chuck beef blend is melt-in-your-mouth exquisite (do yourself a favor and get the double, you won’t be sad that you did), the cheese perfectly gooey, and the toppings — oh, the toppings! — elevated the entire composition to an ethereal level. 

    Often when one orders bacon on a burger, you’ll get one slice — maybe two if you’re lucky — that isn’t cohesively synthesized into the sandwich and frequently feel like an afterthought. Champ’s burgers are flooded with bacon, and it’s cooked to middle-ground soft-yet-chewy perfection. I added jalapeños to mine (because how can you not) and the sandwich also comes standard with lettuce, tomato, pickles, and mayo, and you get heaping piles of everything. I’m not usually looking for tons of mayo but the burger was drenched in it, and it really worked; while my wrapper probably contained about 10 jalapeños that had to jump ship as I systematically devoured this monster beef delivery vehicle at my typical breakneck pace. 

    Recency bias is always difficult to overcome when comparing favorite entries in a given category — and I absolutely loved both Bubba’s and Lankford, and should probably try to orchestrate a blind tasting one of these days for fairness and accuracy’s sake), but it’s very possible I just found my new favorite hamburger* in Houston. 

    (*While technically both are still hamburgers, at this point the spots that specialize in smashburgers versus the older-school traditional hamburger joints arrive at their delicious destinations in such distinctly unique fashions from each other, that the “my favorite hamburger” designation can be bifurcated into regular and smash — which means burger-chan of course remains my top smash in the city).

  • KP’s Kitchen: Burger simplicity par excellence

    KP’s Kitchen: Burger simplicity par excellence

    Friday, January 19, 2024 — My ever-growing list of burgers to try in the Greater Houston area (go ahead and click the link; it’s the first time I’ve publicly shared my spreadsheet 😊) is usually populated by places that appear on best-of lists and/or word of mouth via the city’s lively and various Facebook foodie groups. 

    KP’s hit my radar by way of Reddit, and I’m certainly glad it did. My spreadsheet ranks burgers by Yelp review first and Google rating second, as the former is typically a tougher grade. KP’s is the rare spot that grades out ridiculously highly on both platforms — 4.6 on Yelp, and 4.7 on Google. 

    And it deserves those high marks.

    KP’s cheeseburger might be the most unassuming of all of the patties I’ve reviewed to date — its two smashburgers are accompanied by smoked bacon, American cheese, dijonnaise & hand cut fries — but its the execution that makes this straightforward sandwich top-notch.  The burgers themselves are exquisite — I don’t know what the meat blend is, but they’re expertly seasoned and cooked to perfection, and given the sheer volume of meat stack plates I saw coming out of the kitchen, it’s no small feat to nail the temperature over and over again for a restaurant that’s not a fast-food joint. 

    Truly, the KP burger’s appeal lies in its simplicity — the cheese is melted just so, the bacon soft yet chewy, and the bun representing the ideal delivery vehicle. You’d be forgiven if you overlooked KP’s given that it sits right on I-10 (“I can’t imagine an elite burger place on a highway frontage road”), but do yourself a favor and hop on over there for this beefy greatness. 

    To top it off, KP’s is BYOB, and for an outrageously picky beer snob like me, the ability to bring a world-class hazy DIPA into the restaurant — in this particular instance, a fresh-off–the-canning-line batch of SpindleTap’s lovely ode to Nelson and Galaxy hops, Hirsch Road Hop Heads — absolutely elevated the overall experience, and cemented KP’s as a go-to spot for meals to come.

    4.5 out of 5 patties. 🍔🍔🍔🍔

  • Katy’s got a fever, baby. And the only prescription is more Kowbell

    Katy’s got a fever, baby. And the only prescription is more Kowbell

    Friday, January 12, 2024 — Kowbell Burger—nestled snugly in Katy Asian Town—burst on to the local burger scene a mere handful of months ago and quickly garnered a legion of hype. No small feat in a greater metropolitan area dripping in burger exceptionalism. Naturally it quickly hit my to-do list, and I finally checked it off this weekend. And I am delighted to say, it absolutely slayed.

