Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
it's closed Sundays, and the doors close at
7pm—the end of the working day for Man-
hattan's office-bound masses.
(16 miles/27km); LaGuardia (8 miles/
13km).
L
$$$
Carlton Hotel on Madison
Avenue,
88 Madison Ave. (
&
212/532-
4100;
www.carltonhotelny.com). $$
Washington Square Hotel,
103 Waverly
Place (
&
800/222-0418
or 212/777-9515;
www.washingtonsquarehotel.com).
5 E. 51st St. (
&
212/759-4729;
www.
primeburger.com).
(
John F. Kennedy International (15
miles/24km); Newark Liberty International
Diners & Drive-Ins
253
White Manna
There's No Place Like Chrome
Hackensack, New Jersey
Even seasoned New Jerseyites sometimes
confuse the White Manna in Hackensack
with the White Mana diner in Jersey City.
For burger hounds, however, that would
be sacrilege—there's no comparison
between the two, they exclaim.
It's true, these two vintage Art Deco
chrome-trimmed gems were opened by
the same owner, Louis Bridges. The octag-
onal Jersey City diner actually came first,
built around 1938 and displayed as a
“diner of the future” at the 1939 New York
World's Fair. The Hackensack version was
purchased soon after, as Bridges sought
to capitalize on the World's Fair fame with
a chain of these streamlined eateries
around northern New Jersey. The White
Manna (the original name—the other din-
er's sign was a later typo) was eventually
moved here to the corner of River and Pas-
saic streets in Hackensack in 1946.
But these days it's the two-N Manna
that rules supreme with its juicy, onion-
rich sliders—originally modeled after
White Castle's, but a far superior version.
Sitting at its narrow U-shaped counter (the
only place you
can
sit in this pocket-sized
diner), you can watch the grill cooks at
work, slinging lumps of ground beef onto
the sizzling griddle, topping them with a
fistful of shaved onions, then smashing
them flat with a spatula and flipping them,
onions and all. Scooped onto a soft potato
roll and wrapped in wax paper to go,
they're misshapen, moist, and flavorful to
the max. And
messy
.
The blazing red-and-white neon sign on
top nearly overpowers this dinky little
dive, a rounded-off cube with glass-brick
corners and white steel walls, which seats
barely more than a dozen customers at
once. The menu is limited—burgers,
sodas, a few breakfast items (it's certainly
an atmospheric place for that morning cup
o' joe)—but at lunch- and dinnertimes,
there's often a wait before you can grab a
seat on one of those counter stools. That
9:30pm closing time is a shame; those
mouthwatering little burgers would taste
divine at 2am after a night on the town.
358 River St. (
&
201/342-0914
).
(
Newark International (22 miles/35km).
L
$$
Best Western Oritani Hotel,
414 Hackensack Ave. (
&
201/488-8900;
www.bestwesternnewjersey.com).
