In-N-Out Burger’s Secret Menu Finally Photographed

The standard In-N-Out burger. Photograph by Kevin Marple

Anybody who lives in or has visited the west coast knows about In-N-Out Burger. The chain, which has more than 250 locations from California to Texas, is the focus of an almost cult-like following among burgers-and-fries fanatics. But the most intriguing part about In-N-Out, especially to folks who have never been to one, is the diner’s famous secret menu.

Only regulars know the special items not displayed on the menu. Like at some speakeasy with a secret password, the restaurants let guests use special catchphrases to tweak their food. Anything ordered “Protein Style,” for example, gets you a burger without a bun. Asking for a “4 x 4” gets you a stomach-stuffing sandwich with quadruple the patties of a regular hamburger.

So what do these “secret” items look like? For the latest issue of D Magazine, photographer Kevin Marple was assigned the dubious task of shooting these off-menu enigmas. But that wasn’t as easy as it sounds. In-N-Out is famously protective of its brand and doesn’t allow picture-taking in its restaurants. So like any true photographer, Marple had to improvise … by engaging in a bit of “guerrilla-style photography.”

After building a small studio in a hotel room that was strategically selected because of its proximity to an In-N-Out restaurant, Marple realized this was not going to be a quick shoot. In fact, what at first was supposed to be a quick snap of some tasty burgers soon turned into a marathon of fast food photography.

Marple says he bought at least 10 of each item on every trip, then scrambled back to his make-shift studio to photograph them before they became soggy and unappetizing. His hotel room was soon covered in greasy fast food bags, and employees at both the restaurant and the hotel became highly suspicious.

“The clerks at the front desk were looking at me like I was some kind of pervert,” Marple writes. “For five hours they’d watched me carry in over 30 bags of In-N-Out burgers. I’m sure they thought I was a single guy with a burger fetish.”

In the end Marple got his photographs completed in time for D Magazine’s article on the burger chain, though not without permanently scarring his appetite for fast food. To read the whole hilarious story, and to see photographs of the secret menu items, click here.