nyc part one: pizza, bagels and shake shack

Welcome to Day 1 of my weeklong NYC trip recap, filled with the food and shopping highlights of our trip.

I will confess that it has been slightly overwhelming going through all of the photos from our week in New York, an embarrassing number of which are of food and teapots.

And how to share the best ones with you? Thematically? By day? By quirky similarity? Well I'm punting that decision back one more day, and today sharing the best dive food of our trip... slices, donuts, bagels and the infamous Shake Shack burger.

But fear not! There is plenty of snooty, pretentious food to come. (And plenty of teapots... and other great housewares finds.) I'm sure I gained about a pound a day on the trip (thanks for welcoming me back, spinning class!), so you know we didn't pull any punches when ordering.

Starting with the slices...

Everyone knows NYC has the world's very best pizza. (No use arguing, friends in Italia... it's just different.) Even the stuff that the locals turn up their nose at is still better than 99% of what you can get in LA, or most places in America. We made two quick pizza stops during our trip, one at some random place around the Flatiron District, and one up the street from our hotel, at what is purportedly "the best pizza place in Midtown" (evidently Midtown is not known for great pizza, though this country bumpkin proved easy to please).

I'm a regular slice kind of girl (what the rest of the country would call a "piece of cheese pizza"), but Mark likes the fancier versions

I'm convinced that great pizza is like that fantastic dress that looks like nothing on the hanger, but then you put it on and... wow! A picture of a slice of pizza just never looks that awesome, and sometimes even looks a little gross. But believe it... these slices were delicioso.

"Midtown's best"

I'm not a huge bagel person normally, but of course no trip to NYC is complete without one.

Check out that amazing crackled surface, covering the chewy interior

Diner breakfast, from the diner at 39th and Lex, featuring the world's most egregious $1 pile of bacon

In theory there were supposed to be pictures of donuts, since we ate at Dunkin' Donuts twice while we were there. (I know, I know... Dunkin' is not a big deal. But we don't have them out here, and so I get overly excited when I see one. And there was one a block and a half from our hotel. I couldn't help it.)

Apparently Mark couldn't help it either, because this is all that was left by the time I could get out my camera

And, at last, the dive food that no one would really call dive food. Dive food is not something you wait upwards of an hour for, and yet, that's just what we did to get our hands on the oft-raved-about Shake Shack burger.

The Shake Shack in Madison Square Park, with lines wrapping around and around the park

A mere 50 minutes after getting in line, we finally got to order... and then wait some more

A close-up of the burger, with fresh lettuce, quality bun and legit cheese

The accoutrements: crispy crinkle fries and custard-based chocolate shake

So after all of that, the verdict? Well, friends, my verdict is: Meh. It was fine, not amazing, and certainly, CERTAINLY not worth the wait. The burger itself begged a comparison to In-N-Out, and frankly In-N-Out is tons better. Of course, if you don't have In-N-Out in your area, then Shake Shack likely makes a tastier burger than any of your local fast food joints. Only problem is that Shake Shack ain't fast. Not even a little bit.

His thumb says "good," but his eyes say "meh"

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xoxo,