Mission Impossible Vegan Burgers at Monty's Good Burger

One of the few things I am always excited about in finding new places is that... you never know what hits you until it happens.

Take a case in point with Monty's Good Burger. I was on my way to have a few drinks and bites at Here's Looking At You (Congrats on being named on Eater's Top 38 restaurants of 2018). For a bit odd reason, I saw a long line out the door at 6pm on a Saturday night. Of course, I'm looking at all these young fashionable hipsters wannabes and figuring a Black Friday sales was happening. Then I took a good gander and realized they are lining up where Sumo Dog's old mini counter used to be at. It's all for a place called Monty's Good Burger.

The line wasn't for their hot dogs as they moved to Santa Monica's Gallery Food Hall. What was going on you may asked? Apparently the line is for vegan burger. Go figured right with the appearances of hipsters and young millennials. 

Sorry for the grain as it was taken at midnight

Fast forward in about... 5 and a half hours later? There is still a line for this. In a true sense of being so LA, I decided to google and Yelp Monty's Good Burger up to get an idea what I'm dealing with. Apparently it got raves from several publications that I ceased to trust and a few knowledgeable writers I followed from a distance. All of whom are raving about their the "veggie burger that bleeds".

I just stood in line because of what?... bored on Saturday night? Needing something to soak up the drinks I just had at Here's Looking At You? Worst yet? Just want to figure it out if the hype is real or I'm missing out 5 months too late.

Oh yeah, I also wanted to meet the mascot, Monty, the white Schnoodle that is on the logo. Don't laugh, but there were people actually wanted to take selfies with that celeb doggo and I'm one of the few that gets to pet him and also shooting the breeze with of the handlers who was patrolling and controlling the line.

When it was my turn to order, I noticed a few things that stuck out to me. One was the simplicity of the menu to either a single patty or double patties. The components can be subtracted from the usual lettuce, tomato, vegan cheese, grilled onion, or their special thousand island sauce. If it screams out In-Out-Burgers to you, then you're not alone. A kale salad, Fries, and Tots are the other main items you can ordered besides the two burgers.

Treated with care, would vegan burgers like this makes me wanting to order more? What's the verdict? Here's the funny part? If you put a blind test on me, I couldn't tell the difference between this plant based patty with the meat patties. More to the succinct point, this incarnation can be juicy as well. Way better than the tofu burger you're accustomed to.

If you are into the Mission Impossible Burgers, then the grilled burgers from Monty will suits your need. One thing I crave for is the buns they used. Everything here is locally sourced and they are not cutting corners to bring out the best in what they are serving. Including an eco-friendly bottled water "Just Water" branded by Jaden Smith. Pretty much that speaks volumes to me... in a subtle green friendly way.

Initially, I was bummed out that Sumo Dog moved to the westside, but with a fresh blue coat of paint and a logo of Monty plastered on the wall, it seemed like nothing changed. Without a missing beat, I would gladly get a single or double from Monty's.

A great find all because of yours truly not wanting to pay for valet parking and walk a distance to discover place on the way to dinner!

Monty's Good Burger
516 S. Western Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90020

Another East Coast Burger Presented by Wahlburgers

There's a obscene debate going on between east coast versus west coast that go beyond the rap wars of the 90's. Can you guess what's the big bruhah lately?

Who has the best burger? In-n-Out or Shake Shack?

I want to say neither just to spite both of the over-hyped wannabes. For some devout followers that swore by them, it can get more religious or political at times as a hot button issues that can't be resolved with a vote of a taste test. Biased opinions tends to take over when we discuss such sour topic that can divide a nation.

For the west coast, it's the team In-n-Out with their fresh meat patties and fresh veggies that are from the source of their carefully chosen farm distributors. Never frozen, always fresh is the model. You can taste the difference so said the believers.

Then, you got the east coast pushing the rhetoric of Shake Shack down your throat with their meatier version of the burgers with the variety that can beat the slim down menu of their westside counterparts. Both have their strong points, but someone else wants to get in on the action.

Apparently, Wahlburgers from a famed actor and his hip hop family also wanted to enter this battle royale. It's not just Shake Shack have come on strong in the past few years, but Raising Cane and Five Guys have also started to make the march toward the west coast.

