When was the last time you had a patty melt? It was probably too long ago. Even if it was, like, last week. Why are you not eating more patty melts? There’s nothing stopping you, you know. You could have one right now if you really wanted. You could get in your car or call for an Uber or get on the bus and go to a diner and order a patty melt. It would be so easy. Do it. Go.
I’m not joking. Go to a diner and get a patty melt. Now.
Patty melts are an almost perfect food. They’re salty and savory and sweet and buttery. They’re a little greasy. The flavors stick to your fingers a bit, still lingering even an hour and three WetNaps later. Patty melts contain all of the major food groups (bread, onions, cheeseburger). They are constructed so perfectly that they don’t require a single condiment. A standard cheeseburger can’t say that. A cheeseburger almost always requires… something. Mustard, ketchup, barbecue sauce. Something flavorful and saucy. Otherwise it just… is.
And I say that as someone who loves cheeseburgers. I’m not doing this to knock them. But a patty melt is like a galaxy brain cheeseburger.
Look at our ingredients. Hamburger, Swiss cheese, caramelized onions, buttered and grilled rye toast. Not a single ingredient too many or too few. No wasted motion. No need to fancy it up with aolis or zeitgeist-y produce. Just a hyper-targeted flavor bomb awaiting impact. It’s insane that they aren’t on more menus. It’s insane they aren’t on every menu. Someday soon some enterprising young chef will realize this and open a food truck called “Just Patty Melts” and the menu will read:
Patty melt: $7
Patty melt platter (with fries and a soda): $10
Funnel cake: $4
(Because funnel cakes rule, too, and should be offered as a dessert at more restaurants. But that’s another conversation.)
I think it might be the bread that puts a patty melt over the top. A regular hamburger bun doesn’t bring much to the equation. Most are just some variation of soft white bread (with some seeds sprinkled on top, maybe), which lacks the structural integrity and flavor you’d like to carry a thick beef patty. Potato rolls are an improvement, flavorwise, but they’re often too squishy, too, and end up a soggy mess once the condiments and burger juice soak into them. And a harder roll — crusty, thick and chewy, or both — is just too much. I mean, unless you’re training for a boxing match and need to toughen up your jaw. Then, maybe. Although the carbs could be an issue. You have to make weight, buddy.
But grilled rye toast? Yeah, that’ll do just fine. Crispy on the outside to give it foundation, soft enough in the middle that it doesn’t take 30 seconds of chomping to taste the burger, salt and butter springing off of it and careening around your taste buds. It’s such a great flavor-delivery system. You can improve a ton of sandwiches with grilled rye toast. Have a breakfast sandwich on it sometime, instead of an English muffin. Tomorrow, preferably. After you go to the diner and eat a patty melt.
I suppose I should stop here and explain what I mean by “diner.” The word has been thrown around a little too loosely lately and you can really only get a good patty melt at a diner, so let’s clarify things. Let’s get specific.
A diner must have a huge menu, first of all. Like, distressingly huge. At least 10 pages, with everything from seafood platters to lasagna to waffles, with four or more nightly specials handwritten on cards and inserted into laminated sleeves between pages (bonus points for misspellings, like “Rueben” instead of “Reuben”), all offered every single second the kitchen is open. It must have waitresses that call all the customers “honey” or are openly disdainful of their presence, with no middle ground. It should, preferably, have one cook who seems to be there all day and who cooks everything on the same flat top grill and who is intimidating enough through appearance and/or rumor that you would never dare say something like “I don’t think this is a true patty melt because a true patty melt has caramelized onions and those take over 30 minutes to prepare, whereas these appear to have been merely softened in butter for 10 minutes at most” in his presence for fear of bodily harm. That is what I mean by diner.
Go find a place like that. If you don’t know where the nearest one is, follow the glow and low hum of neon pulsing off of the sign it should also have. If that doesn’t work, ask anyone you see on the sidewalk who looks like they haven’t shaved in over 36 hours. They’ll know. Just head in the direction they point toward while grunting. And when you get there, sit down, flip to about page six of the menu (under “Hot Sandwiches” instead of “Burgers,” for some reason that you should probably not inquire about), and point to the patty melt. It’ll be the best decision you make all day.
Oh, and be sure to tip the waitress well. That lady has seen things.
