www.theponybar.com
The Order: Sirloin Burger, medium rare. Swiss cheese, lettuce, tomato, and an onion roll.
Side Order: Comes with Adirondack Bill's pickles and hand-cut chips
$9
Drink Order: Sixpoint Belgian IPA, Sixpoint Cask-condition Bengali Tiger IPA
First off, the beer selection is awesome at this place. The night I went it just so happened to be a brewery night. So! Instead of having 20 or so American microbrews on tap, all of the taps had a different beer from Sixpoint Brewery. And all the beers are always only $5. Amazing. But I digress, this is about the burger.
At first, the burger was a little disappointing, having been talked up a bit, but don't let that stop you from coming here. I found that if I ate around the edges first, saving the middle for last, this burger ended up being well worth it. The juicy center I discovered was fantastic, the amount of flavor you get there is well worth the price of the burger. The onion roll, the taste of the meat and the seasoning all came together in this, the juciest part of the burger.
The pickles are amazingly spiced with horseradish. The next time I went to this bar, I wasn't that hungry and just ordered a basket of pickles to snack on. They are best when they get to the bottom of the barrel, and you can tell because of how much spicier they are, than usual. The chips are plain and simple: lightly salted and don't overwhelm you, making the focus of your meal the burger. As it should be.
It wasn't too long of a wait for my food and apparently the place clears out at around 9:30 or so on the week days but is generally still open until about 4am. The owner is here almost every night and the barstaff are really friendly. And a really diverse crowd hangs out here (I met a brewer from Sixpoint the 2nd night I went here).
Don't forget to ask for a card to begin logging and rating what beers you've had. When you get to 100, you get a shirt. When you get to 420, you get a sweatshirt.