What seemed to be a major difference between Marky's burger versus the other funky bunch? For one, I think their patties are bit more thicker because of the 1/3 lbs portion. In a a weird way, you can get the pounder by ordering their triple patty.

They are very generous with the servings of their vegetable add-ons of lettuce and tomato. Almost like getting a salad with the patty and buns. Coincidentally, the buns may or may not be from the local bakery as it was posted on the website. This seems to be something I would get from my local market for that burger cook out.

How does this Boston transplant of a burger do compare to the New Yorker (Shake Shack), DMV (Five Guys) or In N Out (good ol' Cali)? In my humble opinion... here it goes.

In order from best to worst: In N Out, Five Guys, Wahlburgers, Shake Shack.

In reality wise, I think the price may play into a bigger hindrance as it was the 2nd most priciest with In N Out being the cheapest. Made to Order burgers, my top 2 choices are the ones I prefer, though Wahlburger is not far from them where Shake Shack is so far back, I don't even know what the fuss was in the first place about them being the best.

Another big plus was the choice of tator tots instead of fries. Yes, I know... they are both potatoes, but I just love the crunchy crispy tots that is in here.

On the flip-side, after this review, I had a whole new appreciation for Five Guys after I shredded them to pieces when I first encountered them many years ago. I had to say it's not as bad as Shake Shack was. One of these days, I might need to add White Castle and Whataburger in my burger comparisons battle.

As in for now, I give Wahlburger a passing grade, but the price of $10 for a single patty may be a deterrence for repeat visits.

Wahlburgers
835 W Jefferson Blvd #1710
Los Angeles, CA 90007

Recession-proof Burgers @ Mom's Burgers (Compton)

Who says recession affect every area equally? Apparently not affected at all in the city of Compton.

Several months ago, several bloggers mentioned the best place to grab a ghetto burger would be in Compton due to the low seedy looks of the neighborhood. I just can't seemed to fathom on how or why the city continue to get a bad rap. I understood Compton had high crime rates and corruptions in the city hall during the Omar Bradley days. The 60's Watts and 90's LA riots have also contributed to make some conditions worse. However given that those dark days were long gone and the city have been revamping since then, I don't see how the tag of "ghetto" apply to the New Compton.

Now adding tacos to the burgers?

For a piece of mind, the neighborhood was actually pretty safe during day time and located across the street from Compton High School. Some of the new redevelopment townhouses are built in a unincorporated city of Rancho Dominguez, which shares the same zip code with the city of Compton. There were some serious wattage of bling on the tires that displayed many of the customized chrome rims driving around the city that day as they rolled into the parking lot of Mom's Burgers.

Mom's Burgers have been operated for over three decades founded by Joyce "Mom" McLaurin, who like a few others started a mom and pop burger joints around the surrounding neighborhoods. This place is a very low maintenance burger shack that had two outdoor benches and a half dozen stools around the counters.

I wanted to ordered the big Colossal burger that they had listed in the menu, but they ran out of the pastrami that day. The guy behind the big shatterproof window smoothly talked me into ordered the Mom's Bacon burger, which is almost essentially like Colossal burger, but minus the pastrami and extra patty.

Mom's Bacon Burger Combo ($6.30)

I have to admit, I have slowed down on ordering these massive patties because they tend to not cook very well because of the lack of seasoning in a big burger patty and also undercook/overcook a patty because of its size. I didn't have to worry too much of that as I thought the patty was excellent. With or without that bacon, I thought the burger was juicy and a messy debacle that was easily ignored because you would inhale that in less than 5 minutes.

The burger combo comes with a side of fries and a can of soda of your choice. A major brownie point for this place: Pepsi is the prefer choice!

The prefer choice of soda drink at Mom's Burgers

The next two choices are very much the epitome of what a ghetto burger is all about these days: adding egg to the patty. I guess I'm not used to it or ever really experience it other than on a sausage link sandwiches, but it was something I mostly definitely needed to add.

I ordered the popular Chronic burger which was essentially a bacon burger with an addition of an egg on top of it. So essentially, for about 76 cents more, you would get the same Mom's Burger with an added egg which was a much better selection. That was also another burger that didn't take long to wolf down.

Junior Chronic Burger Combo ($7.06)

The hot link sandwich didn't have an egg, so I added on with no fuss at all. That was one great thing about this place was that even though they didn't have much selections, but you can customized it with any added ingredients to your likings as if you were at one of The Counter franchise burger joint.

