Town Topic

Of course this place was a mad house on First Friday but, they had a system down and it worked! Tonight they were only serving their special. Food came out fairly quick, it was hot, fresh and just flat out delicious. Diner food can be good folks! Although it was packed, they were turning the tables over pretty quick and we snatched a good window seat. If you’ve been here, you know that’s a steal considering the dining room is extremely small!

This place is bomb af. The burgers are amazing. If you’ve ever eaten at a place called cozy inn in Salina Kansas (the inspiration for White Castle) this place is the full size version of it. They have THE BEST MILKSHAKES EVER!!! The perfect consistency. There chili is incredible. Eat here. Also, it’s the best drunk food.

I went to Town Topic for breakfast, and loved it. It is small and divey, and the staff was wonderful and very attentive. The chili I got with my eggs was out-​of-​this-​world. I was stuffed for the rest of the day.

Very very small place with a large personality! The waitresses was very cool! Even the owner stopped to talk to us. Their burgers are thin with a crusty edge… DELICIOUS! And served with caramelized onions on top! My daughter loved her old fashion root beer float! Next time I’m having a piece of pie first it looked AMAZING but I was too full to have some. It’s a great place to eat but I am still trying to figure out why he has 2 locations within 2 blocks! Whatever the reason it seems to be working!

I got the single cheeseburger and tots… burger was a 4… tots, I give a 2.
The burger was great; skinny patty, with cheese and grilled onions. The tots… they didn’t really seem like tots. I mean, they were shaped like tots, but the color and taste was just totally off. My better half got a triple burger (fatty) and a sausage and egg sammich, which btw, was SOLID. Such a simple breakfast item, yet so delicious.
We got here around 12:15am and it was absolutely packed! Wall to wall with people and no clear indication of where the line started or where it ended. It took us about 35 minutes to get our food. Tip — call your order in ahead of time, it’ll save you a LOT of time. This place is about the size of a closet and seating is EXTREMELY limited. A few bar stools scattered along the wall and counter but you will be cozying up to the drunkies making there way to place an order.
A plus — free waters in large styrofoam cups for all those said drunkies stumbling in during the wee hours of the morning.
Again, stay away from those odd looking «tots»…

Town Topic, the delicious late night drunk tank of KC.
We walked in to a jam-​packed, cozy Town Topic after some drinks over at Green Lady Lounge. I counted two people who were asleep at the counters, one having trouble standing, and one with an incredible, zen-​like focus on their tater tots.
Town Topic is a fun staple of KC, and one that I’d recommend everyone make the trip to at least once a year. Whether you’re cabbing it there after hours, or just want a good, classic diner breakfast, they always deliver the goods. [Side note, they just brought home an award from the health dept. for being so clean and on the ball!]
I had a single cheeseburger and some onion rings this time around, and as always, it was solid.
While Town Topic is a classic option, I can’t rave about it as much as Winstead’s on the Plaza which is by far and away my favorite late night burger stop, or really one of my favorite burger spots anytime.
One more thing — we passed on the milkshake this time around, but they are the real deal. The crew has the old fashioned milkshake machines and makes them by hand.

Decent food but I was underwhelmed. First off, the food is fine. I considered it somewhere along the lines of Winsteads or a generic diner. The good part: the hours. I went to this establishment around 1:30am when everywhere else was closed. It’s a bit sketchy at 1:30 and I doubt I would go with gal pals and I certainly wouldn’t go alone. Groups would be fine or even a protective date. Granted, it was 1:30am, so drunk people are kind of part of the territory. Other downers were the fact that it took a long time. Again. they’re making it and, at the speed of a diner. the thing is, for to go orders (which pretty much everyone was there for), it was a hefty wait time for a plain burger. I suppose this place is just overhyped. Now, if it’s 1−2am and you’re downtown and hungry, you could do a lot worse. This place is a fine stop, but I doubt I’ll return.

You know how those hole-​in-​the-​wall places always have the best food? It’s like that. It’s a KC classic; tiny, greasy, crowded and totally awesome. They ought to sell t-​shirts though… ;-)

A Legend.
KC Peeps know Town Topic. They know it for burgers, fries, breakfasts, malts… it’s the place where I love to take the kids for that Urban Diner experience; something that’s more and more rare in this day and age. The simple pleasure of a plate of Diner food is something beyond compare, and Town Topic is pretty much the epitome of that.
This one on Baltimore is the one I prefer, mostly. It’s not open the same hours as the one on Broadway, but it’s got a better seating arrangement, and is more fun to hit for lunch or breakfast.
It’s great to sit at the window-​counter and enjoy the sites of KC’s Crossroads district the way that people did decades ago, when the area was vital the first time around. Thank goodness there’s been the resurgence in popularity in this part of town, as Town Topic deserves the traffic… and we deserve the deliciousness.

Diner food. This place is what you would expect. The food is greasy and delicious. By no means gourmet, but neither are the prices. Be wary if you are trying to come by on a weekend evening. Many of your drinking brethren will also be on the search for some drunk food.

