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The Pumpkin Spice Latte Burger at Umami is definitely a novelty. It markets itself as not a "basic" burger. Yesterday it was only $4, same as a latte, so we decided to give it a try. (Its regular price is $12.)The PSL burger features your standard Umami beef patty topped with a garlic aioli, tempura Kabocha squash (otherwise known as Japanese pumpkin), spiced Mascarpone and a coffee glaze. It sounds so crazy that it just might work.
So we tried it, and well, we kind of regretted it. It's not that we ever regret trying something new, it's just that it was kind of like a heavy, meat dessert that languishes in the pit of your stomach for too long.
To be clear: We have eaten at Umami Burger in the past and liked it, typically when dealing with a more standard truffle burger washed down with a cold pint. And to this point, the burger patty itself and the bread were both fine, just like your usual Umami burger. The tempura Japanese pumpkin, however, comes drizzled in a sticky, sweet coffee glaze. These two components drag the burger down into a heavy, stomach ache if you don't have an iron gut. The kind that, if you work from home, makes you want to work prostrate in your bed wishing you had eaten a kale salad or sushi or an emergency MRE.
I ended up removing some of the lightly fried 'pumpkin' and scraping away the sticky glaze and found it to be much better.
My dining companion said it best: It would be a good novelty to try if you had four or more friends and cut it into pieces. Trying to eat one for lunch is just too much of too many supposedly good things.
Moral of the story: Save the pumpkin for your lattes, pies, these 35 Trader Joe's items or these six drinks; get the truffle burger.
