When I walked into Jenny’s Burgers in the Inner Sunset area of San Francisco, I couldn’t believe how cheap the menu was. Everything was under $10 and it all looked pretty good. After a quick look, I chose the bacon cheeseburger.
I watched as the guy behind the counter took the patty out, laid it upon the flame grill and started spinning it around the flames. It was almost hypnotic. Although it took a long time to cook the burger in this way, it was done just right.
Rather than dealing with the pesky condiments and toppings themselves, Jenny’s has them all next to the counter in a sort of buffet style. This worked out great for me, as I could avoid the vegetables and choose the only condiment necessary for this sort of burger: barbecue sauce.
I hope you all appreciated my little April Fool’s joke yesterday. Never fear, I’m still around and just as unvegan as ever.
Today I would like to call attention to Jennifer McCann, my first Unvegan Enemy. In response to the incredible…nay, fantastic website, thisiswhyyourefat.com, McCann has founded the absurd, yet painfully popular, thisiswhyyourethin.blogspot.com. I mean, come on, she couldn’t even pay GoDaddy ten bucks to register her own domain name? She obviously has no qualms with loading the page with ads and hawking her book…
When I first learned of Padma Lakshmi doing a commercial for Hardee’s, I knew I would have to eat whatever she did. Luckily, her burger of choice was the Western Bacon Thickburger.
Now here is where things get a little confusing. In California, there is no Hardee’s. Instead, there is Carl’s Jr., which is almost exactly the same as Hardee’s. A quick look at their websites reveals only a change in the name. The logo and layouts remain the exact same. There is, however, another twist. At Carl’s Jr., there is no such thing as a Thickburger, rather, it is called the Six-Dollar Burger.
On a weekend in San Francisco, I found myself at the Marina and a restaurant called Squat & Gobble. Since the food I like to eat often squats and gobbles, I figured this would be a good place for me.
The menu was chalked onto the wall, and I felt awkward staring at it for such a long time before choosing. The main reason I took so long was because despite the name, many of the food items included food that neither squats nor gobbles (vegetables). The majority of the foods were crepe based, which I always like, but if a crepe is ordered wrong, it is extremely difficult to remedy the situation through picking out invasive veggies. After much debating, I chose the Chicken Pesto crepe. The ingredients listed were mozzarella, onions, chicken breast, pesto and sun-dried tomatoes. I got mine without the onions or sun-dried tomatoes, waited at my table with my number and hoped that none of the uninvited ingredients had made their way into my food.
There comes a time in an unvegan man’s life when, despite his morals and convictions, he must give a group of people their due. With the Fifth Third Burger, my time has come. Finally there is a dish with vegetables that I dare write about with admiration.
On a recent sojourn down to Cancun, Mexico, I decided to be a little adventurous. Some may say foolish, but I prefer adventurous. For days, I had spent my time at the resort happily eating meats, cheeses and fruits. I was in bliss, and for my final meal, I sat down to order something fancy. In doing so, I committed a great sin against my fellow unvegans. It is a moment I scarcely remember, and I almost feel as if some sort of vegetable demon took possession of my body and held on just long enough to force me to spout the words required to ask for a salad to accompany my utterly meaty main course.
No sooner than an hour after my meal concluded, I found myself pacing around my hotel room, pondering the volatile chemical reactions occurring deep within the confines of my belly. I headed to the bathroom, to find that Montezuma had decided to exact his revenge upon me through an intense case of the runs. When I had completed my initial bowel cleansing, I went back into my room to consider whether the recent movement was due to the salad. As if to answer, a wave of nausea swept over me and carried me into the bathroom for a vomit full of salad. As the lettuce left me, I also felt as if I was exorcising myself of the vegetable demon. I had made a most terrible mistake and was paying for it tenfold. It is a mistake I never plan to make again.
*Thanks to my buddy and one-time euchre partner over at the protean pantry for reintroducing me to such a marvelous clip. I took the liberty of further researching and came upon a most glorious Spanish rendition of the clip.
As I developed through my adolescence, McDonald’s made a descent to the bottom of my fast food choices. I can offer no clear reasoning for this except that their food just rubs my tastebuds the wrong way. In fact, I am sometimes proud to say that the only time I eat McDonald’s is outside the country. This statement, however, has a minor disclaimer. And that disclaimer is the McDonald’s breakfast.
McDonald’s breakfast has always been something of a mystery. Few people, if any, know when they stop serving it. Sometimes I wonder if even the employees of McDonald’s have a set time that they know when to cut breakfast off. The breakfast is so rare that when you do see one, you almost feel forced to partake in it, whether you’re hungry or not.
Few places offer slices as gigantic as S’barro. Their Super Slice is filling like no other (non-stuffed) pizza. Last time I went, I scanned the slices of pre-cooked pizza. Aside from pepperoni and sausage, most of the slices had some sorts of veggies. I ordered a slice of the pepperoni and sausage together. From the few slices of that combo they had, I decided to be a jerk and point out the larger piece in the hopes that the friendly lady behind the counter would take it aside for me. She did, and my heart leapt for joy.
She took the slice from the counter and slid it into the oven as I happily awaited my slice of meaty goodness. It came out of the oven sizzling and full of the scent of meat.
While not one of my preferred restaurants (if you can call it that), Jack in the Box recently had a promotion for free medium curly fries, so I took a ride down Sepulveda to take advantage.
Knowing the fries wouldn’t be enough, I got myself a few extra items from the menu. The first choice was two tacos for 99 cents. zenescorts.ch. The value in this is unbelievable, even though I had to get them without lettuce. The meat is certainly not of the highest quality and they use melted American cheese, but still, 99 cents.
On top of that, I got the Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger. Another great value. Trying to mix up the meats, I added a chicken sandwich to the load, completing my multi-ethnic, multi-meat meal. The chicken sandwich usually comes with lettuce, so I had to make a special arrangement to get it without.
In a world crumbling under the pressure of mounting recession and potential depression, deals can be found aplenty. Well, that is assuming you still have enough money to eat. When I went to Rubio’s in Marina Del Rey, they were offering up a little recession combo that I decided to take advantage of. This was two street tacos, chips, beans and a 20 oz. drink for only $5.
The choice of taco innards was up to me, so I got one with steak and one with chicken. They came with guacamole and an unfortunate mix of onions and cilantro. I would have liked the cilantro, but it was all or nothing and I couldn’t risk having onions on my tacos.
