O'Burger Offers First Organic Fast Food in Los Angeles
by Kristin Underwood, San Diego, CA on 08.19.08
O'burger, the first organic fast food joint in Los Angeles, where the burgers and everything else are all organic. What does that mean exactly? Well, "the buns, the sauce, the vegetables, meat, ketchup, mustard, fries and salad dressing" - it's all organic. Yum!
What about the burgers? Well the beef comes from grass-fed cows, the turkey burgers all come from free-range, grass fed turkeys and the veggie patties are vegan-friendly and made in-house from corn, oats and vegetables. According to O'burger, "if its edible, its organic."
For the meat-eaters in the audience, O'burger burgers come from Uruguay and are fed on 2 football-field sized areas of pampas grass. The burgers are lower in saturated fats and higher in Omega-3's, Vitamins A & E and antioxidants.
Since its a food joint, they want the whole experience to be as tasty and healthy as possible, so they made sure their building is healthy as well. They use non-toxic cleaning products and all of their packaging is recycled, compostable and/or biodegradable, using corn-based and sugarcane-based packaging. The paint is all lead-free and no-VOC, and the paneling on the walls is reclaimed wood.
Most of the burgers are $7.99, but you can also choose from hot dogs, fries, salad, grilled-cheese, cookies, and even fancy shakes and vegan shakes. You won't find classic Coke here, but instead they serve fancier, "healthier" sodas, and even kombucha teas.
You can find O'burger on 8593 West Santa Monica Boulevard in West Hollywood, or check out the menu and gig online.
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This is awesome and I'm happy more places like this are popping up, my only concern is that the beef comes from Uruguay?! That is a long way to ship organic beef when there are plenty of organic California ranches like Neiman Ranch. Wasn't there concern about the cattle industry in South America and deforestation too?
In SF this place not 100% organic (condiments and stuff) but virtually everything edible is organic and comes from local sources.
And no, I don't have a vested interest in the company except for that their food goes in my mouth and I love it :)
http://www.burgermeistersf.com/aboutus.php
Also in SF we have non-traditional fast food in the form of Soup/Salad/Sandwich shops that are close to 100% organic and all to-go packaging is compostable. I feel they deserve an honorable mention as well.
http://www.mixtgreens.com/
http://www.soupfreaks.com/
For those near the San Gabriel Valley, there is vegetarian fast food.
Orean Health Express
BTW, this place has been around FOREVER (since 1979!).
This is not the first fast food joint in L.A. Organic To Go has been there for awhile.
I honestly cannot understand how anyone with even a modicum of understanding of the environmental impacts of doing so continues to eat meat. Organic is surely better than non-organic, but not consuming meat at all is simple, cheap and better for everyone and everything involved.
Mmmeat, Atoms, meeat!
I understand the implications that go into eating meat but I'm trying to cut down my consumption. Some people might be able to stop cold turkey but I cannot. At least some people are trying.
I don't insult vegetarians so I'd ask that you not insult those that eat meat. I have no problem with vegetarians, I just can't stand it when SOME have that holier than thou attitude. That doesn't help anyone. You can win more bees with honey than vinegar.
I've actually visited O'Burger and was actually a tad disappointed (maybe I just had too high of expectations). First of all, I wouldn't call it 'fast food' because there is NO parking in West Hollywood - this results in circling, circling, circling the block in order to park to go to the restaurant. Then, you get a number and sit and wait for your food. That is a 'quick-service' restaurant in my book - not fast food. One of the reasons I was so excited about this place was the idea that it might fill a slight hole for parents like me who have crabby kids in the car and since I refuse to feed them normal fast food, have to swing into Whole Foods or something of the like to get them food on the road. O'Burger is definitely not an option for that situation as there's not even a pay parking lot next door.
Secondly, it is incredibly expensive and offers no smaller option for kids. My kids don't need an $8 burger from a 'fast food restaurant.' Either be a fast food restaurant and lower the price point, or be a quick-service dining restaurant and serve $8 burgers, but you can't be both.
Third, it's interesting to me that they serve burgers and hot dogs (natural or not, still not *health* food), and then insist on serving 'yogurt' shakes. It's great to have that as an option, but if I'm having a burger and fries anyways, a yogurt shake (which just plain isn't any good) isn't going to change what I just ate - there is plenty of delicious organic milk and ice cream - I just don't understand where the transition from 'organic' to 'healthy' went - they lost me at the french fries.
Speaking of the fries... the owner was in the front asking everyone what they thought. My husband, being a bio-diesel car owner, asked what they used with their used oil. She said she didn't know. Uhhh... Then, following up with that, we asked about her food waste. She didn't know that either. Don't know where your food waste is going? Makes it hard for me to believe the owners' hearts are totally in it...
The best example of a local, sustainable fast food restaurant I've ever seen is in my home state of Washington: http://www.burgerville.com/#page:/Our-Food/|secNum:1 - they even tell you on the website what farms each of their different products comes from. THAT is someone making a difference instead of monopolizing on the organic trend. Just as someone said earlier, shipping your beef thousands of miles when there is plenty of local, organic beef right here, 60 miles from O'Burger. Greenwashing, anyone?
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Thanks for the taste test.
I enjoyed perusing your website. Come visit my hamburger review blog at
www.burgerfiles.com and tell me what you think.
Thanks!
--Josh