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Peter Luger Steakhouse


cjsadler

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i've read reports that the only steak to order is the steak for 2, but i assume they have a steak for 3 as well. would it be a mistake to order the steak for 3 (and a burger), or just stick with the steak for 2 under the assumption that it's always a better choice (for cooking reasons or whatever).

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Living in Great Neck, even in a stingy-ish highly-non-foodie family, I've been to the local Peter Lugers quite a few (5?) times, and I've always found the service to be very good.  Is it possible that the Great Neck location should be considered the preferred one, even if it's not the original?

The Great Neck location serves pretty much identical food at the same quality level as the Brooklyn location.

(BTW, That's where I grew up as well.)

Steven -- the tomatoes didn't ALWAYS suck, at least the ones on Long Island didn't. It could be that they use local product there, when they are in season.

Jason Perlow, Co-Founder eGullet Society for Culinary Arts & Letters

Foodies who Review South Florida (Facebook) | offthebroiler.com - Food Blog (archived) | View my food photos on Instagram

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Living in Great Neck, even in a stingy-ish highly-non-foodie family, I've been to the local Peter Lugers quite a few (5?) times, and I've always found the service to be very good.  Is it possible that the Great Neck location should be considered the preferred one, even if it's not the original?

The Great Neck location serves pretty much identical food at the same quality level as the Brooklyn location.

(BTW, That's where I grew up as well.)

Steven -- the tomatoes didn't ALWAYS suck, at least the ones on Long Island didn't. It could be that they use local product there, when they are in season.

Has anyone been to both locations enough times to see if the service in Great Neck is consistently better than that in Brooklyn?

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i've read reports that the only steak to order is the steak for 2, but i assume they have a steak for 3 as well. would it be a mistake to order the steak for 3 (and a burger), or just stick with the steak for 2 under the assumption that it's always a better choice (for cooking reasons or whatever).

Steak for 3 is a risky proposition because you don't know what you're going to get. You could get lucky and get a really massive, thick porterhouse -- in which case the steak for 3 is going to be better than the steak for 2. But you could also get unlucky and get two smaller porterhouses -- and that's bad because they cook quicker and don't develop flavor as well as the big cuts. Steak for 2 is the most reliable order.

Note that the burgers are rather small by the standards of steakhouse burgers. A burger barely counts as an addition to the meal.

During lunchtime there are some noteworthy daily specials as well, especially the corned beef. I think it's corned beef and cabbage on Thursdays and corned beef hash on Fridays. Skip the prime rib, which is surprisingly poor.

The last time I checked the wine list there was, I believe, one zinfandel. Pretty sure it was Fife -- nothing to write home about. There were only about 25 red wine choices -- it's just a single small page. Red wines are served lukewarm in chunky goblets. The bartenders make decent drinks and the beer is cold -- that's the way to go.

Steven A. Shaw aka "Fat Guy"
Co-founder, Society for Culinary Arts & Letters, sshaw@egstaff.org
Proud signatory to the eG Ethics code
Director, New Media Studies, International Culinary Center (take my food-blogging course)

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Steak for 3 is a risky proposition because you don't know what you're going to get.

My understanding is that steak for 3 is a steak for 2 with pieces from another steak added in--the steak comes cut into pieces, so you wouldn't necessarily know by the presentation. Someone correct me if this isn't the case, but I think it is. In any case, always order in even numbers and take the extra home if necessary.

On my last visit, my party followed a recommendation from Mr. Cutlets and got a couple of strips of bacon (just to get the taste :smile: ) and then got lamb chops for the table appetizer followed by steak. If one wants to really indulge, I think this is the way to go.

:smile:

Jamie

P.S. We ended with schlag. Oh my aching arteries :laugh:

See! Antony, that revels long o' nights,

Is notwithstanding up.

Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene ii

biowebsite

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My understanding is that steak for 3 is a steak for 2 with pieces from another steak added in--the steak comes cut into pieces, so you wouldn't necessarily know by the presentation. Someone correct me if this isn't the case, but I think it is. In any case, always order in even numbers and take the extra home if necessary.

:shock: so should i order steak for 4 and a burger? sounds like steak for 2 and a burger won't be a whole lot, and steak for 3 might consist of scraps.

this is more difficult than i ever imagined. i hope parking is easier.

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so should i order steak for 4 and a burger?

I think steak for 2 is plenty for three people, especially if you are getting bacon, burgers, or whatever else.

:smile:

Jamie

See! Antony, that revels long o' nights,

Is notwithstanding up.

