TONIGHT, WE DINE! AT THE SHACK!

...or at least, we try

I love food but I'm a latecomer to the insider/outsider New York eating itinerary. There are plenty of places I need to get under my belt in the name of a culinary education (some more difficult to notch than others). Since late February when Eater posted a "Shake Shack Watch..." complete with a Shake Shack Countdown clock I've been both reading and hearing the hype about this Danny Meyer creation. Frank Bruni weighed in yesterday about it on his new blog, Diner's Journal. I'm becoming an expert about the hype without having tasted a single fry.

Yeah, I now know, it's been around since the summer of 2004 and "anyone who loves hamburgers in New York has been to Shake Shack." Well, I still haven't been there. I did try last Thursday night. Though there was a large group of shuffling people by the pick-up windows, there was only a line of 5 people at the order window. At 7:08 P.M. this seemed to confirm my impression that this buzz was just a lot of hype...

Ha! It was 8 crucial minutes past their since-lengthened hours. A girl in a blue shirt at the end of the short line had the unenviable task of disappointing dedicated Mad-Shackers and newcomers.

Don't believe the hype? Surf. Comments range from shout-outs, to hating, bemoaning lemming-like behavior of New Yorker's, to defenses of Shack-shout-outs. I'm not convinced that comments like this and this rumor (http://eater.curbed.com/archives/2006/03/kalina_investig.php) weren't thrown out into the Interwebs by people tired of the long lines.

I'd ask if a hamburger place could really be this good but I've been craving an IN-N-OUT burger since my last one in Vegas, November 2005, (when I foolishly passed up a second burger in two days at the same branch thinking I'd see another on the horizon at some point during a cross-country road-trip from L.A. to N.Y.) not that anyone would really remember their last great fast-food burger or count down til their next one or anything...