How do you make your hamburgers?
 

Hi all - as the title says, how do you make your hamburgers? What seasonings do you use? Do you use frozen, or fresh bought?

Backstory - I've always been told I make a good hamburger, but I really want to take it up a notch today for the afternoon game since we are hosting some friends for an early bbq dinner.

My current recipe is salt/pepper/garlic powder/mustard/worchester sauce/horseradish. I take fresh ground beef and mash them into balls and then once on the grill I try my best to flatten them out as well as I can (big hamburgers tend to be a bit much on a general person's pallet, IMO).

Do you guys have any ideas to add/subtract from what I already do? And also, what sort of homemade sauce do you like to put on your burgers?

Any advice will be appreciate, I'll be running to the store in about 2-3 hours.

That sounds good. Usually some burger seasoning like weber and fresh onion but always fresh ground beef not frozen patty

Mustard? Piss off :)

Since I have a griddle in the backyard....I just make smashburgers. Salt and pepper only.

Odly enough, I don't use ham

I usually make my hamburgers by telling the person at Five Guys how I want it.

80/20 ground beef only. A little salt and ground pepper. A little garlic and onion powder maybe. I want the taste of the beef to come through. I flatten mine out before going on the grill to get consistent cook through.

My daughter likes for me to chop up some red onion and embed it in her burgers. It's a bit much but...

Simple Truth Organic Ketchup only.

Hidden Valley Ranch powder and Worchestershire mixed in with 80/20 beef, form into balls, smash into burgers on the Blackstone, and season with salt and pepper. Finish with mild cheddar cheese and a 50/50 mix of mayo and siracha.

All I can add is blue cheese is really good topping IMHO, let the beef become room temp before cooking and here's a little device I like to use:

https://www.amazon.com/Cuisinart-CSB...11&sr=8-5&th=1

Typically just season with salt n pepper, but once in a while I like to add a packet of onion soup mix in... the lightly crunchy onion bits and beef bullion really punches it up

If you need more than S and P....that's a problem

If you are needing to season your burgers or steak with anything more than salt and pepper then you have a shitty cut of meat.

Agree on the 80%. Tried 70 once and all the grease just made the grill flame up too much, which in turn tends to burn your burgers.

Also agree on the organic ketchup. :thumb:

I mean, hamburger is like a million little cuts of meat ya know?

Use home grown good hamburger

Medium rare

Salt and pepper and maybe garlic powder. Cook over charcoal or you're a pleb though j/k

The burgers I like the best are smashburgers on the blackstone, but if you're entertaining, you have to be on your shit. A lot happens fast.

For those, I typically mix up salt and pepper. Sometimes Bovine Bold.

For a patty type burger I'm a big Bovine Bold guy with pepper. I'm a big fan of Chipotle Chili powder, but my kids won't eat it so I usually don't. But I will die on the Bovine Bold hill (Credit: KCUnited. He is a savant).

Make sure it's 80/20. I am pretty bad about forming the patties. There are some videos to keep them formed up properly. A burger sauce can up your game a fair bit. There are million recipes out there, but the dudes that I typically trust in the space are Ethan Cheblowski and Joshua Weisman. They have a ton of videos, but it is typically mayo, ketchup, and whatever you want to season it with.

This is a pretty simple one

This is a little more complicated one

If I were doing it, I'd do 2 parts mayo, 1 part ketchup, 1 part whole grain mustard, pinch of salt, a little pepper and this is where I'd put the chipotle chili powder (I put that noise in a salt shaker - a little goes a long way.) Most people would want an acidic element, but I'm not a pickle or vinegar guy.

My wife usually makes up the burger patties. When I used to do it, I would put salt (or seasoned salt) , pepper, garlic powder, and minced onions.

Take raw bacon. Dice it up into little pieces. Mix with raw hamburger. Slow cook on the grill.

I've got an old friend that's a cattle rancher, small herd. He calls is 'craft beef'. Ha.

Best ****ing beef you ever tasted.

Salt and pepper, that's it. I prefer to cook it on the flattop because the charcoal flavor isn't needed and masks the natural flavor of the meat, which is ****ing delicious.

cooked no more than medium.

Always turn to the Bible with questions like these.
https://www.seriouseats.com/the-burg...e-man-or-woman

https://www.seriouseats.com/thick-an...-cheeseburgers

Awesome tips. If you haven’t read kenji he’s a total nerd about testing every little detail. But the biggest learning for me was to barely form a patty. Even a little work is probably too much. In the smash burger write up he barely mixes it at all.

See this is all a bunch of nonsense, there is no one right way to make them... its all about an individuals taste

I yell “woman, I’m hungry make me a hamburger “.








And then I make them myself!