The burgers and sandwiches are on the gourmet burgers price range you normally would find at Red Devils, Blue Dahalia, or at Pete's. You won't find Mom's Burgers comparable to your average local burger joint and definitely better than the surrounding burger shacks like Fresh and Meaty or Three Bears.

Hot Link Sandwich ($2.71) + Egg ($0.54)

The big question is whether or not it's worth driving to a remote place just for a simple burger? The truth is that the burger is pretty good, but driving all the way there would required you to travel to another place and used this burger shack as a pit stop for your burger munching. Driving it for just the burger would not be necessary.

Considering the prices that was charged, I'm just shock that the burgers are recession proof. Tam's burgers are 99 cents each and In-N-Out burgers are cheaper, but for the price and value, it was worth the order.

Would this place's serving qualify as a ghetto burger? The city of Compton wants to let others know that the city is turning a new leaf and wants the label of ghetto to be repeal.

Mom's Burgers
336 W Alondra Blvd
Compton, CA 90220
(310) 632-6622

Grade:

Grand Preview: D-Town Burger Bar (Downtown L.A.)

Here's an interesting thing on my way to the Varnish earlier this week: another new place opened up in downtown L.A. This time is a burger joint that is about a few blocks away from Cole's and the Varnish bar where I was going to meet up a few friends for a night cap drinks.

I was pondering about whether or not to grab a quick bite before stepping into the place since it will be a while before dinner time. I was made aware of this place by a downtown blog, which gave me a favorable impression of the place. It just opened up on March 6, so it was not even two weeks old when I made this visit.

It was pretty quiet at around 5pm in the afternoon and I was probably one of the only two patrons in here. The jukebox was playing in the background and a shiny new counter that reminds you of the old classic diner was in full effect as well. A much more retro place than a Johnny Rocket? Perhaps. This place is a bit tad tight in terms of space, but then again it's down LA. As pointed out, it has a nice counter bar seats with several tables scattered around the bar counter.

Stepping inside, a big board on the east side wall is where the menu has been positioned at. As you can see, it's very limited with only three visible items on hand: a burger, hot dog, and fries. There is also a vegetarian burger if you desired, but it's really bare bone at this moment.

The Current Menu

My initial thought was that this has to be their launch menu. I'm pretty certain that they will add more items when they do get a chance. It's just like any other burger joints that started in its infancy as it will take time for the menu to grow. From what I gathered, it was a very straight forward menu.

I ordered their combo meal #1, which consists of a burger, mixture of regular fries and sweet potato fries, with a regular soft drink. The burger was not bad at all. It was served with fresh vegetables and the quality was almost similar to what you can get at either Five Guys & Burgers or Red Robins.

For $6.75, it was cheaper than a comparable burger combo I got yesterday at a Compton joint. Even better news, not much different in terms of quality of taste against some of the more overpriced burgers that is out there in West Hollywood or even beach cities. Just for a downtown burger joint, it's priced right about what you can get around here. Just think about it, a sausage joint is charging $6 for a sausage dog. Yes, that's the current rate at downtown L.A. these days.

Combo #1 - Burger, mixed fries, and a softdrink ($6.75)

Obviously, it's hard to judge a place that was just opened and with many new additions that is about to come. They probably need to make some finishing touches and work out some of their kinks. For a brand new two weeks-old place, it was very solid and probably will be a hit. I probably could hang out here just to shoot a breeze at a early supper hour. Couldn't quite fathom what this place will be like when they are busy, since it's a very small place.

Post note: As I was going home at 10pm after my Varnish visit, this place was packed. So indeed, this place is doing pretty well at late night and probably busy as well during lunch hours.

D-Town Burger Bar
216 W 6th St
Los Angeles, CA 90014
(213) 228-0022

Lost n da Hood @ Three Bears Bar-B-Q (Los Angeles)

Try to imagine myself in part of Goldilocks in "Three Bears" stories getting lost in the woods. Instead of the woods, let's replaced it with da hood and the good ol' gruffly Pepsi Monster is playing the sweet naive little girl in this fairy tale.

