Regarding the substance of the burger itself, the same accoutrements that might show a slim, lacey-edged smash patty in its best light—a little slick of mustard, a few circles of raw onion, and a melty cap of American cheese, say—might be too flimsy against the brawny heft of a half-pound bar burger that can sustain degrees of sweetness, richness, and piquancy (your barbecue sauces, your secondary meats, your nontraditional cheeses) that would suffocate a smaller patty. But what you’re really asking, I think, is what makes a burger great not as it’s being eaten but as it lives on in memory. Or, more to the point, how can we know that our memories of happiness are true? I spend an inordinate portion of my professional life creeping around in my own psyche, untangling knots of nostalgia and pleasure and, god, so many emotions, not least self-love and self-loathing, all of them unavoidable colorants of any bite I take. I give myself the task of locating some sort of unassailable, uncontaminated truth: that this dish of dumplings, or that cocktail, or such-and-such restaurant is actually, inarguably, wonderful. It’s impossible, of course, and more than a little absurd, but it’s so irresistible, isn’t it, to attempt to discharge the burden of our own experience?