Is This The Twin Cities' Best Burger?

The Daily Meal recently published our 101 Best Burgers in America for 2014, and in order to compile our ranking, we assembled a list of nearly 200 burgers from all across the country, from Spruce Pine, North Carolina to Hillsboro, Oregon. We then divided these burgers by region, and compiled a survey that was taken by a panel of 50 noted food writers, journalists, bloggers, and culinary authorities from across the country, asking them to vote for their favorites; limited, of course, to the ones that they'd tried. We tallied the results, and published the 101 stellar American burgers with the most votes. 

Hamlet and Claudius. The New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox. Matt's Bar and the 5-8 Club. 

Okay, so it may not be the most epic of rivalries, but there is a long-standing one between Matt's Bar and the 5-8 Club in Minneapolis over who invented the Jucy Lucy. While the battle rages on, it seemed clear to us that Matt's Bar serves the superior specimen. Legend has it that shortly after the restaurant opened in 1954, a hungry customer came in and asked for two burger patties with a slice of cheese in the middle. He took a bite, proclaimed it to be "one juicy Lucy!" and a legend was born. Only fresh-ground beef goes into each hand-formed burger, and the first bite yields a river of molten, gooey cheese.

These burgers are much more difficult to make than it may appear, and while the one at the 5-8 Club did make it into our compilation at #94, the one at Matt's Bar is absolute perfection and therefore was ranked far above its competitor at #14. 

Kate Kolenda is the Restaurant/City Guide Editor at The Daily Meal. Follow her on Twitter @BeefWerky and @theconversant.