My mission (unlike the little girl getting lost in the forest and finding an abandoned cottage with porridge being cooked in the hot pot unattended) was just simply trying to find a good old burger joint in this neck of the woods. An urban legend was spewed to me that a good ol' neighborhood place had a gigantic burger that rivaled Hawkin's House of Burgers and Big Mike in an epic proportion for the most gluttonous burger in town. In any ways possible, I just have to see it for myself.

I didn't get lost like Goldilocks, but I did felt like I'm out of my elements coming to this neighborhood. There were a few glances looking in my direction as though I shouldn't be here. Don't worry, it wasn't like this place was so dangerous you need to be on the lookout for a suicide bomber.

The place is so typical of the yesteryear's burger or taco shack. It is very small with a few tables inside for dining area. Maybe the place gave some hints of elements about its surrounding neighborhood as it had a metal bars on every window and the cashier counter have a very small space for the food to come out, but not for a hand with a gun to go through (unless it's a small revolver).

Picture of Laurence Fishburne is next to "We Reserved the Right to Refuse Service to Anyone" sign

The urban legend that was recounted to me was dead on. The menu board consist of burgers named after all types of bear. The biggest burger was called "Smokey Bear" with the smallest being called "Baby Bear". They have different types of burgers with different toppings of pastrami, egg, or different sizes that were named "Grandma Bear", "Polar Bear", "Koloa Bear", and "Panda Bear". Their most famous burger that rivaled the Whopper or Famous Star (in this area) was the "Grizzly Bear" which was a double decker similar to Smokey, which is a triple decker.

After placing a few orders and checking out the place, I have noticed a small photo of Laurence Fishburne picture taken with the owner/manager? of the place. A small captioned below the picture stated he was here for $3 beer & chicken weekday special. Wow! I didn't know the CSI guy was a major baller. Yes, there is an economy special for cheap booze and a piece of wing during selected weekday evenings.

First off, a little warning about this place: the wait time for the burger to be cook will be very extensive of a wait. If you happened to think this is a fast food joint, think again. As some of these burgers will attest because of its size, especially the bigger burger will required a time of at least 10-15 minutes to be cooked. I waited about for over half of a hour for all my items to be ready.

My first thought about the seeing the Smokey Bear special was how ridiculously big it was. The buns are too small to handle the beef patties as I suspected the beef patties weighed at least half of a pound EACH. It has a very good charcoal pepper seasoning on the patties. Alas, with all big burger, there is one problem: when you bite into it, the middle of the burger is very bland.

Smokey Bear ($16.99 for the combo)

With all these different components of topping flying around (pastrami and butterfly cut sausage), nobody ever thought of the big burger needed seasoning in the middle or inside of the patties. Once I finished chewing the top portion and get down to the middle portion of the beef patty, you will get a noticeable difference in taste. The seasoning is only on the outside of the patties and not incorporated to the inside of the patties. Therefore I surmised that they added the pepper when it was grilled to cook and not mixed into the ground patties.

The Smokey Bear was huge and in an epic disproportion compared to the buns. The Top layer of the triple decked burger has a butterfly cut sausage (split in half) with a slice of cheese. They stocked the pastrami on the bottom layer of the burger. The burger as usual come in an aluminum foil to make sure the grease didn't sipped through.

The top and bottom layer of Smokey Burger

I ordered a $16.99 combo for that burger, it came with two cans of soda (they do have Pepsi, but it was diet) and two orders of seasoned fries. The best thing about this place was their onion rings and their seasoned fries. I wished I had ordered multiple orders of those two side orders because it was some of the best fries and onion rings I had ever had. They put some sort of garlic seasoning on those fries and it was delicious. The onions was battered just right and was worth it for $3.

They ran out of Pepsi, so I took Dr. Pepper

The other items I had ordered was a slice of their peach cobbler (which was OK) and a Grandma Bear burger that comes with a pastrami. The Grandma burger was much more manageable to finish as it feel like a big Whopper with a pastrami added on. That would have been fine until I realized it was $7.95 just for the burger itself.

Grandma Burger with Pastrami ($7.95)

Then my thoughts sucker punched in the guts when realization hit me that majority of these items was much more expensive than a conventional burger joint. Yes, it does it rival gourmet places like Grace or 25 Degrees in price, and much more bigger. For the price they were charging? A doozy that put me to sleep like Goldilocks in Baby Bear's bed.