This review is based solely on the fact that I have been unable to eat at Town Topic the last two times I have attempted to do so. I went once around 2pm and the establishment was ghostly. Doors locked, not a person in sight. The second time was tonight. I visited Town Topic at approximately 11:30pm, and guess what? Doors locked, not a person in sight. The sign on the window states Town Topic is open until 2:30am. Once again, thanks for nothing.

I love this place. You know what your getting when you walk in. I love how the hot dogs are on hamburger buns. I asked for relish, and hey just took some pickles and chopped it up. Awesome!
Onion burger was awesome. Charred in all the right spots. Fries, milk shake, chili. All great. I love being in there. I have a love for places like this so I may be over enthusiastic.

This is one KC hype that I won’t even pretend to understand.
Perhaps I came at the wrong time (9 PM and a sign on the door that said No Breakfast) or perhaps I should have had a few drinks before stepping inside so the food would taste better, but I whatever they put in my bag was more expensive, of smaller portion, and of lower quality than McDonald’s.
The ladies behind the counter were lovely. Perhaps if I were 80 yrs. old and had been living in KC for all those years, this place might be sentimental. My paper-​thin cheeseburger and small handful of fries did not sit well, though.

I didn’t grow up in KC, so this place doesn’t automatically win a place in my heart.
Nothing great about it. The chili tastes like it’s from a can and the hamburgers/​hotdogs are unremarkable.
Not too expensive and that is a plus for me.
Nothing to get excited about. Just some sloppy burgers.
Probably appealing to the young crowd that are out late, but I’m old and asleep when all that’s happening. Color me disinterested.

Most of the Town Topic reviews are about how great it is to go there after a night at the bars, and it is great! Who doesn’t love an onion-​y burger and tots at 2:00 AM?
But I’m writing this review to say there is something else great about Town Topic, breakfast. And since I usually don’t have have time before work, I’m really talking about «Breakfast for Lunch», perhaps the best breakfast next to «Breakfast for Dinner». Wait, does that make sense? Never mind.
Oh well, my point is getting breakfast for lunch at Town Topic is a truly great thing!

A friend and I walked past late one night and decided to come back the next day for a nice greasy breakfast.
Food: Good! I had a haystack and my friend had a cheeseburger. It was the best food ever but it was pretty damn delicious.
We sat at the counter and service was fast. I would definitely go again and get a milkshake!

Town Topic is one of those places that gets a little extra credit for being an iconic KC location. Are the burgers the best in town? NO, but where else can you eat at an old school diner which occupys a space the size of your bedroom. If you have had any adult libations and walk within a block of this place the delighful smells emanating cause your stomach to go into convulsions. Pretty good food, but again they get bonus additional points for being open 24 hours. One of those places that you must go to at least once to experience a true «burger joint».

Good burgers. And between the hours of 2am and 6am when nothing else is open: GREAT burgers. Sure, it doesn’t hurt to have a little firewater in your belly, but I’m pretty confident that I would have enjoyed this place even in a sober state.
Somebody should add this place to the wikipedia entry for «dive restaurant.» Definitely the embodiment of your good olé burger joint.
What you need to know: delicious burgers, super divey, open 24 hours, awesome for late night. Period.

I can now speak for the burgers. And you know what? Winsteads does ‘em better. Not just a little bit better but a whole hella f&!@ing lot better! I rolled in around midnight last Saturday night prepared for an amazing grease-​tastic burger and what I got was a dried, flavor-​less, skimpily dressed cheeseburger. Sad times folks. The ambiance was great, the waitresses were nice but that cheeseburger was not worth the late night calories. In the realm of paper-​thin burgers, Winsteads is king. Save Town Topic for the pancakes.

Kansas City’s premier burger dive.
Sure, the food is great. The burgers are greasy and salty, grilled onions peeking out from under the gently toasted bun. The onion rings soak through the paper bag, and the fountain Coca-​Cola somehow seems better than any other in town.
But really, it’s all about the ambiance.
This place stands like an island in the midst of an ever-​changing downtown scene. It’s almost as if the Earth turns more slowly within the four walls of the Topic, and time slows to a crawl. Not that I’d know – young tyke that I am – but I’d doubt the joint looked any different four decades ago. And while some places obviously strive for this sort of authenticity, one gets the feeling that at Town Topic, its completely accidental. I don’t think they have any idea how great they are, and that’s where the charm lies.
The crowd that gathers here is a perfect cross-​section of the downtown crowd. Sitting here recently, I shared the counter with a young, crisply-​dressed yuppie advertising guy, a near-​toothless homeless man, a crusty old timer in Dickies coveralls, a couple of tattooed biker punks and an inexplicable teenybopper. And its not till you look up from your double cheeseburger with grilled onions and glance around the tiny room, that you realize just how rare this commingling really is.
I’m a firm believer that restaurants should be reviewed on a relative scale. No, this ain’t the American Restaurant. This isn’t 1924 Main. This is a cheapskate corner burger dive, and its as good as it gets.