Looking for Wayback Burgers vegetarian options? Your best bets are the Gardenburger, the Impossible™ patty, the Impossible™ Melt, and a short list of fried sides. Wayback is a better-burger chain built around beef, so the meatless list is small. But there’s a real veggie burger and a plant-based patty, and you can build a full meal around them. Below you’ll find what’s safe to order, what to skip, and what to ask the staff. New to the site? We built it to answer one question at every all-meat menu: what about the vegetarians?
A Quick Look at Wayback Burgers
Wayback Burgers opened its first restaurant in Newark, Delaware, in 1991 under the name Jake’s Hamburgers. Franchising began in the early 2000s. The chain became Jake’s Wayback Burgers in 2010, then dropped “Jake’s” in the summer of 2014 to avoid confusion with a smaller competitor in the South. Existing restaurants were allowed to keep their old Jake’s signs, so you may still spot one.
Today the company is based in Cheshire, Connecticut, and is a private, franchised brand run by Wayback Franchising, LLC. A July 2026 Wayback-sponsored profile on Franchising.com puts the chain at about 160 U.S. restaurants across 35 states, with roughly 200 worldwide. Wikipedia lists locations in seven countries, including the Dominican Republic, Canada, the United Arab Emirates and Japan. So it’s a regional name, and you may not have one nearby.
The menu leans on burgers, hot dogs, chicken sandwiches, salads and hand-dipped milkshakes. Wikipedia files it with the “better burger” crowd next to Five Guys and Shake Shack. That matters for you, because the sides and shakes do much of the work on a meatless order.
Wayback Burgers Vegetarian Options: What to Order
The short answer on Wayback Burgers vegetarian options: order a Craft Your Own burger with the Gardenburger® or Impossible™ patty, or get the Impossible™ Melt. Add fries, tater tots or onion rings. Wayback’s own site describes the Gardenburger® as made with natural vegetables and grains, and the Impossible™ patty comes from Impossible Foods. The table below follows Wayback’s official nutrition and allergen chart. Wayback doesn’t label anything vegetarian or vegan itself, so every mark here comes from the listed allergens and ingredients.
| Menu Item | Vegetarian | Vegan |
|---|---|---|
| Craft Your Own: Gardenburger® | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (chart lists milk) |
| Craft Your Own: Impossible™ | ✅ Yes | ⚠️ Check (bun, cheese and sauces you add) |
| Impossible™ Melt | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (Swiss cheese, aioli, chart lists egg and milk) |
| Kids’ Grilled Cheese | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (cheese and butter, chart lists milk) |
| Caesar Salad | ⚠️ Check (chart lists fish) | ❌ No (egg, fish and milk) |
| French Fry | ✅ Yes | ⚠️ Check (shared fryer, oil not stated) |
| Tater Tots and Cajun Tater Tots | ✅ Yes | ⚠️ Check (shared fryer, oil not stated) |
| Onion Rings | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (chart lists milk) |
| Fried Pickles | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (chart lists milk) |
| Cheese Fries | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (cheese sauce) |
| Cheese Curds | ⚠️ Check (rennet not disclosed) | ❌ No (dairy) |
| Bacon Cheese Fries and Chili Cheese Fries | ❌ No (bacon or chili) | ❌ No |
| Regular Milkshake and flavored shakes | ✅ Yes | ❌ No (dairy) |
| Lemonade, Strawberry Hibiscus Lemonade, Iced Tea | ✅ Yes | ✅ Yes |
A word on the Impossible™ patty. The chart lists soy and wheat for the plain Craft Your Own version, with no milk or egg. That makes it the closest thing to a vegan burger on the menu, but you still pick the bun, cheese and sauces. Ask for it without cheese and without the mayo-based sauces if you want it plant-based, and ask how the patty is cooked.
Burgers and Sandwiches
Craft Your Own: Gardenburger®
This is the classic meatless order. The chart lists milk, soy and wheat, so it isn’t vegan, but it’s a straightforward vegetarian patty. At 320 calories before toppings, it’s the lightest burger on the list. Expect a bun-and-toppings build, so add lettuce, tomato, onion and pickles for a fuller sandwich.
Craft Your Own: Impossible™
The Impossible™ patty runs 410 calories on the chart and lists soy and wheat. It’s the better pick if you want something meaty in texture. Build it the way you’d build any burger and skip the bacon.