    The patty is a tri-blend of chuck, brisket, and short rib, and is a true joy unto itself. But of course, burgers are best served fully adorned by their best topping friends, and in this instance I selected the Blue Bayou. If you’ve been reading my burger reviews you know I’m wild about blue cheese, and this gem is smothered in its eponymous fromage, along with smoked bacon, signature k-buffalo sauce, and mayo. Because I have to have jalapeños on everything, I requested their addition. And because I’m an absolute meat savage, I of course added a second patty to make it a double.

    This burger encapsulated Larry bliss — an exemplary meat blend, brilliant blue cheese flavor, a second layer of meat, and an added zippiness from the peppers. The restaurant also features multiple proprietary sauces, helping further elevate an already refined beef delivery conveyance.

    My only nit was the bun—as you can see in the photo, it’s a bit underwhelming visually, and I’m not sure it did much for the overall experience flavor-wise. Also, the Parmesan truffle fries were a bit thick and could’ve used more seasoning.

    With that said, if you swapped these buns out for brioche, we could potentially be talking about the best burgers in Texas 😱 Bun notwithstanding, I get why Kowbell is currently rocking a perfect 5.0 on Google (and yes, we know Google ratings are inflated), and a 4.6 on notoriously stingy Yelp.

    5 out of 5 patties 🍔🍔🍔🍔🍔

  • The “Legendary Cheeseburger” at NYC’s Nowon is highly overrated

    The “Legendary Cheeseburger” at NYC’s Nowon is highly overrated

    Monday, January 1, 2024 — I made time for one hype burger during our recent NYC holiday trip, and — it wasn’t great.

    Nowon is a Korean-American gastropub with two New York locations. We dined at the East Village outpost on 6th Street between Avenue A and Avenue B. Having grown up six blocks away from Alphabet City and later as an adult living on its northern border at 14th Street and Avenue A, it’s my favorite neighborhood in New York. Countless memories of long nights at bars — my wife and I had our very first date at the former Musical Box (Easter egg!) bar on Avenue B between 13th and 14th Streets — and dozens of terrific meals, but unfortunately this wasn’t one of them.

    Nowon hit my radar on the heels of a handful of highly influential NYC food influencers — including Jeremy Jacobowitz; The Infatuation‘s Bryan Kim, Neha Talreja, Willa Morre, and Kenny Yang; and by Shauna Lyons in The New Yorker, arguably the city’s ultimate high-brow cultural aesthete — recommending the burger as one of the city’s best. No greater sign of a New York restaurant having a moment than threatening you with a $125 fee if you need to cancel and don’t provide ample advanced notice!

    Digression aside, our party of four was sat at a too-small roundtop despite there being a more generously sized rectangular table available. My brother and I were both excited to try what the restaurant calls its “Legendary Cheeseburger.” 

    The sandwich consists of two smashed patties, pickles, kimchi, and kimchi sauce, and…it was incredibly underwhelming. While I’m certainly willing to give a place the benefit of the doubt and chalk it up to a bad night, the burger was straight-up boring. The sesame-seed bun was uninspiring and borderline stale, and the patties were *way* overcooked. Biting into this thing was akin to chewing on a hockey puck. I thought for sure the kimchi sauce would moisten this arid meat-delivery vehicle, but no such luck — this was one of the drier burgers I can recall having in some time. I love a juicy burger, and this was the antithesis. Lastly, the patties were on the small side, and being smashed meant the sandwich had no heft. Maybe many New Yorkers prefer a daintier hamburger, but if there’s one “bigger in Texas” stereotype I’ve wholeheartedly adopted during my decade in the Lone Star State it’s the desire for burger stacks so massive you need to unhinge your jaw to consume them.

