Home > Columns > Best Veggie Burger Project > Eating the Hillstone Veggie Burger at Face Value

I’m not the pot-stirring, feathers-ruffling type, but I have a feeling what I’m about to say may not go over well. It concerns veggie burgers—a minor passion of mine—and in particular it concerns one of the most revered veggie burgers in the whole United States, the Hillstone Veggie Burger. Getting straight to the point: It could be better.

Hillstone, the Cadillac of chains in the high-end restaurant group that includes Houston’s, has mastered the art of consistency, and I doubt there’s anything on their menu that would seriously offend the diner who ordered it. Their House Made Veggie Burger has a strong reputation. The New York Times rated it the number-one veggie burger in New York City.

Chat rooms and message boards cast furtive speculation as to what the secret ingredients might be. (Beets? Prunes? Does the burger marinate in barbecue sauce, and do they baste it as it cooks?)

It’s not for nothing that I’ve eaten it at least a half-dozen times over the years. I like that it’s a house-made veggie burger—a rarity, unfortunately—and a solid vegetarian option at a solid non-vegetarian restaurant. Yes, it’s a good veggie burger. It’s just never seemed all that great to me. But I wanted to make doubly sure, so I returned last weekend to see if I could learn to love it, or if I had been right to be lukewarm all along.

How to Judge a Veggie Burger, Step 1

When judging a veggie burger, I focus on the patty first and then zoom out slowly. This patty is about the diameter of a CD and has the thickness of a deck of cards. It’s made primarily of rice, but black beans are mixed in, and a small amount of (allegedly) beet gives it color. There are also little splotches of fuscia, a dried fruit that the Internet believes to be prunes though they’re quite sweet—perhaps they soaked in something, or maybe they’re actually cranberries.

The patty is deeply colored—the sugars have caramelized quite a bit and the burger is blistery, in a good way—and it’s served with a thin blanket of Jack cheese. (The patty itself is vegan, but the bun and, obviously, the cheese, are not.)

I took a bite of just the patty. It has the texture of sticky rice but the dominating flavor is barbecue sauce. Delicious barbecue sauce, sure, but it reminded me of someone who once told me that her family refers to veggie burgers as “ketchup vehicles.” The sweetness is made more pronounced by that mysterious fruit.

When I pried off a piece with my fork, it broke free a bit too easily, which immediately caused me to worry: Is this thing going to fall apart in my hands?

Judge a Veggie Burger, Step 2

But, zooming out: Wow, what a bun. Another house-made item, the roll is about as perfect as you can get in a hamburger bun. It’s soft and airy, substantial enough to grip, protective of its contents, and tasty on its own. Most crucially, it fades into the background of the veggie burger landscape as soon as you start eating, allowing the more important elements to dominate your taste buds’ attention. It’s a real miracle of a bun!

Then there are nice slices of tomato, a little pile of shredded iceberg lettuce, a few bread-and-butter pickles, and a smear of mustardy special sauce. Classic American hamburger treatment. No complaints.

Judging a Veggie Burger, Step 3

I sliced the burger in half, as I always do, and saw some very nice veggie burger strata. All the elements were on display in inviting, distinct layers, and my first bite was solid. No one element overwhelmed. I might have liked the patty itself to assume more of the limelight, but for the moment I was pleased. I especially enjoyed the sauce’s tangy kick from the sauce.

I took another bite, and this is where the trouble started. I heard a splat. A good quarter of my patty had slipped out of the bun and landed on my French fries. This is a classic veggie burger gripe, where due to a principle of physics that I can no longer recall, the force of teeth on one end of the burger causes slippage of veggie burger on the other. I think I speak for most if not all veggie burger enthusiasts when I say: I’d prefer not to eat my veggie burger with a fork.

The monotone flavor and crumbly texture of the patty aren’t exactly deal breakers, but they’re not minor strikes either, especially for a veggie burger that’s so highly praised. I kept eating, scraping up the remainder of the veggie burger with my fork. I actually started to feel helpless to the burger, in the way I can feel helpless to a plate of French fries or a bag of potato chips—foods that are engineered to capitalize on a certain human weakness for salt and sugar and fat.

The Birth of a Mission

Surely this kind of food has a time and a place, which may or may not be a restaurant, but it got me thinking: Beyond the fixin’s, where are the namesake veggies? And at $17, what’s making it so expensive?

More importantly, how high is the bar if this the best we can do? Surely New York City has some stronger contenders. We just need to be able to locate them.

Enter this here Best Veggie Burger Project. The idea is that we pool our resources in order to find the best options, and in the process hope that if we make enough of a stink, more restaurants will give their veggie burgers the TLC they deserve.

Tell us about your favorite veggie burgers, either from your hometowns or from your travels, and use the rating system below. Write to goodveg@squidoo.com. We want submissions from all over the world. Eventually, no one will have to suffer through a sub-par veggie burger again!

Hillstone

376 Park Ave South location, New York, NY; other locations nationwide

Price: $17.00
Vegan?: Patty, yes; Assembled burger, no
Flavor: 6 points (A little monotone, it tastes mostly of BBQ sauce)
Texture: 5 points (Crumbly, though not mushy)
Presentation and fixings: 10 (Excellent bun, classic burger adornments, pretty plating)

OVERALL SCORE: 7