Where to begin?

It seems now that it was a year ago we visited the hallowed confines of the Five Guys Burgers and Fries. As the experience has percolated in my mind, I didn't see it, as my esteemed colleague did, as a singular shining experience. Rather, I viewed it as one more excellent visit to this delectable low-cost emporioum of delights, and I instead saw it as part of the larger gestalt of delicious chow-hound living here in the nation's capitol.

Perhaps the Five Guys live at the top of this slideshow of culinary madness, but my co-writer surely should be taken to task for failing to mention his own hometown trusty-and-reliable, the Philly Cheesesteak. While the Five Guys family of burger joints grows here with mercenary efficiency, the city of Philadelphia and its environs is quite literally overun with mostly-delicious and often alarmingly spartan cheesesteak vendors.

The home Sean and my sister occupy is eleven paces from the nearest cheesesteakery, and while many such places are simply ordinary (which is mostly good), this particular outpost of cheesesteak is in the still-plentiful 'quite good' category.

So the burgers at Five Guys are superlative, surely, and as Sean notes they represent a perfect balance of tiny starch sleeve and almost commingled meat and topping innards.

Now, imagine my surprise when I find, as I gaze upon the face of my friend, while he rises a level from his seat and ascends to this higher plane of burger-awareness, that this pleasure had never before been availed of him. I alone was responsible. I had never brought him to a Five Guys.

I was derelict in my duties as ambassador of local gastronomical delicacies. I had brought Sean from the land of the Dunkin Donuts (still a noble breed) and bade him to watch the steaming semi-plasmic hot Krispy Kreme Original Glazes Doughnuts roll off the belt and into his open mouth. I squired him into the fine dining arena of Georgia Brown's amazing food and unbelievable southern service zenith. And yet I failed him when it mattered most: The Five Guys.

To make amends, I can't offer much. I am but a humble man, with a family to feed (things far less greasy than burgers), but I present him with this gift, one I hope he will use but not abuse.

There is a Five Guys location on Wilmington Pike in Glen Mills, Pennsylvania, approximately 25 miles from your house.

My work here is done.