Until this week, it was only available in a friendly dive on the sea floor called “The Krusty Krab.”
But now, the “crown jewel” of burgers — the Krabby Patty — is making an appearance in restaurants all across North America, including in Chicago.
No, Plankton hasn’t finally got his little green hands on the patty’s secret formula. As part of the 25th anniversary celebration of “SpongeBob SquarePants,” Nickelodeon and Paramount have announced “The Krabby Patty Kollab,” running Oct. 8-27 at participating eateries.
About 250 restaurants will begin offering their own interpretations of the Krabby Patty this week, including at about a dozen eateries in the Chicago area.
Those include Soul & Smoke and, beginning Tuesday, plans to offer a brisket patty with smoked provolone, house-made secret sauce, pickles, iceberg lettuce, mustard greens — all on a potato bun. It is served with a side of potato puffs.
Soul & Smoke has locations in the West Loop and Avondale, but the special is only available in Evanston.
“Once school goes back in, things start to slow down and we have to attract [customers]. So we thought it could be a fun way to have a little fun in October,” said Heather Bublick, one of Soul & Smoke’s co-owners.
The Krabby Patty Kollab promotion folks told Bublick the only rule was no seafood (kind of makes sense, since the owner of the joint is a crab).
The actual recipe for the real Krabby Patty is a closely guarded secret in the show. So the culinary artisans have considerable latitude. The series’ original sandwich, however, has no latitude for SpongeBob, and features — in a very specific order — the bottom bun, one patty, ketchup, mustard, pickles, extra onions, lettuce, cheese, tomato and top of bun.
Other Chicago-area restaurants participating in the promotion include: Bagel Miller (4655 N. Lincoln), Can’t believe It’s Not Meat (multiple locations), Edzo’s Burger Shop (1571 Sherman Ave., Evanston), Frontier (1072 N. Milwaukee), Joey’s Red Hots (multiple locations), Penelope’s Vegan Taqueria (5204 N. Clark and 230 W. Chicago), Rubi’s on 18th (1316 W. 18th), Seoul Taco (multiple locations), Taqueria Chingon (2234 N. Western), The Dearborn (145 N. Dearborn) and The Region (2057 W. Roscoe).
Wendy’s restaurants across the United States and in Canada are also participating and plan to offer promotional items through early November.
For a list of participating restaurants across the globe, visit krabbypattykollab.com.