The Smokey burger was a tad underwhelming, the Grandma Bear felt like undervalued, and the peach cobbler was OK at best. The only saving grace was their fries and onion rings. If that was the highlight, then you are going to be in a big sticker shock for the main items.

An order of fries and onion rings

Curiously, I wanted to take home a BBQ item since the burger was so underwhelming. By luck, there was something that came through for the night, it was their Tri Ribs. I ordered their "baby" version and came away very satisfy. It was nicely cooked, very tender and the sauce gave the right flavor to the ribs. If I come back, the Barbeque items are the ones I want to try out as it was badly overlooked because of the folk tales for the gigantic burgers.

Baby Tip Ribs ($5.99)

I guess I wouldn't say that I would make my way coming here again soon. If I meandered my way down south of Harbor freeway and needed some tri ribs and some onion rings with a few cans of Dr. Pepper, then I'm there. Otherwise, I might stick with the Big Mike for my burger feast.

Three Bears Bar-B-Q
11916 S Figueroa St
Los Angeles, CA 90061
(323) 754-7664

Grade:

New Found Twin @ Father's Office (Culver City)

For Father's Office review in Santa Monica, please read here.

There are some sequels that needed a "reboot" as it would be seen in a different light than the original. The term "reboot" was coined by Hollywood movie industry insiders who were disappointed by the results of a popular movie series wanted reconstruct a storyline at any given timeline for their franchise character. They wanted to keep the name and soul of the characters in tact, but the producers and the powers to be wanted a new direction in terms of the story lines. In a nice way, they pretty much wanted to rewrite the entire back story and reintroduce the character in a whole new setting, plot, and maybe even time line.

I'm sure everyone is familiar with James Bonds, Batman, and even Incredible Hulk going through a phase of transformation. The Great news? Even Father's Office have to go through a reboot.

The original Father's Office on Montana Ave in Santa Monica was to me, a townie's sports bar that serves out excellent choices of beer and gourmet bar food in Jack Tripper's Regal Beagle that plays Van Halen's music. It's small, it's dingy, and to the point, it's very yuppish. The place looked like a bar that caters to frat house crowd on a Friday & Saturday night which would even made Mr. Roper stayed home.

When the new location was proposed, the planners have to "re-imagine" on how this place should look. One of the first thing they decided to do is to modernized the layout of the place. Instead of trying to convey to the crowd that it's a bar, they made it more sleeker and posh to give it more of a lounge look. At night, the mood is more darker and dimmer (hence my pictures without flash will be more grainier), as it will gave you a more romantic atmosphere in case you desired it.

One thing I noticed right off the bat regarding the atmosphere was that most bars tend to be festive with loud shouts and echos. With the reboot of this place, the lounge atmosphere had a more subtle mood with less chaotic noise. You can actually carry out a conversation with the people across the table. Maybe it's not for everybody, but I love the fact you can be loose and just hang out. Even with televisions all decked throughout the establishment with live sports game, it never felt like a sports bar, but a cozy lounge with a finely dark oak finish bar and tables.

As in the food wise, I think they did watched an episode of Top Chef. They probably realized that people don't want to eat their burgers with greasy buns, so they substituted with a buns from sub sandwiches. That way, the grease won't sipped through the bun and make it slippery to hold the burger. I actually was impressed by that nice little change.

The food as always a little bit pricey for a gourmet bar food. It's about $10-14 for each main dish with $2 extra for frites. Oh, there is a disappointment to report, they got rid of the cute little shopping carts for fries.

The big draw to coming to Father's Office is still the large selections of more than 30 beers on tap, fabulous wine selections and now featuring several interesting small bites food items on their menu. Oh, here's another catcher, there is also outdoor seating in the new FO V2 where if you want the scenester's feel.

The service also felt much more professional and much more geniunely personable where in Montana Ave's location felt like they worked in a townie bar way too long. The subtle difference in the clientile can be felt also where it does feel like you are not with the townies, but with the more mature jazz lounge crowds.

Dry Cider

This reboot get my seal of approval in terms of improvement in service, atmosphere, and decor. The price of the food still gnaws me a little bit, but I love their drinks selections anywhere from the Anderson Valley Poleeko Gold to my dry cider made here in CA. It never looked like the first original location and got a whole new makeover from the other bar. Changes that were made are all for the upgrade improvements from the previous place.

