The District Eats: Louis Lunch

For an extremely special meal, we packed the car and drove way out to Connecticut this weekend. Home of the absolutely stunning Yale University, New Haven, CT is also birthplace of the US hamburger, or so the owners of Louis’ Lunch claim.

Using 100 year old stand-up grills, this tiny (and do we mean tiny) eatery on Crown Street serves nothing but Hamburgers, bags of chips, two or three homemade pies, and a selection of drinks ranging from Orange soda to Birch Beer. Each burger is made to order, on the medium rare side, served between two slices of toasted bread. Feel free to ask for onions and cheese, but ketchup is not tolerated at Louis’.

After we found a spot to crash in the corner of a wooden booth, we ordered our burgers and waited an easy twenty minutes for the grill to serve them up. In the meantime we munched on homemade apple pie and downed orange sodas while listening to the story of Louis’ Lunch Wagon, circa 1907-1916. When our burgers arrived, they were hot, extremely juicy, and very tasty without ketchup, thankyouverymuch.

Whether our burgers were cooked in the same grill as the first US hamburger, I can’t validate, but, the trip up I-95 was worth it, to squash into the worlds tiniest eatery and watch our burgers get cooked from start to finish, on the diminutive wooden counter.

Tips:

Bring cash- cards are not accepted here.

Don’t ask what they have. They have burgers. That’s all.

Don’t bring your own ketchup. It’s rude.

Louis’ Lunch. 261-263 Crown Street, New Haven, CT

More:
Louis’ Lunch Website
New Haven Yelp Eateries
Old Hamburger Wikipedia Entry
Louis’ Lunch Trip Advisor Profile