Friday, January 23, 2009

Blue Plate Diner, Salt Lake City, UT

As you know, all none of you reading this blog, I'm a big fan of The Food Channel and when Guy Feieri raved about a homemade veggie burger at the Blue Plate Diner ... which is like a real mainstream food joint but with a section on their menu for veggie meals, you know it had to go down on my list.

I ordered the Fried Ravioli just to help my future cardiologist pay for his kids education ... it was like one of those impulse items at the cash register. But I was going to order a side of Tempura Onion Rings but the waitress, who was really nice and helpful and attentive suggested subbing them for the fries. Hey, and I didn't even know we could do that. Waitresses can be like goddesses sometimes.

The ravioli was great, lightly breaded with italian bread crumbs and the perfect crisp on the outside and the cheese was just perfectly oozy on the inside. The dipping sauce was interesting, a homemade marinara type with carrots and other veggies. Nice and flavorful and a bit different from the usual red sludge one gets with a fried appetizer.

But, no crushed red pepper flakes. That was just silly and would have made the dish perfect. I didn't feel like ravioli with tabasco. nah, wrong.

The burger came and I don't know, I was perhaps holding the barre too high and expecting the worlds best vegan burger. (The others weren't home made), and it was good but it didn't knock my socks off. Maybe I did it myself by ordering the chedder cheese and vegetarian chili on top instead of being a purist and just having a burger. One of the problems is I was with a carnivore and although sometimes feel like ordering one of everything I just can't for financial and it's just embarrasing to sit at a table with 5 hamburger plates and not be sharing.

It was heavy and it was sort of thick and weighted down. I tried to put the lettuce and tomato on it and then it became a structural engineering nightmare ... trying to slide the bun to the edge of the plate and lever the entire structure up with a fork. And although the flavor was there it didn't erupt in my mouth like some other vegan burgers with chili and cheese.

The onion rings were more like a beer battered ring...which I love...and so does my future cardiologist where he may be...but they weren't the light and airy tempura rings that I was expecting.

I'd go back again and give it another shot and this time try the other burger substitues. I really wanted to try the sausage one and the chicken one and why not, the vegetarian one too...unless it's just a gardenburger. Well, next time in Salt Lake we'll roll on by.

Oh, and the coffee was damn good, just like diner coffee should be.

Marty