A gargantuan patty made of a ground bacon and beef, stuffed with bacon strips, topped with bacon bit-studded cheese sauce, topped with a pile of bacon strips, doused in Jack Daniels root beer barbecue sauce, all on a bacon bun. See the Boss Bacon Burger's construction and demise in Epic Meal Time's latest video.
Editor's Note: We're teaming up with our friends over at Food52 to bring you even more easy weeknight recipes. Food52 recipes will appear on this site every Tuesday and Thursday, and are carefully curated by the Serious Eats team. Check back on Serious Eats every weekday afternoon for a new quick and easy weeknight dinner idea from our own test kitchens, or from the good folks at Food52.
This summer dinner replaces the usual beef and pork with a lighter option: shrimp. The thing that takes the most time is the aioli, but it's the most important part of the dish. It's not only used as a condiment, it also binds the shrimp together to form the burger. The patty is light, but the aioli provides the richness you'd expect from a good burger.
About the Author: Will Gibney is currently a summer intern here at Serious Eats and loves being around so much food. He recently found true love in a Jamón de Bellota in Spain
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[All photographs unless otherwise noted: Todd Brock]
11105 Crabapple Road, Roswell GA 30075 (Map); 770-573-9775
3,500+ locations nationwide. Find one at sonicdrivein.com/locator
The Schtick: "America's Drive-In," where carhops deliver burgers, dogs, and such to your driver's side window, with almost 400,000 drink options
The Burger: Varieties don't stray too far from the classics. Typically unremarkable fast-food beef, overapplied veggie toppings, bonus points for good bacon
Want Fries With That? Ick. Go onion rings or chili cheese tots instead
Setting: The interior of your car, maybe a nearby picnic table
Price: Sonic Cheeseburger, $3.19; SuperSonic Double Bacon Cheeseburger, $4.59; Bacon Cheeseburger Toaster Sandwich, $4.69; French fries, $1.00/1.49/1.80; Onion rings, $1.69/1.99; Chili Cheese Tots, $1.99/2.59/2.99
Who knew there were so many hardcore Sonic fans out there? Not me, that's for sure. When I ranked the chain's onion rings last in AHT's Onion Ring Roundup last month, no one was more surprised than I was when Sonic apologists crawled out of the cyberwoodwork to defend "America's Drive-In." Most seemed to believe that the translucent puddle at the bottom of my bag and the extreme greasiness that soaked every ring across two orders was an anomaly, an exception to the rule, an unfortunate case of that particular location dropping the deep-fried ball.
Maybe they were right. I mean, it had certainly happened with my BK Chef's Choice experience. Maybe Sonic deserved another shot, I decided. And maybe, as long as I'm going, I should put the burger menu through its paces, too.
View Michael Schwartz's Miami in a larger map
When James Beard award-winning chef Michael Schwartz opened Michael's Genuine Food & Drink in Miami in 2007, he brought traditional American comfort food to a city often associated with Cuban and Caribbean cuisine. The Philadelphia native is blooming in Florida, asserting his influence over the local, seasonal ingredients often passed over by other Sunshine State chefs and using them to create inspiring, accessible food. His Raleigh burger is a reinvented classic: served on a wood board, the tender meat is encased in a buttered and toasted brioche bun, garnished simply with butter lettuce and a generous slice of ripe, juicy tomato. But despite his all-American approach, Michael appreciates the melting pot of cuisine that lends Miami its signature heat.
Here are Michael's top five Miami burgers:
In this month's issue of Los Angeles Magazine, dine editor Lesley Bargar Suter chronicles the "casual dining revolution" of Adam Fleischman, founder of Umami Burger. Three years after first opening Umami Burger in 2009 in Los Angeles, Fleischman now runs the Umami Restaurant Group, which includes nine Umami Burger locations, the pizzeria 800 Degrees, and UmamIcatessen, with more restaurants on the way. (In her piece, Suter gives a shout-out to AHT's Damon Gambuto, who reviewed Umami Burger back in 2009.)
Layoffs at a major beef processing plant, a boom in U.S. imports of beef, and record high prices of fresh lean beef trimmings are some of the effects of the "pink slime" controversy—the use of ammonia hydroxide-treated beef trimmings as a burger additive, known as "lean, finely textured beef" (LFTB) in the beef industry. Read more from Reuters.
For more background information on the spread of "pink slime" awareness, check out this New York Times editorial, "What if It Weren't Called Pink Slime?"
About the author: Robyn Lee is the editor of A Hamburger Today and takes many of the photos for Serious Eats. She'll also doodle cute stuff when necessary. Read more from Robyn at her personal food blog, The Girl Who Ate Everything.
[Photographs: Robyn Lee]
You love Pat LaFreida; we love Pat LaFreida (and if you don't know Pat, his new show on the Food Network, Meat Men, will make a fine introduction). He supplies stellar meat to some of the best restaurants in New York City and all around the country, and a good percentage of our favorite New York burgers start with his custom blends. So when Pat offered to take us on a burger crawl of the city to learn how some of our favorite burgers get made, the only questions were, "How many?" and, "When do we get started?"
We decided to focus on four burgers that AHT considers exemplary of different burger cooking styles. All the burgers in this series come from meat ground in Pat's plant, and are the result of painstaking testing, tasting, and conversation to develop the just the right balance of texture, flavor, and burger magic.
I don't know who it is that designated May as National Burger month, but I'd like to give them a big, sloppy, greasy, onion-scented, cheese-covered kiss on the mouth. Or perhaps just a hug is fine. What better excuse to celebrate our national sandwich (national food?) and look back at the dozens of well-tested burger recipes we have in our archives?
Here are 22 burger recipes that run the gamut form simple to complex, with representation from around the country, breaking regional borders, and indeed inter-species relations. Perhaps burgers are the key to world peace. Check out the individual recipes below, or click through the slideshow above for a bigger look at the goods.
The Nasty Bits: Very Crispy Tongue
Very Crispy Tongue with Chili Bean Paste and Sichuan Peppercorns
Los Angeles Tacos: Komodo Truck's New Brick-and-Mortar Cafe on Pico
Dinner Tonight: Shrimp Burgers with Roasted Garlic-Orange Aioli (via Food52)
'International Influences on New Orleans Cuisine': NOLA History in Six Courses
