Sketch Burger

Sunday March 14th 2010
Sketch Burger, E Girard at Columbia, Philadelphia, PA.

There’s a funny story about Sketch Burger, which involves a guy named Alex Hampshire, who’s a little bit of a funny story himself. Alex committed himself to the inexplicable torture of vegetarianism for nine years of his life, a diet that consists mostly of chick peas and spaghetti, until one day he stopped into Sketch Burger.
“A Vegan Friendly Burger Shack.”, reads the decal on the window at Sketch. And indeed it is, vegan options are offered, vegan baked goods, sauces, the whole deal. They also serve lamb, beef, bison, chicken, and the real stuff, not soy imitations. Alex didn’t realize this.
“I’ll have the burger!”, He proudly declared to the woman at the register.
“Well how would you like it done?”, She responded.
“Really?” He asked, “How would I like it done?”
“Yes, we take our burgers very seriously.”
“Well, I guess I’ll have it rare.”, He instructed her.
And rare he had it, scarfing down near raw beef for the first time in nine years, apparently exclaiming out loud how much he was enjoying his burger the entire time. He left energized and excited, parading about town to spread the word about the Sketch. His friends informed him in no time that Sketch wasn’t solely a vegan place, and that he did indeed eat a burger comprised of rare beef, but instead of throwing a hippy tantrum Alex embraced his love for the Burger and changed his ways after nine years of youthful confusion.
Today I went to Sketch to see what all the fuss was about. Up to this point I thought it was called Sketch Burger because they secretly served vegans raw meat, but they actually give people free burgers every week for doing funny drawings which are displayed on the walls, much like the one seen below of Gordon Ramsey, who the waitress informed me thoroughly enjoyed his burger when he was in town.

Fancy things like Kobe Beef and Bison are offered, but again, the wallet, so I went with the regular burger, which I had with horseradish cheddar, and a tahini sauce. Now I didn’t grow up eating burgers because my mom boycotted fast food restaurants for allegedly tearing down the rainforest to raise cattle, and I don’t even eat them on much of a regular basis these days, so when I do I almost never get through the whole thing, especially from a place like this that serves them real big and all. I was left with a sauce laden half inch by half inch chunk which I certainly didn’t want to waste, but I had such an intense burger high going on that I couldn’t put my will power into finishing it and with my judgement impaired, I allowed the waitress to take it away.
We sat in our booth, my brain reeling out of control in a protein haze, admiring ridiculous crayon drawings of people with burger heads, burger adorned Christmas trees, and stick figure cops chowing down on a Sketch meal. Names of meats and animals written all over place, I couldn’t get my mind off of Alex, possibly sitting in the exact spot I was, having his mind blown to bits by the rush of the burger.
All said, I think Sketch Burger would be a fine place to take someone to break their meat edge.