Julius Caesar, Act II, Scene ii

biowebsite

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Tommy, chances are good you'll see a porterhouse for 2 waft by you before you order and you can gauge your appetites from there. My party split lamb chops, bacon, spinach and spuds... and we took some steak home.

Also, my daughter ordered the burger, and while in its own right it is good, when you are eating porterhouse, the burger...is just a burger... It's probably more enjoyable to eat the burger when not eating the steak. But if you are only in Mecca once...

The onion rolls are excellent and worth eating unless someone is on carb control. For dessert, key lime pie is the real deal. I think the schlag is cool whipish and doesn't live up to its hype.

Go hungry.

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I don't believe the steak-plus-scraps theory of steak-for-three is correct. The steaks at Peter Luger are carved in the kitchen, but they're reassembled into the shape of the original steak. It wouldn't really be possible to reassemble one convincingly with extra pieces inserted. The times I've had steak for three it has been either a larger porterhouse or two smaller ones -- whatever they had to do to make the weight. Steak for four is just steak for two times two.

It's hard to tell somebody else how much to order. For three normal people, steak for two plus bacon, bread, beer, sides, a shared hamburger, and dessert, is more than enough food. For the average eGulleter, though, such an order might set off alarms and induce panic at the earlier stages of the meal -- even though in the end there's little chance you'd be hungry. It also depends on how efficiently you utilize a porterhouse. Some people will only eat the premium pieces with very little fat on them, which will easily leave a half-dozen porterhouse chunks plus a meat-laden bone over. Steak for two, in that instance, is enough for two people. But if you're partial to every part of the steak and you have the patience to eat all the scraps off the bone, steak for two can easily feed a whole additional person.

Steven A. Shaw aka "Fat Guy"
Co-founder, Society for Culinary Arts & Letters, sshaw@egstaff.org
Proud signatory to the eG Ethics code
Director, New Media Studies, International Culinary Center (take my food-blogging course)

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For three normal people, steak for two plus bacon, bread, beer, sides, a shared hamburger, and dessert, is more than enough food.

i'm convinced. there's little doubt i'll leave hungry, especially if i have beer.

and ain't no one sharing my burger. :biggrin:

thanks everyone.

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Steak for 3 is a risky proposition because you don't know what you're going to get. You could get lucky and get a really massive, thick porterhouse -- in which case the steak for 3 is going to be better than the steak for 2. But you could also get unlucky and get two smaller porterhouses -- and that's bad because they cook quicker and don't develop flavor as well as the big cuts.

Have you ever really gotten a three that was thicker -- as opposed to broader -- than a two? That would be an improvement, perhaps worth the risk. I thought they were cut to uniform thickness to simplify cooking.

"To Serve Man"

-- Favorite Twilight Zone cookbook

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I think I've had a steak for three that was thicker, but you can't trust that sort of impression without actually measuring. I've only ever taken actual measurements of one Peter Luger steak so I can't say for sure if the thickness is uniform, but I think it isn't -- even the steak I measured wasn't uniform across the steak (it was thicker at the T junction than at the end of the long bone). Logically, if you're going to butcher an irregularly shaped short loin to get porterhouses out of it that conform to specific target weight ranges of +/- just an ounce or two, you have to do it by hand (with a bandsaw, but positioned by hand) and you have to control the thickness variable to make up for variations in the other dimensions.

Steven A. Shaw aka "Fat Guy"
Co-founder, Society for Culinary Arts & Letters, sshaw@egstaff.org
Proud signatory to the eG Ethics code
Director, New Media Studies, International Culinary Center (take my food-blogging course)

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My wife and I are going to Luger's next Tuesday on our short trip to NYC. After plowing through this thread I'm not sure which meal I am looking more forward to. A repeat of our favorite meal last year at Babbo, our long-awaited trip to Per Se or steak and bacon at Luger's.

It is going to be lunch on our last day and we pretty much need to leave to drive back to DC ASAP after the meal. Is it reasonable to get the car out of hock at the hotel garage and drive to Luger's and then out of the city or is it wiser to subway there and back and get the car out of the garage after the meal? We are going at 11:45 am and are staying at the Barclay Intercontinental at 48th and Park Ave.

Edited by bilrus (log)

Bill Russell

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My wife and I are going to Luger's next Tuesday on our short trip to NYC. After plowing through this thread I'm not sure which meal I am looking more forward to. A repeat of our favorite meal last year at Babbo, our long-awaited trip to Per Se or steak and bacon at Luger's.

It is going to be lunch on our last day and we pretty much need to leave to drive back to DC ASAP after the meal. Is it reasonable to get the car out of hock at the hotel garage and drive to Luger's and then out of the city or is it wiser to subway there and back and get the car out of the garage after the meal? We are going at 11:45 am and are staying at the Barclay Intercontinental at 48th and Park Ave.

