The Spaniard

We finally went to The Spaniard at 12:30 p.m. instead of 12:30 a.m. That turned out to be a good decision.

The Spaniard is known as a West Village bar, not a burger destination. The menu calls the burger a Double-Double, with American cheese, lettuce, pickles, homemade burger sauce, and a sesame bun.

Every part did its job. The meat stayed juicy, the crust delivered, the bun held, and the toppings remained in balance. The sauce complemented the beef without turning the burger into a sauce delivery system. Nothing took over, and nothing felt missing.

Smashburgers can become extremely uniform. Thin patties, American cheese, pickles, sauce, soft bun. Once enough restaurants use the same general blueprint, the differences start to feel marginal. The Spaniard stood out because the execution was complete.

It was surprisingly good for a bar we had previously associated more with going out than eating lunch. That is probably why the burger remains under-discussed. Most people are not walking into The Spaniard in broad daylight looking for one of the city's better smashburgers. They should be.

Get the onion rings too. The burger is the hidden gem, and the onion rings are the required supporting order. The Smash Burger runs across lunch, dinner, weekend brunch, and late night, so the daytime version is easy to plan around.

The Spaniard separates itself by executing a familiar smashburger formula with unusually few weak points. The beef remains juicy beneath a strong crust, while the bun, toppings, and sauce stay in proportion.

In a category where many burgers share the same blueprint, The Spaniard earns its position by delivering a more complete version of it.