It took me a while to warm up to DBGB’s room: It can feel a bit cavernous and cold. But once you start in on chef Daniel Boulud’s reengineered burgers and sausages and assorted versions of bistro/American greatest hits—and get absorbed in all the celebrity-chef-donated copper cookware lining the walls—suddenly all is warm and luscious and A-ok in this world. (If $40-$50 a head buys a legal, relatively safe pleasure injection for a couple of hours, I’m in.) Favorites here: the Piggy burger (beef topped with Daisy May’s pulled pork and slathered in jalapeno mayo) and the Vermont dog (a smoked-pork and cheddar sausage with red-onion crème fraiche and hash browns). The fries rock too; sit at the bar and have them with one of the gazillion international beers on tap, and you’re in excellent shape. Brunch here is a nice surprise, departing as it does from most NYC-brunch clichés without the punishing waits of nearby tiny brunch-champ (and all-around champ) Prune.
DBGB Kitchen & Bar. 299 Bowery between Houston and First St.; 212-933-5300.
Prices/Features: MOD, DRK, GRP (See Welcome to Salmaland for key to letter abbreviations.)