    Nowon’s saving grace for us that night was that everything else we ordered — pickled cucumbers and fried chicken for appetizers, and kimchee and mushroom rice veggie dish entrees selected by our significant others — was delicious.

    Parenthetically, during my previous trip home to NYC this last summer I made a point to try 7th Street Burger, another smashburger joint which has also garnered its share of hype. It was enjoyable — certainly juicier than Nowon’s — but I’m not sure it brought much more to the table than one might find at Shake Shack.

    Thus far in the Houston-NYC burger wars, H-Town is running circles around my hometown. While it may not be an entirely apples-to-apples to comparison, I can’t help but evaluate everything against burger-chan, my 2023 Top Burger winner, and eating Nowon’s dry, joyless burger made me appreciate just how fortunate Houstonians are to enjoy the thoughtful, intentional, and heartfelt experience Willet and Diane deliver every day.

    Nowon rating: 1 out of 5 patties 😬

  • My Top Houston Burgers of 2023!

    My Top Houston Burgers of 2023!

    Friday, Dec 13, 2023 —

    When 2023 started I didn’t anticipate becoming a burger influencer, but here we are. Though as someone whose favorite food has been hamburgers for a long time, and who also has historically enjoyed obsessively cataloguing and rating things that he loves, it’s almost a wonder I didn’t start publishing reviews sooner.

    In any case, having knocked a good number of Houston’s best burgers off my to-eat list these past few months (notably I’m pretty pleased to have consumed 7 of the 11 on Houstonia’s list), I thought it’d be fun to count my top five down. Drumroll please…

    5) Fusion Grill (1453 S Mason Road in Katy). I just published my full review of Fusion a few days ago, so I won’t repost the entire write-up here, but it’s worth reiterating that Fusion (which began life as a food truck) has staked a claim among Katy’s ardent burger-loving populace as one of the best burger spots around — and I believe it’s a worthy contender for all of Houston. The sheer number of different and delicious burger options makes choosing anything a daunting task, but my go-to at Fusion is the Asadero Burger. The asadero cheese combined with roasted jalapeño and jalapeño ranch sauce give it a jolt of spiciness for those of us the love an extra kick in your burgers, and the oversized bun makes for the ideal delivery vehicle. In addition to the burgers, the parmesan truffle fries are also outstanding as is the fried calamari. Fusion may well be Katy’s best overall restaurant — it’s high enough on my list that I selected it for my birthday dinner this past year. Just make sure you come hungry 👌

    4) Lankford’s Grocery. It seems one can’t have a conversation around Houston’s best burgers without Lankford’s entering the chat. And now I know why. The eatery’s Grim Burger—fortified with a jalapeño-laden base, smothered with mac and cheese, and topped with bacon and a fried egg—is a carnivorous delight. Extra points for the flavor of the beef blend and seasoning of the patty still shining through under the weight of a plethora of delicious toppings.

    3) Bubba’s Texas Burger Shack. Famously situated under the Westpark Tollway, Bubba’s not only lived up to but exceeded the hype. I ordered a double beef burger with jalapeños, zesty pickles, a fried egg, bacon and cheddar, and it was everything I’d hoped for and more. Intense, flavorful, meaty, no-frills greatness.

    2) Old School Burger (975 S Mason Rd in Katy). Convenient for me that two of my top 5 burgers of the year are located right in my backyard on Mason Road. I’d started to hear rumblings of Old School’s excellence around a year ago, and knew I had to check it out. It turns out their Blue Star Burger—smothered in blue cheese crumbles, bacon, caramelized onions and blue cheese dressing—is just about everything I want in a meat delivery vehicle. The closest thing I’ve found to a replacement for my beloved Substitute Burger (also a blue cheese icon) from the former Katy GOAT Bernie’s Burger Bus (R.I.P). Completely unassuming from the inside, let’s just hope they’re still here by the time next year’s list rolls around — despite rave after rave among Katyites, the other commonality within every laudatory review of Old School Burger is an observation of just how empty it is at any given time. Hopefully they do a LOT of takeout business.

