(Photo: Danny Kim/New York Magazine)

• St. Anselm

  355 Metropolitan Ave., nr. Havemeyer St., Williamsburg; 718-384-5054

  Use the words “best” and “steak” and “Brooklyn” in the same sentence but fail to conclude your thesis with the name Peter Luger and even the palest vegan in the audience will wonder whether you might be better off in a home of some sort. But eight blocks north of Luger’s, at St. Anselm, we have a contender. They call it a butcher’s steak (you know it as hanger) because there’s only one per cow, and back in the day, butchers—greedy bastards to a man—would save it for themselves. Here, it’s the most popular item on the menu—a great beefy thing of beauty. It’s simply salted, expertly grilled, sliced across the grain, and loaded with flavor. A drizzle of garlic-steeped melted butter doesn’t hurt a bit. The coup de grâce, though, is the $15 head-scratcher price tag. Both Peter Luger and low-budget beefery Tad’s in midtown: Consider yourselves put on notice.

  See Also
  The Underground Gourmet on St. Anselm

From the 2012 Best of New York issue of New York Magazine