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Brooklyn Brackets: Vote for Your Favorite Burger Joint in the Borough

By DNAinfo Staff | March 4, 2015 7:48am 

  Choose your favorite burger in Brooklyn in DNAinfo New York's March Madness showdown.
Brooklyn Brackets: Burgers
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BROOKLYN — There can only be one best burger in the borough.

As part of DNAinfo New York’s Brooklyn Brackets series, we asked you on Monday to choose your favorite neighborhood institution. On Tuesday, we wanted to know how Brooklyn’s artisanal products stack up. And now we inquire about a crucial dining issue: How do you like your burger?

Do you favor a classic at Peter Luger or will you stand in line for the new-kid-on-the-block Ramen Burger? How about some seaweed with your burger at Do or Dine? Or do you go for a simple beef-and-cheddar at 67 Burger?

In the Sweet 16-style match-ups below, choose your favorites from the best burger joints in the Brooklyn neighborhoods we cover. Next week, the contestants will be cut down to eight, then four the following week, and so on until there's a winner in each category at the end of the month.

May the best burger win!

Best Burger Round 1”><p><a  data-cke-saved-href=VOTE IN THE POLL BELOW

THE CONTENDERS

67 Burger — 67 Lafayette Ave. or 234 Flatbush Ave. Nine types of cheese, 15 other toppings and grass-fed, all-natural beef on 67 Burger's menu let you design your own perfect burger at both locations of this neighborhood burger joint, in Fort Greene and Park Slope.

Black Swan — 1048 Bedford Ave. Black Swan’s massive burger is topped with roasted oyster mushrooms, gruyere, green leaf, tomato and pickles for mouthwatering perfection. The juicy entrée comes with your choice of sweet potato or regular fries, or salad. The Bed-Stuy pub also offers a BYOB option — build your own burger — and you can’t go wrong with options like caramelized onions, goat cheese, and avocado.

Brooklyn Public House — 247 Dekalb Ave. The ground sirloin and hanger steak burger at Brooklyn Public House is a showstopper in Fort Greene. The burger comes with bacon mayo, arugula, bacon relish, cheddar and tomato chili and is served in the friendly "everybody knows your name" atmosphere at DeKalb Avenue's most popular pub.

Do or Dine — 1108 Bedford Ave. Simply called “burger” on the menu, Do or Dine’s brunch option needs no fancy title, but don’t let the plain name fool you. This beef burger is tempura fried, stuffed with cheddar, and topped with seaweed and egg. Forget the bun: this entrée is served up with just tater tots and Bloody Mary gel.

Dram Shop — 339 Ninth St. This Park Slope bar is a gathering spot for locals, but burger fans come from far and wide for Dram Shop's $12 burger, made with two grass-fed beef patties and, if you want, smothered with chipotle mayo. If that's not enough to satisfy your hunger, you can order the bar's fried mac and cheese as a side dish.

Dutch Boy Burger — 766 Franklin Ave. Try the "hangover" burger at this popular Franklin Avenue spot in Crown Heights, which serves burgers made with meat from Los Paisanos Meat Market in Cobble Hill and buns from Baked in Brooklyn in Sunset Park. You can get a burger with beef, turkey, lamb, chicken or a veggie pattie and wash it down with booze from Franklin Park, the beer hall connected to the back of the restaurant.

Fritzl's Lunch Box — 173 Irving Ave. It's only been open for a couple years, but this Bushwick spot started getting attention for its burger almost immediately. Juicy, and topped with pickles, onions and special sauce, Fritzl's burger is best enjoyed in the summer, in the restaurant's backyard.

Hope & Anchor — 347 Van Brunt St. Red Hook's nautical diner has an entire menu dedicated to burgers, with 13 beef burgers and five non-beef burgers that include options like salmon and tofu. The restaurant's triple-decker sandwich, called "Hook, Line & Sinker" is a pound of double angus beef between two grilled cheese sandwiches and delicious fixings like bacon, fried egg, pickles, cheese, sausage, onion rings and tomato for $20.

Lot 2 — 687 Sixth Ave. Tucked away in the South Slope, Lot 2 is an unassuming restaurant that delivers consistently delicious, inventive takes on American food. The menu switches up protein and veggie options depending on what's in season, but the burger is a constant. Served with just three duck fat potato french fries, this $16 Creekstone Farms beef patty is juicy and flavorful.

Lulu & Po — 154 Carlton Ave. Lulu & Po's burger is made on a Martin's Potato Roll with DeBragga beef blend, creamy goat cheese, zucchini pickles and caramelized onions. Serious Eats described the Fort Greene restaurant's burger as oozing with "juices, with a tang and funk from the goat cheese, a sharply acidic pickle kick, and an intense, concentrated onion sweetness — coming together in a most excellent bite."

Peter Luger — 178 Broadway. The half-pound burger at this South Williamsburg steakhouse is simple, with just meat. You can ask for add-ons like bacon and tomato, but why would you? It's only available for lunch and was Zagat's best burger in the city in 2014.

Prime Meats — 465 Court St. Prime Meats in Carroll Gardens is known for its handcrafted sausages, dry-aged côte de boeuf and "The Prime Meats Burger" that's made with half a pound of Creekstone certified black angus, a homemade sesame roll, fermented dill pickle and served alongside handcut fries. The farm-to-table restaurant is run by Brooklyn restaurateurs Frank Falcinelli and Frank Castronovo, who also own Frankies 457 in the neighborhood.

Ramen Burger — 899 Bergen St. After serving long lines of customers at Smorgasburg, Ramen Burger opened its first brick-and-mortar location in the Crown Heights beer hall Berg'n last summer, serving its signature "ramen burger" made with a shoyu glaze and served on buns made from fresh ramen noodles.

Tchoup Shop at Heavy Woods — 50 Wyckoff Ave. The first bite of the burger at this Cajun-inspired spot inside Bushwick bar Heavy Woods is a bit of a mouth explosion. The grassfed beef is packed with spices, and the pickled onions and handmade mustard on top complement the saltiness from the thick, juicy patty.

Vinegar Hill House — 72 Hudson Ave. The burger at Vinegar Hill House, made on a potato roll with cheddar, pickle relish, lettuce and mac sauce, is part of the brunch menu at this tucked-away, neighborhood favorite. The burger became so popular that the eatery hosts a "burger night" on Mondays where you can grab this towering $15 sandwich served with steak fries in the evening hours.

Watty & Meg's — 248 Court St. Monday night is "Burger Night" at Cobble Hill's Watty & Meg. For $10, diners can get a juicy burger, fries and a can of Founders All Day IPA, with toppings like avocado, applewood smoked bacon and a fried egg available for a few extra dollars. The restaurant's daily menu also includes its grass-fed burger as well as a maple burger with soy marinated kale and a veggie burger made with rice, yucca, black beans and quinoa.

VOTE FOR THE BEST BURGER BELOW

Voting for this round is now closed. Check back on March 11 for the next round.

Reporting by Serena Dai, Janet Upadhye, Camille Bautista, Nikhita Venugopal, Rachel Holliday Smith, Leslie Albrecht. Graphic by Nigel Chiwaya.