    1) burger-chan. Hell yes burger-chan! I have a confession to make: I had tried (and enjoyed) burger-chan all the way back in 2020 (not that I said anything about this list comprising only burgers I’d consumed during this calendar year). However, I’d previously had it to-go from their former food hall space — enjoying it this year at their Alabama Street location was indeed a first, and also made me wonder why I went so long between devouring their utterly astonishingly delicious hamburgers (well, part of the reason was that they were also closed for part of 2021, and then when they reopened I was trying to eat healthier, but still — shame on me for taking as long as I did to reunite with Houston’s very best hamburger joint).

    More importantly though, we need to talk about the sandwiches themselves — unlike almost every other establishment on this list, burger-chan burgers are FULLY customizable, enabling you to mix and match combinations and toppings to your heart’s content. Just as — if not more — importantly is that even though their patties are smashburgers (and I’m generally a classic oversized patty fan), theirs are perhaps the most generously-sized smashburgers I’ve ever encountered. One patty could pretty easily satiate you, which is uncommon in my smashburger experience. And of course, the meat blend — expertly seasoned, mouthwatering, and melt-in-your-mouth delicious. The only downside of burger-chan is how quickly the burger disappears from your tray (that, and also the lack of a bleu cheese option — let’s make that collab happen in 2024, friends! 😊)

    Which burger places should I prioritize in 2024?

    (Honorable mention to Stanton’s City Bites, Trill Burger, Loro, and The Montgomery Grove)

    Resources

    Houstonia’s “Houston Burgers You Absolutely Need to Experience” [8.08.2023]
    Eater’s “30 Houston Burgers to Add to Your Bucket List” [8.08.2023]
    The Infatuation’s “The Best Burgers in Houston” [10.24.2023]

  • Kicking it Old School with Katy’s best Burger

    Kicking it Old School with Katy’s best Burger

    Friday, February 20, 2023 — While I love a great slice of NYC-style pizza, hamburgers are my favorite food on the planet. I don’t know that this photo fully does it justice, but I wanted to take a moment to add to the chorus of excitement around Old School Burger on Mason Rd.

    Certainly we have no lack of options when it comes to hamburgers locally, but my family and I have felt a bit of a void in the “mid-tier sit-down greater-depth-of-flavor-than-fast-food” burger restaurant in Katy cohort following the sad closing of Bernie’s when COVID hit, and more recently Grub (side note: don’t get me wrong, I will absolutely crush a Whataburger / Shake Shack / In N Out / even McDonald’s — no snobbery here). We enjoy JLB well enough, though the Mason Rd spot isn’t really the most appealing place to take a seat, and we admittedly need to revisit Craft Burger one of these days, as we haven’t been back following a less-than-ideal experience closer to when it first opened. But enough about other places!

    Old School is absolutely as delicious as advertised, with patties that are more smashburger-style than traditional (though I don’t know that I’d call it a true smashburger), and a meat blend chock full of juicy, beefy flavor. This is a true melt-in-your-mouth patty; I’m actually not sure I’ve had beef quite like *this* in Katy/Houston before. I ordered the Blue Star Burger and added their Jalapeño Ranch sauce — I know that sounds a bit unorthodox, but it was fantastic — and my entire family thoroughly enjoyed their burgers! My only nit was with the queso fries — they were also excellent; there just weren’t enough of them on the plate to constitute a large order.

    In any case, if you enjoyed my recommendation for Gino’s Italian Joint, I hope you’ll take me up on this one as well. Similar to others’ experiences, there was virtually no one else eating there for the duration of our 45-minute visit, which is wild for how rich the burgers are. Next time you’re wondering which burger place in Katy to check out, I’d put Old School at the top of your list.