An Amateur Vegan Chef: Homemade In-N-Out Burgers Veganized!!

If you're like myself pre-vegetarian I enjoyed myself an In-N-Out burger or two. I was never a big burger eater, but they did know how to make one. Post vegetarian I enjoyed their "grilled cheese" which was delish, and post vegan I'm left with slight cravings for their grilled crispy buns, raw onions, tasty dressing and melted cheese!! And who says you can't have one vegan??? It was actually quite easy. Even Husband who isn't a big veggie burger fan thought it tasted "just" like an in-n-out burger...minus the veggie patty. =)

I used:
Boca original vegan burger patty (these are the best I've found thus far and are quite tasty!)

I bought some potato buns with onion. I typically buy sprouted wheat buns which are my fav and are healthy for you, but I thought since I was trying to mimick INO that they wouldn't do, so I opted for the less healthy, ingredient list a mile long buns for the sake of the recipe.

Onions
Pickles
Lettuce Leaves

Homemade thousand island dressing (see below for recipe, super easy!)

daiya cheese
Mustard

Thousand island: I used this site as a guideline to the recipe, but made some modifications. No milk or eggs and I reduced the recipe down by a lot because I didn't want that much. This is super fast, easy and I usually have the ingredients on hand. If you don't have the worcestershire sauce I think it would taste just fine.

~ 1/4 cup Ketchup

~ 1/4 cup Mayo (I use vegenaise)

~ 1 Tablespoon of relish
A few dashs of vegan worcestershire sauce
A sprinkle of sugar
Mix together all ingredients in a bowl, then refridgerate until chilled

Husband loves the animal style burger at INO. I googled exactly what that meant since I wan't to get as close as I could and it is extra sauce, extra grilled oninos, pickles and mustard fried on the patty. I can do that!! You can't have INO without fries so I started there. I took a few potatoes and instead of cubing them like usual I sliced them thin and long like fries. I put them on a baking pan sprayed with olive oil with my handy misto. Sprinkled salt and pepper, slap ya mama seasoning and some rosemary (this is key! LOVE rosemary on my potatoes!). These obviously are a step up from INO fries but thats how we do it at my house! =) I popped them in the oven until crispy. Meanwhile I started the burgers.

Pre-Baked

I heated two pans with olive oil. One smaller one for grilling the onions and buns and the other for the pattys. I spread some mustard on the uncooked pattys and put them in the heated pan to cook. Chopped the oninos but kept them in rings and tossed in the other heated pot to grill. Flip the pattys until thoroughly cooked, while stirring the onions.

When the onions were done I put them on a plate and I grilled the buns on each side until crisp. Don't forget to check the potatoes. Once they were done I turned the oven down to warm and kept them in there until the rest of the food was ready. I also tossed the buns that were done in there as well since the pattys weren't ready yet. The last bun that was in the pan I tossed the onions on the side so they heated back up. When the pattys were done I topped with some daiya cheese and left on the stove until melted.

Once everything was done cooking I assembled! I used approximately two tablespoons of dressing for each burger. Topped with onions (I like raw oninos, but used the grilled for Husband), then burger patty, pickles, then a lettuce leaf. (You can add sliced tomatoes too if you like, but I'm not a fan of tomatoes on my burger). If you so desire use leftover dressing for dipping your fries!