Smash burgers but seasoned with garlic powder and chipotle tobacco sauce are incredible.

Just need cheese and they have a ton of flavor.

80/20 ground chuck. Mix in a little salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder and Firebug grilling sauce. Usually make them into 1/3-1/2 lb patties, sit in room temp for 20 minutes. I find the bigger patties are much easier to get to that medium / medium rare temp I'm looking for.

Also, if you buy pre-made patties from the store, I'm going to guess you're a cu*k or simp, maybe both.

Good meat, pepper in the patty and if I have enough time to salt them an hour beforehand I'll salt them. If not, I salt them after the fact.

Then smash 'em on a hot griddle with some grilled onions and jalapeño.

But the bottom line for me has always been that simple is better and the quality of the beef makes the burger.

This is the answer. Find some butcher who has better ground beef than what is at the grocery. I had a coworker who would purchase half a cow and have a bunch ground up. He gave me some to take home and try. Amazing the beef flavor completely different from what I get at the grocery store.

Anyone on this board grind their own? I’ve been thinking about purchasing a meat grinder to try and make my own sausages. Would be good for ground hamburger too I suppose. I’ma little intimidated by it for some reason though so haven’t pulled the trigger yet. .

If you add more then salt and pepper to it then you're not making hamburgers. You've made meatloaf sandwiches.

We butcher our own cow every year. For the first year in a long while we're going to run out of ground beef before we run out of steaks.

I'm eventually going to grind something up, but I am holding back a couple of chuck roasts to ground into it to ensure some solid fat content.

But ultimately if you have good beef with good marbling, a lot of it can grind through a coarse plate to make some good hamburger. Just don't overgrind it with the smaller plates because your consistency won't be right.

But yeah, that's absolutely the key to a good burger - good beef. The rest is just some attempt at hiding mediocrity through seasoning. And at that point you're just working with varying levels of mediocre.

Burgers are like steaks - if you're truly making a great one, it has little to do with anything you did. You started with quality beef and didn't get in the way.

Somewhat carefully.

The old lipton’s onion soup powder recipe makes a good unique burger.


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Timing of the salt is more critical than people realize.

If you put it on there like 10 minutes before you grill, it just barely starts to break down fibers and then leaves moisture on the surface that interferes with a good hard crust that comes from that flame/surface contact (depending on your method).

And because the proteins are neither strong nor fully broken down, you end up with something weirdly crumbly.

So if you salt, salt with enough time to put it back in the fridge pull the moisture and then the moisture reabsorbs into the patties. That will fully break down your proteins, give you the best flavor into the middle of the paddy and give you perfect consistency without having to overwork them when you form them.

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Damn skippy it does, and no one here is gonna tell me any different

Exactly. I saw a recipe that called for cracking an egg in the ground beef and putting in bread crumbs. What the ****?

Just be careful about pulling the meat out of the fridge too quick or handling it too much as the fat warms and it gets sticky

I like to put a dimple (make the middle thinner) in the middle to avoid the burger ending up super thick in the center.

I always use a thermometer because it is so easy to burn burgers. As above, shit goes fast when the fat drips on the coals.

With salt, I have always heard immediately before grilling, or at least 30 minutes before. In between makes an inferior product.

Man, I spent years trying to 'perfect' my burger game before I realized that there's just not a lot of ****ing around that needs be done.

I'll slap some barbecue sauce on them if I grill them on occasion just for something different. Or if I use grocery store beef I'll add some Cavendars greek season (that shit is great, FYI).

But in the end the only meaningful difference I found in making a perfect simple burger is when I add the salt.

One thing I really like on my burger is a nice slice of Red Onion, other than that Bacon, Garlic blend seasoning and six pepper blend

I wish Andy Reid could post here so we'd get the real deal.

I will say there's nothing like a crispy cast iron burger made from the shavings of a brisket. Delish.

I had a cow about 3 years ago where the butcher just made the hamburger way too lean. With that entire cow I would add an egg yolk and a 'squirt' of vegetable oil to the mix just trying to get some fat in there. Otherwise the outside scorches more than it 'fries' and it's just not that good. Made a lot of tacos that year because it just didn't make good hamburgers.

And yeah, if you're grilling instead of smashing, the dimple is a must. Really helps prevent the meatball problem.

Yeah, that's a fine rule of thumb. Like I said, I try to get an hour in there. And adding the salt right before you grill will have the same general impact as just adding it after. I typically add it after I pull them figuring the juice will dillute the salt and it will run into the patty and the condiments.


Oh, and the bun is a HUGELY underrated element. Get good buns - it's the first thing you truly notice on a burger. And put some mayo or cream cheese on your bottom bun. Some people hate mayo so I suggest cream cheese instead. Whatever you use, you need a fat layer on your bottom bun to keep the juices from running into that bottom slab and turning it into mush. It creates a barrier that keeps the juice in the meat better.

