Instead of javascript templates reuse the DOM as a template

01-initial-server-side-render.html

<div id="results">
  <div class="result" data-result-id='1'>
    <div data-attr="title">Result 1</div>
  </div>
  
  <div class="result" data-result-id='2'>
    <div data-attr="title">Result 2</div>
  </div>
  
   <div class="result" data-result-id='3'>
    <div data-attr="title">Result 3</div>
  </div>
</div>

02-client-side-update.js

// pseudo code

$.getJSON('/search', { :query => 'foo' }, function(json) {

  template = $('#results .result').first().clone();
  
  $('#results .result').remove();

  _.each(json['results'], function(result) {
  
     result_html = template.clone()
     result_html.find('[data-attr=title]').text(result['title']);
     
     $('#results').append(result_html);       
     
  });

});