4 CT Restaurants Are Among America's Best For Eating-On-The-Cheap

Forget the rain (if it even comes)! Connecticut has four casual restaurants where you can go – right now! – to take the kids and get cheap food, and you don't even have to dress up.

Or maybe you can take a date, because you don't have to worry about making a reservation. And you don't have to pay too much to enjoy yourself.

And you probably don't even have to change out of your bathing suit.

These places are so good that the popular food-and-drink website, The Daily Meal, named them among the 101 best casual restaurants in America. Connecticut landed two eateries in the top 10 and just missed the No. 1 ranking.

The Daily Meal says that, since its 2011 founding, its set out to compile a comprehensive ranking of the 101 Best Restaurants in America. "However, we’ve been hit with a dilemma: Does a restaurant like, say, the venerable Frank Pepe Pizzeria in New Haven, Connecticut, as stellar as it is for what it does, really belong in the same ranking as a place like Manhattan's Eleven Madison Park, with its three Michelin stars?"

"That’s why four years ago we decided to separate out the casual from the fancy with an initial ranking of 50 casual restaurants, expanded to 101 in 2015," the website says. "From hot dog shacks to taco joints, from neighborhood hangouts to legendary barbecue spots, these are amazing restaurants where price is no barrier to entry and you'll feel right at home in jeans.

The Daily Meal's criteria:

• "Can two people fill themselves up and get out for less than $50, excluding tip and alcohol?"
• Is there "an overall comfortable and relaxed ambiance"
• Does it have "a 'destination' status (that is, is the place worth traveling for?), and a proven reputation and longevity?"

The Daily Meal compiled a list of America’s best purveyors of pizza, burgers, hot dogs, tacos, and more, ending up with more than 500 restaurants that the website believes represent a vast cross-section of America and the casual restaurants that make them great.

"From there we assembled a survey, and sent it out to a panel of hundreds of America’s leading culinary authorities. We asked them to vote for their favorites, but only ones that they’d dined at within the past two years."

Here are the four Connecticut restaurants on the list:

#60 Ted's, Meriden, Conn.

Most burger purveyors griddle, grill, or pan-sear their patties, but since 1959, Ted's ... has steamed theirs. Steamed meat? Yep. Steamed Cheddar cheese, too. Cooked in custom-designed steam boxes, the burgers, served on kaiser-like rolls, lose very little bulk while cooking and hence stay very moist. The steamed cheese is spooned over the patties and cloaks them thickly.

#10 Sally’s Apizza, New Haven, Conn.

Sally's Apizza is a New Haven classic, operating from the same location in Wooster Square where Sal Consiglio and his wife Flo opened it in the late 1930s. Today it’s run by their sons, Richard and Robert, and their pizza is a traditional thin crust, topped with tomato sauce, garlic, and "mozz." The folks at Sally's will be the first to tell you that Pepe makes a better clam pie, but as for their tomato pie (tomato sauce, no cheese)… well, Sally’s has the original beat.

#5 Louis Lunch, New Haven, Conn.

Louis’ Lunch is never simple. Is it the birthplace of the hamburger? Supposedly, one day in 1900, a gentleman hurriedly told proprietor Louis Lassen "he was in a rush and wanted something he could eat on the run," resulting in a blend of ground steak trimmings between two slices of toast, with which the gentleman was sent on his way. So what do you get at Louis'? A flame-broiled burger made in a vertical hinged-steel wire gridiron that cooks the burgers on both sides at the same time; a hamburger sandwich supposedly made from a blend of five cuts of ground steak. If you want condiments, you’ll have to ask.

#2 Frank Pepe Pizzeria Napoletana, New Haven, Conn.

If you want to discuss the loaded topic of America's best pizza with any authority, you have to make a pilgrimage to this legendary New Haven pizzeria — whose "clam pie" has taken first place in The Daily Meal's ranking of The 101 Best Pizzas in America nearly every year. What should you order at this checklist destination? Two words: clam pie ("No muzz!"). This is a Northeastern pizza genre unto its own, and Pepe’s is the best of them all. The advanced move? Clam pie with bacon. Just expect to wait in line if you get there after 11:30 a.m. on a weekend.

>>>You can view the entire 101 locations here, including more details on the Connecticut locations.

Written by Tom Davis, Patch Staff

Image courtesy Anthony Kostelis