Drive to Luger's. The subways have been spotty on weekends lately due to service and maintenance.

"If it's me and your granny on bongos, then it's a Fall gig'' -- Mark E. Smith

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FG: Varying thickness to achieve target weight would make sense if steaks from the wider and narrower portions of the short loin -- and, perhaps more significantly, from larger and smaller loins -- were to be used interchangeably. I could just as easily see Luger's allocating the broadest porterhouses to threes, the mid-sized ones to twos, and the very smallest, in pairs, again to threes -- anything to remove judgment from the cooking process. According to their web site, raw steaks for two (threes are not sold) vary in weight from 36 to 38 ounces, a 5.5% variation; since no one but Suzanne carries a ruler and scale to restaurants, more variation is probably tolerable at table than mail-order. Thickness differentiation may be thus unnecessary within each "steak-for" category, and possibly also across categories.

Which pretty much leaves us back where we started.

Is the visit-to-visit variability in Luger's quality greater than at other steakhouses, or are we just more critical of it? Could the position of a given steak on the loin be a minor contributor to this variability?

"To Serve Man"

-- Favorite Twilight Zone cookbook

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bilrus brings up parking, which is something i was hoping to hear some comments on.

There's lots and lots of parking around the restaurant. You don't need to use their valet system (whatever that is). The neighborhood isn't the scary wasteland it once was.

"If it's me and your granny on bongos, then it's a Fall gig'' -- Mark E. Smith

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bilrus brings up parking, which is something i was hoping to hear some comments on.

There's lots and lots of parking around the restaurant. You don't need to use their valet system (whatever that is). The neighborhood isn't the scary wasteland it once was.

is there a valet in front of the restaurant? if so, i'll do that as it's nice and easy.

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bilrus brings up parking, which is something i was hoping to hear some comments on.

There's lots and lots of parking around the restaurant. You don't need to use their valet system (whatever that is). The neighborhood isn't the scary wasteland it once was.

is there a valet in front of the restaurant? if so, i'll do that as it's nice and easy.

I'm with you on that, Tommy.

Bill Russell

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Diagonally across from Luger's is a church with a valet that offers parking for Luger's. We couldn't find available, legal, on-street parking, so it was our only option, and it worked fine.

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If you're heading back to DC it might be wise to try heading out through Brookly to the Verazzano Narrows bridge and across Staten Island to get back to the NJ Turnpike, rather than driving back into Manhattan. I imagine it depends very much on what time of the day you're leaving - perhaps someone whose driven this route more than I have can confirm or suggest an alternate method. I do know that getting from Brooklyn across Manhattan and over to NJ by car after 2 or 3 PM on a weekday can be a nightmare.

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Diagonally across from Luger's is a church with a valet that offers parking for Luger's.

it sounds like you're describing a regular parking lot that caters to Luger diners, rather than a Luger valet service. while i don't mind tipping a valet, i'd consider not paying 20 for parking if a free option is a stone's throw away.

Edited by tommy (log)
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Peter Luger maintains its own protected lot a few steps from the restaurant. Parking is free, though you are expected to tip the attendant. Just drive into the Peter Luger lot and you're all set. There also tends to be on-street free parking available at most times.

Driving to the NJ Turnpike via Staten Island is in my opinion the best way to go -- far prefereable to retracing one's steps all the way back to Midtown and also better than crossing via lower Manhattan. Of course you could run into a traffic disaster on any of these routes, but the odds are more favorable with the non-Manhattan strategies.

Steven A. Shaw aka "Fat Guy"
Co-founder, Society for Culinary Arts & Letters, sshaw@egstaff.org
Proud signatory to the eG Ethics code
Director, New Media Studies, International Culinary Center (take my food-blogging course)

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I could just as easily see Luger's allocating the broadest porterhouses to threes, the mid-sized ones to twos, and the very smallest, in pairs, again to threes -- anything to remove judgment from the cooking process.

It's not easy for me to see the universe of short loin cuts falling into the exact same ratio of twos to threes as the customers' orders. Allowing zero variation in thickness would be such a blow to inventory control that it's difficult to imagine it as policy. I also think you may be overestimating the need to remove judgment from the cooking process. Then again, there's only so much we can learn by speculation -- I'm sure someone could just ask whether the steaks are cut on a template or by hand.

Steven A. Shaw aka "Fat Guy"
Co-founder, Society for Culinary Arts & Letters, sshaw@egstaff.org
Proud signatory to the eG Ethics code
Director, New Media Studies, International Culinary Center (take my food-blogging course)

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