Sunny's Bar, Red Hook.

The dive bar other dive bars want to be when they grow up.

Sunny's is the rare dive that earned its number one slot on this list without a single editor disagreeing. It is a working bar at the end of an industrial pier in Red Hook, in business under various names since 1890, run by the Balzano family for four straight generations. The current owner, Tone, took it over from his uncle Sunny in 2013, and changed almost nothing.

You sit at a fifty foot wooden bar that has been polished by elbows since Theodore Roosevelt was president. The walls are covered with framed family photographs and 70s tug-boat schematics. The Saturday night bluegrass jam has run uninterrupted since 1996, brought in by Sunny himself when the longshoremen started thinning out.

Why number one. No other dive bar on the list combines this much intact local history, this much living family tradition, and this much honest pricing. A round of four beers and a shot is twenty four dollars including tip. The family will not allow it to creep.

The Saturday bluegrass jam.

Every dive bar lives or dies on its single ritual. At Sunny's it is the Saturday night bluegrass session, which starts at 9pm and runs until the last fiddler stops. Up to twelve players show. They sit in an open circle in the front room near the doors. There is no stage. There is no microphone. They pass instruments around and call tunes by name.

You drink a Brooklyn lager at the bar, you turn around on the stool, and you watch Bob from Carroll Gardens play banjo for free for an hour. This is the moment that justifies a thirty dollar Lyft from Manhattan.

The jam is not advertised. It is not on a sign. The musicians arrive in the same order most weeks, with their instruments in cases that look as old as the bar. Tip the band by buying them a round at the bar between songs. They will play harder.

The two-drink uniform.

Drink discipline at Sunny's is simple. The bar does not stock a craft cocktail program. The bartenders are pouring beer and shots, fast, for thirty people. Order accordingly.

• The first drink: Brooklyn Lager, draft, six dollars. Tone keeps it on the closer tap so the line moves. Drink it cold while the bartender already knows what the second one is.
• The second drink: a shot of Old Overholt rye, four dollars. The house pour is honest. Order both at once and you will save fifteen minutes of waiting.
• The third drink: repeat. The house red wine is also good but slows you down. Skip the cocktail menu (it does not exist).
• The exit drink: at last call, a Pickleback. Tone will pour the brine.

Arrive at 8pm, leave when the music stops.

Sunny's is open Wednesday through Sunday evenings, never on Mondays or Tuesdays. The pier is dark. There is no overflow strategy. If the bar is full, you wait outside, which is fine in summer and miserable in February.

Saturday is the night to plan for. Arrive at 8pm sharp. The bluegrass starts at 9pm and within thirty minutes the room is at 100 percent capacity, which is about 80 souls. By 10pm, latecomers are queueing on the pier. By 1am, the bar empties because the trains are far and the Lyfts are hard to call back.

If you cannot do Saturday, Friday is the second choice. Wednesday is locals only and the music is acoustic country, often just one or two players. Sunday afternoon is when the regulars drink slowly and read the paper at the bar; this is the Sunny's of legend, but you have to arrive between 4pm and 6pm to catch it.

It is genuinely far. Plan the journey.

Sunny's is at the end of Conover Street in Red Hook, two blocks from the Buttermilk Channel. The nearest subway is the F or G to Smith-9th Streets, then a 25 minute walk past warehouses, or the B61 bus, or a fifteen dollar Lyft. From Manhattan, plan an hour each way. The remoteness is part of the deal.

The Lyft trick. Have the driver drop you at the corner of Conover and Beard, not at the bar's address. Walk the last block. The bar door is unmarked except for a small sign and you will not be sure you are in the right place until you push it open. That is correct. That is the point.

Cash only. There is one ATM at the back near the toilets. It charges a four dollar fee. Bring cash from home.

For two people, a hundred dollar night.

Plan for forty to fifty dollars per person for a full night, including tips. That covers four drinks, one round of shots, and the jukebox dollar that buys you four songs of personal joy.

For a group of four, a hundred and sixty to two hundred dollars total. The bartenders will pour faster if you tip per round, not at the end. Two dollars per drink is the local convention. Throw in a five dollar tip for the round of shots if you want the next pour to be generous.

The jukebox is one of the best in Brooklyn. A dollar buys four plays. The regulars will judge you on selection. Lean toward Hank Williams, Townes Van Zandt, and the Carter Family. Avoid anything post-2000.

What the regulars wear, almost.

There is no enforced dress code. The actual code is unwritten and matters more. Wear something you have owned for at least three years. A flannel shirt, jeans, work boots, an old jacket. The regulars are dock workers, retired tug captains, neighbourhood artists, and a handful of writers from the Red Hook crowd. They are not dressed up. You should not be either.

Avoid. Anything that looks like it was bought at JFK that morning. Logo sneakers. A blazer over a t-shirt. Statement jewellery. The Sunny's regulars notice everything and judge accordingly. They will be polite. You will feel it.

How to ruin Sunny's for yourself.

• Do not photograph the regulars. Tone will ask you to delete it and you will not enjoy the conversation.
• Do not request specific songs from the bluegrass musicians. They are not a wedding band. They will play what they play. Tip them at the bar instead.
• Do not order a craft cocktail. Even a simple Old Fashioned puts the bartenders behind on the tickets. Order beer and a shot.
• Do not bring a group of more than five. The bar is a long thin room and your group will block it. Split into pairs and cluster at different points along the bar.
• Do not arrive after 10pm on a Saturday and expect to get in. You will queue on the pier in the cold for an hour.
• Do not use the back jukebox if the front jukebox is loaded. The regulars consider the back jukebox the overflow only. Walk to the front, look at the queue, then load if appropriate.

Anchor the night at Hometown Bar-B-Que first.

Sunny's does not serve food beyond bagged crisps. The pre-game, then, is dinner two blocks away at Hometown Bar-B-Que on Van Brunt Street. The brisket is the best in New York and the room is loud and packed by 7pm. Eat at the counter at 7pm, walk to Sunny's at 8pm, drink until midnight.

The post-game, if there is one, is The Brooklyn Crab on Reed Street, which keeps a kitchen running for late dinners and has the only good rooftop view of the harbour for miles. Skip the seafood, drink one more round, watch the lights of the Statue of Liberty across the channel.

For more bars in the area, see our New York city guide, especially the Brooklyn hidden gems list.

Yes. Drop everything.