COLUMBUS, Ohio — If you find yourself at the corner of the University of Virginia campus and the UVA Hospital, be sure to tuck under the elevated railroad tracks at 14th and Main streets and check out a little hole-in-the-wall burger joint called “The White Spot.”

Go ahead and take your best guess as to why it’s called The White Spot. You won’t figure it out.

Okay, ready? (Sorry to patronize you. Let’s go.)

The White Spot, which has been in operation as a diner for more than 65 years (according to my amateur internet sleuthing) used to be a single-chair barber shop in the good old days. Whenever the central hair-cutting seat was removed, it left a neat, 2-foot-wide round spot in the old-school tile. Instead of filling in the gap with calculus and laborious ceramic measurements, the owners covered it with a smooth cap of white paint and went right to work making burgers.

Today, the “White Spot” is still available to stand on, walk over, check your phone by, and generally bide your time next to as you ponder the litany of cheap eats the restaurant provides students and locals alike at 1407 University Avenue (between its modern neighbors, a smoothie bar and a poke/sushi joint).

Regardless of its cosmopolitan, worldly surroundings, The White Spot is the sort of place without a website or a brand page. They don’t have time for that. They’re busy taking orders.

My buddy Cory, who lives in Washington, D.C., made the 2.5-hour jaunt over to Charlottesville, Va., to hang out with me for two days, and he and I both agree that our best meal in town came from The White Spot, a burger joint/diner haven that seems to exist decades beyond its expected lifespan.

Take a look at the White Spot’s menu and you’ll notice a few things: It’s on an old-fashioned letter pegboard, with every single menu option spelled out. That same food list hangs across the restaurant three times (twice for indoor customers, once in the window for passers-by). All of the options end in exact dollar totals. And there’s enough room for all of your (new and old) favorites, whether its a hot dog ($4), a Gus Burger ($6), or the “One Helluva Mess” breakfast tray ($10).

And if you’re feeling something more elegant? Try “The Grillswith,” two fried, classic Krispy Kreme donuts with a scoop of vanilla ice cream in between.

Cory and I dropped by for dinner on Monday night and each decided on the signature Gus Burger, which is a traditional American cheeseburger (your choice of toppings) with a fried egg on top. I ordered first and the chef/cashier went right to work, cracking a raw egg on the griddle flat and placing a patty nearby before ringing me up. I winced at first, thinking that my order would have displaced Cory’s meal by 10 minutes or so, but our man behind the counter had this all down to a science. Cory placed his order soon after, the chef flipped my burger and mashed my egg, and got right to work getting Cory’s meal on the burner.

We each waited about 3 minutes — raw to ready — and both our burgers were primed for immediate consumption.

The White Spot’s burger patty is skinny, but so satisfying. The meat was hot and sizzling, and the bun was fresh. The egg was mixed around just enough to keep from spilling into (and out of) our mouths. I ordered mine with lettuce, tomato, and mayo, like I do most any other burger, and had to pace myself from murdering the delicacy in less than 90 seconds.

Cory got fries with his from the get-go, which he artfully laced ketchup over, and I placed a second order so I could try their onion rings, which were fried in a basket in front of me and served piping-hot in a waxy paper boat. The rings were thin, and I normally prefer mine to be meaty and heavy on the onion side, but these were crispy and tasty, and the flavor stayed with my mouth for hours.

The White Spot, apparently, is a favorite of locals near the UVA campus. Three students were enjoying their meal outside (somehow, in the humid 100-degree heat index) while Cory and I sweated it out at the counter inside, which he said reminded him of the southern sit-in boycotts of the Civil Rights Era — the kind of establishments with round, steel stools with a mild vinyl padding, and a linoleum eating surface that spans the length of the eatery. Mentally, you could place it among collective cultural visions of early-stage McDonald’s, or what (the currently flailing and failing) Steak & Shake wanted you to believe they were all along.

Cory and I each agreed that the food was incredible on its own regard, and it was refreshing to see it rang up, cooked, and served by a one-man crew. He personally thanked us for coming in and threw our trash away, too.

But the price blew us away the most. College town prices can come at a premium (a six-pack of Bud Light at the corner mart down the block came to $12, for instance), but paying $6 for a burger with an egg and cheese, served faster than your favorite punk rock song, could not be beat at any cost.

In fact, Cory went back the next morning for a breakfast sandwich before hitting the road back home to our nation’s capital. He crushed it in our eighth-floor hotel room as I was busy trying to find jeans and make something of my Tuesday morning.

Again, if you ever find yourself in Charlottesville, you’d be doing yourself a disservice to not drop by the White Spot. We went by on a Monday afternoon and felt like we had a prolonged handshake with the local secret. We can only imagine what it’d be like to see the place at full-capacity after a UVA football or basketball victory on a weekend evening. Drop a $10 bill and treat yourself to some bona fide quality greasy-spoon cooking.

You won’t regret it. Look for it by name — circle marks the spot.

###

-moose