A refreshing change for the same familiar character. Let's just hope Superman can get the same reboot treatment others have enjoyed.

Here are the current hours of operation for this location:

Monday-Thursday
BAR: 5 pm - 1 am
KITCHEN: 5 pm - 11 pm

Friday-Saturday
BAR: 12 pm - 2 am
KITCHEN: 12 pm - 12 am

Sunday
BAR: 12 pm - 12 am
KITCHEN: 12 pm - 10 pm

Father's Office Version 2.0
3229 Helms Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90034
(310) 736-2224

Grade:

Big Burger @ Big Mike's Restaurant (Bellflower)

Oh my! I think I will require a double bypass surgery after coming here. There was a famous slogan of "Seven Days without a Big Mike's Burger makes one weak". I was about to find out what makes this burger the cream de la of the burger world.

The interior of the place

At first I thought it was an urban myth about this place. I already experienced Hawkin's House of Burgers' most special prize: Their Hawkins Special. I was tempted to just check out this place because all those reviews and pictures of the gigantic burger lovingly known as the Big Mike was going to be my conquering destiny. I just couldn't passed up that chance since it's only 10 minutes away from me.

Big Mike is basically a combination of both burger shack and a Cajun gumbo & deep fried joint. Besides the well known burger, they also served BBQ steak sandwiches, fried catfish, BBQ ribs, and fried red snapper.

But c'mon, we all know we are here on a clandestine mission to check out the Big Mike.In this very low maintenance of a fine establishment where ESPN is on the telly and having your self served utensils next to the counter, this is the low frill place where you will be hunkering down the Kong-istic burger.

Each of the Big Mike is consist of one pound of big patty, two sausage hot links, and 2 cheese in a big bun. If you get that burger, it comes with a big Gulp-size drink of your choice, and a bag of fries at a cost about $6.95 (still a buck cheaper than for one measly burger without fries or drinks from Apple Pan!!).

Double Big Mike

So, with all that in mind, I decided to tempt faith and get the DOUBLE Big Mike. Instead of one beefy patty, I got TWO beefy patty. No one will ever bring up the question of "Where's the Beef?" after looking at this monstrosity!

The Double Big Mike with a drink and fries cost $11.50 (same price for one lousy gourmet burger from Father's Office, which wasn't even that good). This thing is relatively a bargain and an awesome feast that will never get finished in one sitting. I almost had settle into a subliminal coma.

The Fries & Drink comes with the burger; Corn on cob & potato salad comes with tri tip.

Forget about finishing the hot ramen in Orochon in less than 30 minutes. I dare anyone trying to finish the DOUBLE Big Mike in less than 30 minutes!

I'll be honest about this sucker. I didn't even come close to finishing it in one sitting. Heck, I didn't even finished in two meals. This two pound hunker weight like a brick when I took it home in a paper bag and could have been a huge paper weight for the stacks of papers I got at home.It is just a forgone conclusion in that it will take a while to finish off this thing. People wondered what the real Big Mike looked like. Well, the dude is Big and very soft spoken. He had this place since 1996 according to some paper clippings in the wall and was showing off the picture of first original Big Mike burger.

The top layer of Double Big Mike with sausage

They also served breakfast all day long along with gumbo soup, chili, beef oxtails, and other Texan style breakfast. Wings, chickens, and pork chops are awesome here too. I got the pork chop dinner and that is going to be my meal for the day after.

Oh, if there is anything besides the burger you will need to get is their Tri Tips. Those delicious tender pieces of steak are moist and scrumptious under a thick layer of their special sauce. That was one item on their menu I would strongly suggest getting besides the gigantic burger.

Tri Tip

He has interesting slogan or motto for his place which other reviewers had pointed it out. "Seven Days without a Big Mike's Burger makes one weak". hahahaha, oh, I wish that it does me weak with food coma, but I had to admit that monstrosity did do damage to me in a good way. I don't know if I can't live without it, but I can tell you I will fulfill my clandestine challenge again.

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They are closed on Sundays and they do have outside sitting with a bench on the side.

Big Mike's Restaurant
17845 Clark Ave
Bellflower, CA 90706
(562)866-6967

Grade: