By now, you should've gone to Rick's Atomic Cafe and had his breakfasts. You haven't? Stop reading and go. You back? Okay, now try his veggie burger. Seriously. Try it. Yes, I, too, was skeptical. Why would any meat-eater opt for a veggie burger when you don't have to? Answer: When Rick LeBlanc makes it.
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It's officially called “The Sputnik”, which only makes sense after I tell you that the other sandwiches are called “The Hubble” and “The Salyut”. The Sputnik's cargo is a veggie patty designed and built by LeBlanc, who with his horn-rimmed glasses kinda looks like a NASA engineer. Naturally when I proclaim that it is the best veggie patty I've ever tasted, you will think, “gee, that's a low bar”. Veggie burgers have had a bad rap, because well, they often look and taste like cork.
But given the choice, I'd get Rick's veggie patty over anyone else's pastrami, cheese steak or roast beef. How he managed to make cashews, mushrooms, lentils, leeks and onions coalesce into this crispy, savory, addicting disc of meat-aping matter is its own state secret. Opt to have it the way Le Blanc makes it, with sprouts, tomato, cucumber and whatever he fancies you should have for your lunch. Now if he were only open for dinner.
To read Gustavo's review of Rick's, CLICK HERE.
Before becoming an award-winning restaurant critic for OC Weekly in 2007, Edwin Goei went by the alias “elmomonster” on his blog Monster Munching, in which he once wrote a whole review in haiku.