Rice Burger — Restaurant in Vancouver

Worth visiting just for the atmosphere and service alone; the fact that the food is freshly made to a high standard every time is just a nice bonus.

That said, Rice Burger is one of a handful of food establishments I've visited where the quality of the food and service is consistently high.

Anything fried always comes out nice and crispy, the rice burger "buns" don't fall apart, and I love that most of the ingredients are sourced from BC-based (if not local) suppliers.

Jackson, the owner, and his crew provide the best service I've ever received in any fast casual restaurant, and Jackson himself knows all his regulars, whether they're customers or delivery drivers who happen to stop here a lot.

I've been coming here for years (to the point where Jackson knows me and considers me one of his "OG customers" - his words, not mine) and the food has never gotten worse at any point.

In fact, I once brought some friends who had eaten at MOS Burger (the inventor of the rice burger) in Japan here and they found this better than the original. If this doesn't drive the point home, then I don't know what does.

The menu has more than just the namesake rice burgers and the prices are reasonable for the quality you get in return. Besides the burgers, the kimchi fries are a must-try (especially with meat) and I'm also a huge fan of the bowls.

When I recently visited, Jackson did ask me to provide feedback on a new change to his rice burger recipe where the lettuce and tomato he'd been using for years was eliminated in favour of a slaw mixed with Japanese mayo and lemon juice. I asked him where he wanted me to give this feedback and he said a Google review was fine, so here it is.

Full disclosure: while I did receive a free drink in exchange for this feedback on the recipe change, all opinions honestly expressed here are my own. The rest of the review is based entirely on my own experience here.

While I do strongly prefer the crisp slaw to the former lettuce and tomato, which left a lot to be desired, I do wish that it had just a bit more flavour and that the lemon-mayo dressing was a bit creamier and thicker.

It was somewhat watery and most of it ended up at the bottom of the burger box, which could explain why it had that somewhat bland taste to it. That said, I still find it better than what it replaced at the end of the day.

Whether you've never heard of a rice burger before or you've already tried one somewhere else, I highly recommend stopping by here sometime (or finding their truck at the PNE) whenever you find yourself...

Good potential but a bit underwhelming. I had the spicy chicken katsu rice burger and pork kimchi fries combo which, even with 15% off, was $21 with a can of Sidra.

The kimchi fries were actually quite good and somewhat remincient of the old Bao Down Gastown days, although the pork belly in those was on another level compared to the shredded bulgogi-style pork in Rice Burger's fries.

The rice buger was rather bland, and not at all spicy. It was just the chicken, some coleslaw, and the rice "bun". The rice doesn't taste like there's any seasoning done to it. The chicken was well cooked and a decent size, but lacked any real flavour especially for something labeled as "spicy." The coleslaw was...coleslaw. Some seasoning on the rice, some actual spicy sauce (a gochujang-based sauce or marinade would be an easy fix) and maybe some simple pepper would go a long way to improving this.

Service was good - they bring the food to your table if you're eating in. Music was generic top-40 radio - I feel like some lo-fi music or hip hop would be a much better fit and give the place some character.

I'm glad I finally got to try it. While it wasn't "bad" I likely won't be back unless I catch some reviews that they've punched up the flavours...

DO NOT VISIT THIS PLACE AT NIGHT. I REPEAT, DO NOT VISIT THIS PLACE AT NIGHT. I literally waited a good 5 minutes as 2 line cooks chatted it up while doing next to nothing(one of them even looked directly at me). After I was helped I watched one of their line cooks literally pick up his phone TWICE to answer it and do other things with the same gloves he used to prepare and make the food. Absolutely disgusting - who knows where that phone has been and to touch it and make food with the same disgusting gloves. I was doing DoorDash at this time and I called him out on it and told him I would call the owner to let him know that his actions were not foodsafe and his response was "what are you going to do? Tell him? Go ahead" - you idiot, I just told you I was going to. Not to mention, he lied straight to my face - "sorry for the long wait... pause...we're really busy" yeah.. ok there bud. Do I look like an idiot? Theres a window looking directly at your line.

Austin, if you are reading this - this incident happened on March 4th btwn 4-8PM and it was the shorter and chunkier of the 2 guys you had working...