Bareburger

Bareburger began as burgers cooked in the cramped kitchen of Sputnik, a music venue in Brooklyn. Euripides Pelekanos and his partners, his brother among them, moved into a run-down former bakery in Astoria, Queens, in 2009 and opened a forty-seat restaurant. Within a month the dining room was packed, the place paid for itself in ten months, and they started franchising almost immediately.

The pitch was organic and unusual meat at a time when that was rare in Queens: grass-fed beef, bison, elk, and plenty for people who do not eat meat at all. The menu is long, a little eccentric and full of pun names, and the fun of it is trying something you would not find at a regular burger bar.

Restaurants mostly in New York City and the surrounding states.

• Jackson Hole Burgers (United States, since 1972). A family-run New York burger saloon since 1972, where Jennifer Aniston once waited tables. Also built on beef, bacon, mushrooms and crispy onions.
• Carl's Jr. (United States, since 1941). Charbroiled burgers, onion rings inside the bun, and ads nobody forgot. Also built on beef, bacon, crispy onions and a special sauce.
• Hopdoddy Burger Bar (United States, since 2010). Austin’s burger bar, where the menu runs from bison with fig jam to a rare tuna burger. Also built on beef, bacon, crispy onions and cooked onions.
• Ruby's Diner (United States, since 1982). A 1940s-style Southern California diner that started in a bait shack at the end of the Balboa Pier. Also built on beef, bacon, crispy onions and a special sauce.