The first non-meat burger I ever had was at Johnny Rockets in Santa Monica. I was in L.A. for work, staying at the lux Miramar Sheraton Hotel. Wanting something to eat, I wandered down the nearby 3rd Street Promenade and was draw to the smell of Johnny Rockets, a restaurant chain I had never heard of before. I was only a few years into being a vegetarian, and thought for sure that I would be ordering a grilled cheese with a side of fries. There just weren't a lot of vegetarian options at a hamburger restaurant, and that's what I almost always ended up ordering.

But there was something strange on the menu.

It was called "The Streamliner" and claimed to be vegetarian? How could I resist that when the smell in the place was so intoxicating? So I ordered one, hold the grilled onions, expecting the worst. Veggie burgers of the day were always either 1) made from unappetizing chunks of vegetables and mushrooms or 2) some soy monstrosity which had the texture of shoe leather.

Imagine my absolute shock to find that it was actually a delicious burger with a sublime texture. It was everything I ever wanted in a burger that was reminiscent of a beef burger, but without having to kill a cow. It was love at first bite, and I would be going out of my way to visit Johnny Rockets at every opportunity... announcing it to anybody who was reading my blog "Rockets, bitches. Rockets." And I did that for many years.

After a while I learned that the burger Johny Rockets used was called Boca Burger and though it wasn't the same, I found them in stores and started buying them to eat at home.

Then one day I went to the Johnny Rockets at the Maine Mall... minutes after landing and picking up my rental car at the Portland International Jetport in 2018... only to find that The Streamliner had been discontinued. Replaced with a gag-inducing "burger" that claimed to be a "black bean burger" but was unlike any good black bean burger I'd ever had. I was absolutely gutted. A once favorite food had been destroyed. I never ate at Johnny Rockets again.

Then a miracle happened. Burger King unleashed their "Impossible Whopper"... something I discovered on one of my many work trips to Las Vegas in 2019. It was incredible. And, because Burger King was everywhere, a lot easier to get than Johnny Rockets. And so there it was. No matter where I was traveling, I was ignoring local specialties and buying Impossible Whoppers. What a great time to be alive.

But then... something changed over the years.

The burgers tasted the same, but the produce would vary widely. Sometimes the burgers were perfect, sometimes you'd get wilted lettuce, unripe tomatoes, or stank onions, and the experience was terrible. And I started ordering the Impossible Whopper with cheese because otherwise they'd take it out of the tray instead of off the grill and it wasn't hot. If you ordered cheese, they'd at least microwave it so it was warm when you went to eat it.

So now I go to Burger King rarely, the experience having been ruined. I understand that Johnny Rockets eventually realized their mistake and are now using Impossible Burgers, but there's nothing local and it's just not worth going out of my way to get there. Not any more.

Buying burgers for home was equally depressing. Boca Burger was bought out by Kraft and utterly destroyed. Morningstar Farms was never great, but I preferred them over other options because usually burgers released by Impossible or Beyond were an inch thick and you have to choke them down.

But then I discovered Beyond Stack Burgers recently, and everything changed.

I don't stack them (because multiple burgers causes me intestinal distress)... but I do smash them. Not from frozen, but I microwave them for 30 seconds so they're smashable. It's important that you coat the food-turner with the oil that melts out of the burger first so it doesn't stick to the burger and destroy it, but the result is 100% delicious, and I eat them way more often than I probably should.

The fact that the burgers come 8 per pack, thus matching the 8 buns you get in a bag of buns is just a bonus.

So of course I'm now living in fear that Beyond Foods will go out of business or discontinue their Stack Burgers or "improve the formula" or some such bullshit. History has taught me it's an inevitability.

One of these days, I really need to try making my own burgers. Usually when doing this I find a recipe online that's close to what I'm looking for and adjust it until it's to my liking. But I have yet to find a recipe (or more likely a "copycat recipe") which is even remotely like what I'm looking for.

In the meanwhile, I'll just keep buying my beloved Beyond Stack Burgers and enjoy them while they last.