Apples & Oranges

I love veggie burgers. There, the secret is out. You think of me as a meat and potatoes kinda guy but as Ray Charles sang, you don’t know me.

I love vegetables. I’m known to my friends as one of the great salad makers of our time. And I love food made from vegetables. For a long time I couldn’t find a brand of veggie burger that I really liked. But once I did – ooohhh baby!

Today for lunch, I had a veggie patty – a better name for them – in a wrap with humus, mustard, hot sauce, spinach, radish, cucumber, celery and onion. I broke up the veggie patty into pieces. OMG was it good!

A person who tells me, “I don’t eat veggie burgers, I just eat REAL burgers” with the corresponding condescending tone, is a person whose advice I would not take on the matter of food…as they do not know what they are talking about. Condescending tone right back at ya.

I love “real” burgers too and when I want a hamburger for lunch, I have a hamburger for lunch, not a veggie burger. Just as when I want a hamburger, I don’t have shrimp scampi. I love shrimp scampi, but not when I want a hamburger. And vice versa.

The problem for veggie burgers is that they are called ‘burgers’. If they were called veggie patties or by some other name, they would not be compared to hamburgers. They should not be compared to hamburgers because they are not hamburgers. Just as they are not soup. They are in a completely different category. I would compare a sandwich or wrap made with a veggie burger to one made with falafel, for instance, but never to one made with hamburger.

Veggie burgers and hamburgers are like apples and oranges. I like all four of the foods in that sentence. But I don’t want an apple when I want an orange. Nor do I want a hamburger when I want a veggie burger.

 

I don’t want this to be a commercial but people are asking… the brand I use is Morning Star Farms. I hate to pick one flavor as I like almost all of them but Spicy Black Bean and Mushroom Lovers can usually be found in our freezer.