The cowboy who got rich selling veggie burgers

The great veggie burger experiment in New Mexico oil and gas country

Former Hobbs Mayor Sam Cobb is a fourth-generation rancher and the producer of veggie Boca Burgers. (Grist/Getty Image / Courtesy of Sam Cobb)This story was produced by Grist and co-published with Source NM.   The first thing Andy Barrientes noticed when he showed up for his shift at RMS Foods on Valentine’s Day, 2005, was the cloud of black smoke emanating from the building.  A fire had started in the factory around 4:20 p.m., not long before B…

The cowboy who got rich selling veggie burgers

The first thing Andy Barrientes noticed when he showed up for his shift at RMS Foods on Valentine’s Day, 2005, was the cloud of black smoke emanating from the building.  A fire had started in the factory around 4:20 p.m., not long before Barrientes was scheduled to clock in as maintenance manager at the food manufacturing plant in southeastern New Mexico. The blaze had caught his coworkers coming off the day shift by surprise; they reported smel…