When I first saw the shiny new "Urbun Burger" sign go up on Valencia, I made a bad joke about it sounding like "the rural juror," and apparently I was not the only person this occurred to. It's an awkward name. Their menu looked pretty good though, especially the build-your-own setup, with lots of different choices (5 meats/meat substitutes, 9 sauces, different toppings). It's definitely not the cheapest burger or sandwich you can buy, but given how shiny and "loft-y" the restaurant looks, and the re-inventing-the-burger-as-gourmet-food sound of the name, $7.75 for a basic burger (including fries) didn't seem so bad.
I got a portobello mushroom patty with grilled onions and barbecue sauce. The portobello was cooked just right, grilled through but not too soft. The barbecue sauce was pretty standard, but that's fine by me - "gourmet" "barbecue sauce" is often neither. The grilled onions were plentiful and delicious. Lettuce, tomato and (fresh) onion come on the side with a pickle spear. The bun was one of the best parts of this burger, huge and soft but not soggy, although my portobello kept trying to slide out of it.
Overall, this was a great portobello burger. Their regular vegetarian burgers are made with orginal gardenburger patties, which are not vegan and are also nowhere near as tasty as wildwood burgers (or a lot of other veggie patties). Also I'm pretty sure their top secret "urbun sauce" is the same sauce that's on big macs. But the food was good. I want to go back and try the sweet potato fries.
that sandwich looks great. I didn't used to like mushrooms very much and I haven't tried portobello again since I've come to enjoy them.
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