Damn. I forgot a component that I really love. Roast up some pablanos, and saute them, it's magic. They're good for a ton of shit so do a bunch at a time, slice them and keep them in the fridge. They're REALLY ****ing good on a burger.

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Sam the cooking guy is always a go to for anything. His shit is always top notch. Here he runs Sirloin , Short rib and brisket through a grinder to make his burgers.

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80/20, salt and pepper only.

or sometimes Kafta burgers stuffed with feta cheese.

1 lb. Ground Beef
1 cup Chopped Onions
2 grated Garlic Cloves
½ bunch Parsley
2 tsp. 7 Spices
1½ tsp. Salt
½ tsp. Black Pepper

Home grown, well aged, beef. Early salt an sit. A gas grill. A thin slice of onion.

If you're buying off the shelf, feel free to molest it with spices and slathers and hope for the best.

smash that patty until it is 1/2" thick x 8" . High griddle heat 30 seconds on each side. Salt and Pepper only. make sure the fat is at least 20%.

Oh, that's a good idea.

I rarely use my short ribs for anything because they're really only good for braising and I just haven't figured out a way to smoke them that doesn't end up a gloppy mess.

But using those to add some good fat to a ground mix is perfect. And a great use for sirloin as well as I find sirloin to be about the most worthless hunk of meat ever created. Obliged sir.

Best part of a burger is the sear

So i season with a beef seasoning like Meat Church Holy Cow, smash burger style thin

Double because you then get more of the the best thing about a burger....the sear. So 4 seared sides.

American cheese with pickles and a garlic aioli cooked on the flattop or cast iron.

Profit

I do like meat church. I usually only use Salt, pepper, sometimes garlic on mine, but occasionally will use a rub

I’m craving burgers now.

Had some amazing spicy Italians yesterday.

I already thawed the damn steaks or yeah, I'd be making some burgers tonight.

Crud.

Propane

A little pepper and salt with 80/20. Don't smash them out too thin because they fall apart when you flip them. All the other stuff can be added after cooking according to each individuals taste.

Yep.

I buy them at 5 Guys.

I mean, maybe?

If you have to use a bun and cheese and condiments on your burger then you have a shitty cut of mean.

Eat it like a Salisbury steak.

LMAO yeah man, REAL burger makers eat that patty by itself!

You get the best burger you can buy and eat it raw with no seasoning if you really know what’s up. Just a fork is all you need

What about the "sauce"

I've seen some people mix mayo/relish/horseradish??

Thats how enlightened burger chefs do it!

Sometimes over fire, sometimes cast iron.

Usually just salt/pepper. Every once in a while I mix in a few dashes of Worcestershire before making patties

Burgers are like chili, everyone has their favorite way.

I make a lot of buffalo burgers instead of using regular beef.

Salt, pepper and a little worcestershire. I usually do smash burgers with regular beef but with buffalo I keep them bigger and don't cook them as hard as beef. Cook most burgers in the cast iron though.

I like to use Blues Hog Bold and Beefy seasoning with a little bit of pepper. I used to be a salt and pepper only but that Blues Hog seasoning is spot on.

You do realize that was one of my products I produced on the farm. I sold tons of it. Kept the ingredients secret.

Let me say excellent job, Sir.

My girlfriend puts bacon in a ground sirloin meat patty and then uses salt, pepper and paprika and some other meat seasoning she won't tell me about. Cooks the burgers in bacon fat. Best burgers I've ever had.

Yes, buffalo burgers over beef any day of the week. :thumb:

I've heard buffalo is dry because of how lean it is, not true?

Bacon cheeseburgers are my fav, bacon elevates everything.

Nice! Do you still sell it?

If you overcook it, then yes it will be dry.

Grind some bacon in with it.
sec

You just don’t cook it as long and it can have some light pink in it. Sear it on a hot cast iron and it stays moist.

I can get it at most grocery stores in CoMo. Here is the link to order. https://blueshog.com/collections/rub...eefy-seasoning

Is true.

I don't care for Buffalo burgers at all.

The Buffalo minute steaks can be okay if you fry them in butter, but my buddy had Buffalo at his ranch for years and we tried 100 different ways to make Buffalo as good as beef.

Eventually we just settled on putting it in spaghetti sauce.

grind my own fresh chuck roast only. Have experimented with chuck/brisket blend, always back to chuck. Salt only before cooking, finish with a touch of black pepper

Seems like sec had the tried and true method for fancying up basically any lean game... just grind some bacon, pork fat or whatever fat into it

Bacon or pork belly. Even beef/pork fat will do.

Used to do the same with venison breakfast sausage patties.