Impossible™ Melt
Today’s melt stacks a quarter-pound Impossible™ patty with Swiss cheese, sautéed onions and Cajun remoulade on an inverted, grilled, buttered bun, per Wayback’s current menu. It launched as a limited-time Lent item in February 2020, with spicy garlic aioli in place of the remoulade back then. It’s on the current nutrition chart at 790 calories, listing egg, milk, soy and wheat. It’s vegetarian but not vegan. Menus can change by location, so confirm it’s still on yours.
Sides, Salads and Shakes
Sides carry most of a meatless meal here. French fries, tater tots, Cajun tater tots, onion rings, fried pickles and cheese curds all appear on the chart without any meat ingredient. The fries list soy and wheat only. Onion rings, fried pickles, cheese fries and cheese curds add milk.
The Caesar Salad lists egg, fish, milk, soy and wheat. The fish allergen is the tell that the dressing likely contains anchovy, and Wayback doesn’t say, so treat it as a skip unless a manager confirms. The Craft Your Own Bowl puts your choice of protein and toppings over fries, tater tots or lettuce. Ask whether your location will top it with a Gardenburger® or Impossible™ patty.
Milkshakes are the easy win. The regular milkshake, the Pumpkin Churro Shake and the Caramel Crème Brûlée Shake list only milk. The Chocolate Brownie Shake and Dubai Swirl add egg, which is fine if you eat eggs. Wayback doesn’t publish shake ingredient lists, so ask about mix-ins if gelatin is a concern. Lemonade, Strawberry Hibiscus Lemonade and iced tea list no allergens.
What’s Vegan at Wayback Burgers?
Not much, and nothing is labeled vegan. The Impossible™ patty, fries, tater tots, lemonade and iced tea come closest on paper. The Gardenburger® lists milk, so it’s out. Every dairy-based side and shake is out too. If you eat vegan, order an Impossible™ patty with no cheese, check the bun and sauces with the staff, and know that shared fryers and grills are possible.
Three Ways to Build a Meatless Meal
The menu is short, so a few combinations cover most visits. These use only items from the nutrition chart, and the calorie figures are Wayback’s own, before any toppings you add.
- The lighter plate: a Craft Your Own Gardenburger® (320 calories) with a regular French Fry (300 calories) and unsweetened iced tea.
- The plant-forward plate: a Craft Your Own Impossible™ patty (410 calories), no cheese, no mayo-based sauce, with a side of tater tots (450 calories). Tater tots and fries list no dairy, though fryer sharing isn’t stated.
- The full indulgence: the Impossible™ Melt (790 calories), a side of onion rings (390 calories), and a regular milkshake (600 calories).
Prices vary by franchise, so we haven’t listed any. Kids can get the Kids’ Grilled Cheese (380 calories) or the Kids’ Fry (180 calories), and both list no meat.
Special Dietary Requirements and Allergies
Wayback’s chart lists the major allergens per item, and almost every burger, bun and fried side lists soy and wheat. The Gardenburger® and most fried sides list wheat, so they aren’t gluten-free. Wayback’s menu and nutrition pages don’t describe its fryer oil or grill setup, so we can’t tell you which oil it uses or whether fryers are shared. Practices vary by franchise, so ask your location before you order fries next to a meat item.
- Caesar Salad lists fish, likely from anchovy in the dressing. Skip it unless the staff confirms otherwise.
- Wayback doesn’t say whether any of its cheeses use animal rennet. That matters most for cheese curds, which are pure cheese, so we’ve marked them as a check.
- Bacon Cheese Fries and Chili Cheese Fries contain meat.
- Sauces and toppings aren’t listed individually on the chart, so ask about aioli, ranch and other sauces.
Tips for Vegetarians at Wayback Burgers
- Order the Gardenburger® or Impossible™ patty through Craft Your Own and say “no bacon” out loud.
- Ask whether the patty is cooked on the same grill as beef, since the chain doesn’t say.
- Add a side of fries or tater tots to round out the meal, then check on fryer sharing.
- Skip the Caesar Salad. Ask for a Craft Your Own Bowl on lettuce with a meatless patty instead.
- Finish with a regular milkshake, which lists milk as its only allergen.
- Check the Wayback nutrition page before you go, since the chart changes and varies by location.
Wayback Burgers Vegetarian Options FAQ
Conclusion
Wayback Burgers isn’t a vegetarian destination, but it covers the basics. Get the Gardenburger® or Impossible™ patty, add fries or tater tots, and finish with a milkshake. Ask about the grill and fryer, since the chain doesn’t publish those details.
Planning more meals out? Start with our guide to eating vegetarian and vegan at restaurants, then browse all our restaurant guides. For burger chains like Wayback, see what’s vegetarian at Freddy’s, Smashburger and The Habit.
