Burger King's First Fully Vegan Location Is Officially Open

Eating vegan has gone way beyond being just a fad. There are different reasons why people want to make the switch to a vegan diet, whether it's for the health benefits or to lower their negative impact on the environment. To accommodate customers' dietary preferences, restaurants are adapting menus to include more plant-based options — or, in the case of Burger King, changing a location to go all vegan.

Starting March 14, Burger King in London will be serving up an entirely vegan menu at its flagship restaurant in Leicester Square until April 10. Why only a month? It's a pilot launch to help the chain assess whether to go meatless at other locations.

But Burger King is certainly not new to the meat-free game. Last year, one location in Cologne, Germany, served only plant-based options for a few days (via VegNews). That same year, the chain also converted one of its restaurants in Madrid into a fully vegetarian concept for one month (via VegNews).

What's different with the meat-free London location, though, is that this is the first time that Burger King has launched a completely vegan outpost. Plant Based News confirmed that though some of the menu items at the Leicester Square spot are labeled "plant-based" and are not necessarily certified with the vegan trademark, all the available options will be vegan.

Supplied by plant-based food company The Vegetarian Butcher, the new vegan Burger King restaurant is dishing out the existing Plant-Based Whopper and Vegan Royale and the recently launched Vegan Katsu Royale and Plant-Based Katsu Chilli Whopper.

A few brand-new menu items are the Plant-Based Bakon Double Cheeeze Xl and the Vegan Cheeeze & Bakon Royale. Customers at the new location can also enjoy sides, such as vegan nuggets, fries, cheese bites, and onion rings, and non-dairy ice cream from Ben & Jerry's for dessert.

This meat-free launch reflects Burger King's sustainability goals. "The limited-edition menu is a direct result of our focus on vegan and plant-based innovation and goes hand in hand with our target of a 50% meat-free menu by 2030, as well as our commitment to sustainability and responsible business," Katie Evans, chief marketing officer at Burger King UK, said in a statement (via The Beet).

As a sign of the company's commitment toward sustainability, for every Plant-Based Whopper or Vegan Royale sold in the UK during the month-long trial, it will donate 10 pence (about $0.13 USD) to Trees for Cities, a UK-based non-profit organization that plants trees in cities (via Plant Based News).

Burger King may open more fully vegan restaurants if the new London spot proves to be popular. But for now, the rest of the world has to wait.