Grand Junction, a half-pound burger, with all the fixings -- pastrami, sauteed onions, lettuce, tomato, pickle, cheese -- $5.95 at Burger Junction in South Sacramento,.

BY ED MURRIETA

As numerous operators of medical marijuana dispensaries have and are learning, location, location, location drives this business, too.

So what better location for Burger Junction than between two medical marijuana dispensaries? People who suffer chronic pain, insomnia, glaucoma, breast cancer and other ailments all eat, and everyone needs at least one burger a year, like an annual checkup with cholesterol.

Today I began research for an upcoming report on medical marijuana dispensaries in South Sacramento — my angle: how upscale and community-minded pot dispensaries bitch-slap common but erroneous perceptions of South Sacramento as a ghetto drug heaven — and I got hungry. Luckily, I pulled into the South Point Shopping Center just about lunch time.

Anchored by a Rite Aid drug store and dotted with small restaurants and a Latino foods market, South Point Shopping Center — at the intersection of Florin and Power Inn roads, on the edge of what feels like forgotten suburbia — is among the numerous aging retail complexes that are filling up with medical marijuana dispensaries.

I ordered lunch before visiting the two dispensaries in the plaza, Remedy Living Solutions and True Hope Collective. After lunch, I spotted fellow patients inside Remedy and True Hope who were fellow diners at Burger Junction.

I scored a first-time-free house joint at Remedy, plus two house joints at True Hope, one I bought for $4 (or 3 for $10) and one I received as a first-time gimme.

But who wants to talk about pot?

Lemme tell you about Burger Junction’s Grand Junction Burger: a meaty half-pounder, char-grilled medium, just between juicy and greasy on a warm, domed steak bun that soaked up the meat drippings until wearing out in a soppy heap at the last bite. A valiant mess of a burger it was. All the fixings for this freight train of tantalization include: pastrami, sauteed onions, pickles, lettuce, tomato and cheese. Glorious.

Burger Junction’s Grand Junction Burger is $5.95, and I swear it’s a couple of bucks cheaper and in the same league as the French Steak Burger at Nationwide Freezer Meats in Midtown, a favorite since I first had one in 1983.

Dessert? A flaky pineapple empanada at the Latino foods store next to True Hope, for 50 cents.

Viva medical marijuana dispensaries in retail shopping plazas.

Burger Junction
7900 Florin Road #5, Sacramento

Remedy Living Solutions
7900 Florin Road #1, (916) 421-4607
collectiveremedy.com

True Hope Collective
7900 Florin Road #13, (916) 392-4540
truehopecollective.com