I don't know why people eat soy burgers when black bean burgers are so damn good.

I mean, not as good as a medium (bordering right there on medium rare, so perfect) hamburger, but there it is.

@2 That's what I really don't understand about "fake" vegetarian/vegan food that's meant to be a facsimile of something else. Tofurkey, Quorn, shit like that. Why go to all that trouble making a second class copy that comes up far short when you can use actual vegetarian/vegan ingredients and make something that even a meat-eater would enjoy?

Public school lunches in the 70's used to have soy burgers (They called them "hamburgers", and they had enough meat in them to make them presentable, but they laced them with soy as well. It was one of the few things that I liked for lunch.

Their most odious entree was something called "Chicken Fried Steak", which had to be avoided at all costs.

Veggie Grill does actually do some pretty decent fake 'chicken' wings. No, I'm not paid to write this, I ate some, and liked them.

I also like a nice juicy medium rare Angus burger though.

@3: Have you ever had Chinese cuisine of "meat" dishes, like Kung Pao Chicken, but made and seasoned superbly from soy? There was a restaurant near the Seattle Center in the 80s/90s where the whole menu was like that. The flavors were great and it was so light.

But yeah, these are exceptions. Generally, tofu is not prepared and served well.

@5: There are plenty of tasty veggie meat alternatives. They're rarely healthy for you, though.

Tempeh > plain soy anyday. It doesn't taste like meat, it's certainly its own thing.

I appreciate that you are publishing 7-yr olds' letters now.

@4 We had mystery casserole Mondays. Never was so glad to have the salad bar!

Some people love the taste of meat but have a moral objection to killing animals for food, or can't reconcile their consciences to the enormous amount of resources it takes to grow beef on an industrial scale, or something. Those people want fake meat that tastes like meat.

Some people don't want meat at all, and aren't interested in the taste of it. Those people want veggie burgers that taste like veggie burgers.

No big mystery.d

@2: Black bean burgers are awesome, as are Boca burgers. But I'll generally prefer something made from the flesh of kine, if given the option. Tofu has its place, but that place is in East Asian noodle or rice dishes, not between the halves of a sesame seed bun.

@6. It"s still there

http://www.thestranger.com/slog/2016/04/…

@6 and @13 Better hustle in there and eat if you like this restaurant's food. Some vegans are going into these people's kitchen and forcing them to change the ingredients in their dishes and revamping their whole menu!!! everything will taste different, and if their long-time non-vegan clientele don't like how the new dishes taste and leave, this place will be gone before Christmas! ! These are probably not widely-travelled, well-financed career chefs who like to (and can afford to) create new "fusion" food with innovative ingredients. They're immigrants so probably just people who cook the way their family taught them to cook, and they opened the restaurant when they came here because that's the fastest way they could feed their kids without fluent English and familiarity with American culture.

I'm beyond shocked that a small loud group of people can use Yelp blackmail to force a restaurant's kitchen to change their ingredients, their offerings, and even their suppliers like this. It's disgraceful to do this to an immigrant family terrified of losing their livelihood. Imagine what would happen if they tried to force themselves into, say, Tilth's kitchen and change what's put in the dishes there and where Tilth's Chef buy ingredients/supplies!

On top of it all, to ask people to tell Bamboo Garden to switch to a 100 percent vegan restaurant! What if they switched and there's not enough vegan business for them to survive? Not everyone wants 16 grains on their bread and hates honey! Killing a long time small family business, because of traces of eggs and honey in prepackaged ingredients from Asia???

I hate humans! So fucking cruel.

@13 & 14, Thanks.

I want a barbequed ground beef burger with red onions and all the trimmings, to hell with the vegan crap.

Badly-cooked tofu is indeed bland, so one of Anonymous's problems seems to be that ze has only ever had poorly prepared tofu products. Zir bigger problem is the degree to which ze cares what other people are eating.

@7 tempeh tastes like something scraped from under a toe nail.