SANTA MONICA – Some days you wake up with a deep hunger, a fierce, intense craving for a big, juicy, delicious burger. Hundreds of restaurants serving burgers line the street, so where do you go? Two words: Umami Burger. Sure, you’ve heard musings, maybe even seen pictures of the iconic U they stamp on their burgers, but until your teeth have sunk into their mouthwatering food, you know not of what awaits you.

On the corner of Broadway and Sixth street sits the answer to all of your wildest burger dreams. You enter through the cute, little outdoor patio lined with greenery, wooden tables and heat lamps.

Upon arrival, a hostess and full bar greets you to left. Now it is time to sit back, sip on a beer, and relax.

During my visit, I waited with excitement after being seated. After all, I had heard chatter for years about this burger, but the question lingered: how would it live up to the hype? Upon being brought a menu, my waiter dropped off some complimentary pickles. After going back and forth I settled on a half order of fries and the Throwback Burger: two 3.5 oz. patties, white cheddar cheese, miso mustard, Umami ketchup, soy pickles and minced onions.

As I waited, the waiter brought me a tray of condiments, and then, just minutes later, my delectable burger sat in front of me. One bite was all it took for me to know that this burger was unlike any other. The juiciness of the patty alone was enough to make my taste buds do a little dance. But I had to wonder: what made this burger so unique?  Well Umami burgers contain something referred to as umami (no surprise.)

According to an article in the New Yorker, umami or the “fifth taste” is a concept that has actually been around since 1979, and was discovered by a Japanese chemist named Kikunae Ikeda, however, it did not gain popularity until about a decade ago.  It is actually a scientific concept about a type of food thats main ingredient is glutamic acid.  The New Yorker continues on, stating that recent research has shown that the “molecular compounds in glutamic acid-glutamates-bind to specific tongue receptors; this apparently, is what makes the magic,” and what makes the taste of umami so unique.  

Umami Burger simplifies their definition of Umami, and describe it on their website, by saying that “Umami means “deliciousness.” Beyond sweet, sour, salty, and butter, the fifth taste of umami is rich and savory…Umami-rich foods include soy sauce, miso paste and bonito flakes in Asian cuisine; and cured ham, cheese, tomatoes, ketchup and mushrooms in Western cuisine.”

Umami burger in Santa Monica is open from 11AM-11PM Monday-Thursday. They are open from 11AM-12AM on Friday, from 10AM-12AM on Saturday, and from 10AM-11PM on Sunday. Their burgers, however, are on the expensive side, ranging from $11.50-$15.00 and  if you want to add fries, a half order costs an extra $2.50, while a full order will set you back $4.00.  Want the same delicious food for a better price?  Come Monday-Thursday from 3PM-6PM and 9PM-closing to enjoy happy hour!

Photos courtesy of Umami burger in Santa Monica. 

–Story updated on September 13th.

By Laura Kelley (Zester Daily)

Umami, the fifth basic taste, is all the buzz promoted primarily by the exploding restaurant chain, Umami Burger.  In Santa Monica, Umami Burger is at 500 Broadway (enter on 5th street). Although only recently defined, umami is a component in produce, prepared foods and snacks that everyone loves.

Sort of like a sixth sense, umami represents savoriness. Like me, you may remember learning about the four tastes we inherited from the ancient Greeks: sweet, salty, sour and bitter. I vividly recall mapping these tastes on different areas of the tongue with a cotton swab in elementary school. A combination of modern science and culinary explorations into how we taste food, however, has turned this notion on its head and added umami to our pantheon of tastes.

Umami is carried in a number of molecules, but most notably in glutamic acid. Many foods are rich in glutamic acid, including ripe tomatoes, some mushrooms, asparagus, seafood, seaweed, kelp, soy sauce and some cheeses. Tasteless on its own, it is only when glutamic acid is broken down into L-glutamate by cooking, fermentation or other processes such as ripening in the sun that it offers up its savory taste.

Discovered in 1866 by German chemist Karl Heinrich Ritthausen, glutamic acid was later identified in evaporated kombu (kelp) broth in 1908 by Japanese researcher Kikunae Ikeda of Tokyo Imperial University. When he tasted the crystals in the evaporated broth, Ikeda found that they had an undeniable savory flavor that he detected in many foods. He named this “pleasant savory taste,” umami or うま味 from a combination of umai (うまい) “delicious” and mi (味) “taste” in Japanese.

Around the same time that Ikeda was investigating the science of taste, renowned French chef Auguste Escoffier was developing recipes rich in umami flavor using his intuition and culinary skill to explore the sensory qualities of food. One of the secrets to his deft use of umami was the importance of stock (particularly veal stock). He deglazed seared roasts with it, made soups with it, and used gelled stock in a wide variety of other dishes to add savory flavor to them.

What Escoffier didn’t realize was that his use of stock to add umami to French dishes was similar to the use of dashi in Japanese cooking. Dashi is a stock made from umami-rich fish (anchovies or sardines) or fish flakes (bonito) often in combination with different kinds of kelp and a small amount of sake. The best dashi is made by allowing ingredients to soak overnight before straining to extract and concentrate the glutamic acid in the stock.

So, many classic French recipes are ready sources of umami, as are a wide variety of Japanese dishes. Where else can you find umami-rich combinations? Well, dishes made with tomatoes and cheeses are like umami bombs that are enjoyed all over the world. In the Mediterranean, the most familiar sources are Italian dishes made with marinara sauce and Parmesan cheese. In Asia, the Tibetans enjoy the combination in their tomato-laden lamb or beef curries that use the blue cheese churu, and in the cheese-filled momo dumplings accented with a spicy tomato sauce dip.

Elsewhere along the Silk Road, salads mixing tomatoes and cheeses abound from western Asia through the Himalayas and into western China. One of my favorites is from Turkmenistan that uses cider vinegar and a little salt to accent the tomatoes and cheese flavored with cilantro. Another is one from Bhutan that uses the crackle of Szechuan peppercorns to blend pungent yak’s milk cheese with tart tree tomatoes. Both salads are loaded with glutamic acid and have high umami factors.

Other Silk Road dishes that have umami appeal are Persian omelets, called kukus, which are enjoyed all around western Asia. Turnovers stuffed with lamb and cheese with herbs, often called samosas, are enjoyed from western Asia to western China and are a great source of umami. I had the samosas pictured here at the bazaar in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, last year. Along with a salad of tomatoes and cheese, and a small kebab, it was a perfect lunch and in a way, indescribably savory and delicious.

Copyright 2016 Laura Kelley via Zester Daily and Reuters Media Express.  Some additions by Don Hughes.