YOU KNOW WHAT New Yorkers love more than multi-billion dollar baseball dynasties, scoffing at out-of-towners and the smell of hot garbage in the summertime? Sliders. No, not the Jerry O’Connell sci-fi show from the mid-nineties, the miniature variety of hamburger commonly found at such grease institutions as White Castle and Krystal.

Gothamites don’t exactly advertise their admiration for these tiny burgers—they’d usually rather talk about real estate or book stores—but trust me, the passion is there. Every time this fast food junkie has proposed anything regarding junior meat patties, the natives have responded with rabid fervor. I speculate slider popularity in this region has something to do with their portability and relative neatness.You can’t drop a quarterpounder in your purse or man-bag without all the cheese and mayo gumming up your heroin needle, and the smell of that much cooked meat can be overwhelming on a cramped subway train.

Manhattan saw the arrival of a brand new slider-slinging restaurant in early November. Tucked away on St. Marks Place, where mighty dives once stood but now Subway reigns supreme, the spot is simply called

Mark. No utilitarian lunch box is this— Mark’s interior decor, dark and wood-based, calls to mind a hip small town drink spot (indeed, it could become something like that, what with its lengthy bar and jukebox of wellselected tunes).The menu is bare bones: a regular slider with cheese and onions ($2), a bacon slider with cheese and onions ($2.75), fries ($3) and pecan pie ($4). Beverage-wise, there’s beer ($4), wine ($5), vanilla shakes ($5) and even a Guinness shake ($6). It’s all very to the point, which is good for those of us who lack serious decision-making skills.

Served up hot and juicy, the sliders at Mark give you a serious upgrade on White Castle flavors with none of the expected stomach-destroying consequences.The bacon sliders are particularly savory, what with those tiny chunks of pork strewn atop the molten cheese and steamy meat.The fries are of the sweet potato variety and are served in rather generous portions with several sauces available for slathering. On the topic of said sauces: the barbecue leaves something to be desired, but the chipotle ketchup is not to be missed (nor is the jalapeño, if you’re into clearing your sinuses).Violently allergic to alcohol? Well, then you’ll enjoy that the sodas at Mark are served in classic slender beer glasses. Finally, I felt like I was in a 1980s beer commercial with Bob Uecker. Great taste? Less filling! Hey, gimme a light! Where’s Dick Butkus?

I detected some sort of accent on the bartender during our brief and very friendly chat, but I couldn’t pinpoint the country of origin. He told me the owners had been working on opening Mark for two years. Is that how long it takes to nail down the perfect slider? No wonder my home experiments always come out looking and tasting like the creature that popped out of John Hurt’s chest in Alien. Mark has also succeeded in creating a delightfully cozy atmosphere right smack dab in the middle of one of the city’s most congested areas.You may as well be in a friend’s ultrachic basement, not the screaming black soul of college kid and boho street hippie junction. They even have a funky multi-colored cow statue out front to beckon in kitsch fans that would otherwise walk right by, fruitlessly searching for the nearest Bob’s Big Boy.

> Mark

33 St. Mark’s Place (betw. 2nd & 3rd Aves.), 212- 677-3132.