Recipes
Burgermeisters, get your beef on!
Posted by Adam Kuban, March 20, 2008 at 2:30 PM
Nick Solares, the guy who publishes Beef Aficionado, is on the same wavelength as I am: "Of all of the infinite varieties of hamburger I think that sliders are my favorite. There is just something about the little bombers that perfectly captures the happy confluence of beef, bun and cheese. The slider is reduction of the burger to its ideal form...."
I couldn't have said it better myself. Those words open a blog post in which Nick goes about trying to duplicate the sliders from White Manna in Hackensack, New Jersey, arguably one of the finest producers of these tiny, oniony hamburgers. Nick's recipe and technique can be found here.
Related
White Kastle Klones: A Recipe for Sliders
Honey-Scallion Sliders [Not Eating Out in New York]
A White Man(n)a Pilgrimage
Grilled: Nick Solares
Posted by Adam Kuban, March 16, 2008 at 3:45 PM
This weekend's New York Times Magazine has a piece on James Beard, the "father of American gastronomy." It's a nice story that highlights why Beard was so influential and why he still matters after all these years. But best of all to my eyes was the burger recipe included with the article. I've never seen one that includes heavy cream in the beef mix, and I'm wondering what it will do. Hmm.
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Posted by Matt Jacobs, January 21, 2008 at 3:00 PM
I am a rabid—as in foaming at the mouth—fan of Cook's Illustrated. While it can be pedantic at times, the magazine's quest for perfection reliably yields delicious, easy-to-reproduce recipes.
In a fit of curiosity, I signed up to test out recipes that may or may not appear in the magazine. You're given a recipe and asked to submit your thoughts on the results by a particular date. Typically, the time frame passes before I have a chance to try it out, so I toss the recipe. But when a recipe for the Ultimate Beef Burger came along—a West Coast–style burger no less—I held onto it after the window had closed and thought I'd share the results with you all instead. If you're like me, your quest for the perfect burger continues into your kitchen.
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Posted by Adam Kuban, July 6, 2007 at 12:00 PM
One of the beautiful things about burgerworld is that, despite the legion of fast-food and fast-casual chains out there, regional burger styles have managed to keep a foothold. I've talked before about the cheese-stuffed Jucy Lucy–style burgers in the Twin Cities and the butterburgers of Wisconsin, but today, I'd like to highlight pimento cheese burgers, a specialty in Columbia, South Carolina.
Prior to reading John T. Edge's book Hamburger & Fries, I'd only heard of pimento cheese being served, in the South, on stalks of celery or eaten as the filling of a sandwich. But Mr. Edge ferreted out these delicious-sounding burgers in the Palmetto State.
Here's a recipe, adapted from Mr. Edge's book, that you might want to try this weekend.
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Posted by Matt Jacobs, January 25, 2006 at 11:33 AM
One of my resolutions this year was to cook more. One of my Chanukah gifts was this hamburger cookbook by Rebecca Bent. Putting two and two together means a bunch more burger recipes for you cats.
The book has a ton of nutty and interesting recipes like a chili burger (the chili is in the burger) and a chocolate-encrusted cranberry burger, but I thought I'd start out simple and make Geoffrey Zakarian's Town Burger. Zackarian is the chef at Town in the Chambers Hotel, hence the name of the burger.
Typically, I'll just follow a recipe exactly since my knowledge in the kitchen is still relatively weak. But this time, Geoffrey's expectations for quality are a little overboard. Since I didn't feel like running around town for Wolferman's english muffins, I bring you the Poor Man's Town Burger.
After the jump you'll get the actual recipe, my modifications and some photos. If you want the Town burger without all the work, I suggest you visit the restaurant during brunch, which is the only time they serve the burger.
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Posted by Matt Jacobs, October 6, 2005 at 9:14 AM
A few months back, Adam commanded that each of us read Hamburger & Fries: An American Story. Thank God he did, for I would never have tasted the sumptuous yet simple onion burger if he had not. The onion burger was (arguably) invented in Ardmore, Oklahoma at the Hamburger Inn by Ross Davis. Marty Hall of Sid's in El Reno, OK explains how it all began:
"He got it started," says Hall. "It was back in the twenties, back during the Depression. Onions were cheap then and hamburger meat was expensive. Same as it is now. But we were a lot poorer then. So Ross came up with this idea of adding onions to the burgers and smashing them into the meat with the back of his spatula. He called them Depression burgers and he'd smash a half-onion's worth of shreds into a five-cent burger..."
This is one of the few times I'm thankful for the Depression. The onion and the american cheese make it taste like a McDonald's burger, but in all of the good ways and none of the bad. I don't know about you, but that onion/cheese smell is what draws me back to Micky-D's every time. Enough talk. Here's the recipe for a great alternartive burger:
1 lb. ground chuck (fat is good)
2 onions, shaved (as thin as possible)
1 tsp salt
6 slices american cheese
6 buns
mustard
After the jump, we show you how to put it all together.
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Posted by Adam Kuban, June 2, 2005 at 8:00 AM
[SKIP THE EXPOSITION AND GO RIGHT TO THE RECIPE.]
As you may have noticed, A Hamburger Today looooves White Castle. Unfortunately, none of us lives close enough to a Castle to enjoy a sackful of Slyders on a regular basis. Heck, Hamburglar Hadley, based in Los Angeles, is 1,800 miles from the nearest "eating house." Seeing as how many of our readers live outside the chain's limited area of coverage, we thought we'd experiment with a copycat recipe that can be made at home. I like to call these homemade sliders "Wite Kastle Klones."
After Googling "White Castle" copycat recipe and perusing the results, I decided to go with this one, despite the fact that it calls for 3 oz. of strained-beef baby food. (Yuck!)
The first step was assembling the ingredients (right), the hardest part of which was choosing an appropriate pickle chip—some were too thick for such a tiny burger, but I finally found an acceptable product. The weirdest ingredient in this recipe is strained-beef baby food; I followed the recipe as-is but will probably omit this component in future versions. I can't imagine it makes that much of a difference, and it just seems nasty. While you'd think finding buns for the sliders would be difficult, I knew from my trip to The Burger Joint that Martin's Potato Rolls would work perfectly. If you can't find these, try cutting hot-dog buns in thirds.
Alright, let's cut to the chase. Making hamburgers is pretty straightforward, and these just have a few added twists, namely mixing the beef with beef stock and the, ahem, baby food. Do this in a large bowl. It makes a sort of mushy mixture, but that's OK; it helps when you spread the beef out in a thin slab (above and right; click images to enlarge). I used a 10-by-14-inch rimmed baking sheet, which seemed to be the perfect size. Line the sheet with plastic wrap before transferring the beef mixture to it; this will help prevent sticking and aid in the spreading process. Use a spatula initially to flatten the meat (above left); then cover it with an additional sheet of plastic wrap, and use a rolling pin (above center) or your hands to spread the beef across the entire sheet (above right). Remove the top layer of plastic wrap, and use the spatula to make squares (right).
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Posted by Matt Jacobs, May 27, 2005 at 2:00 PM
For most Americans, this weekend signifies the beginning of bbq season. For nutjobs like myself, bbq season never ends. To help celebrate, we'd like to help you learn to grill up the perfect burger. To do that, we've enlisted the help of Epicurious' burger school. Grillmasters Steven Raichlen, host of Barbecue University on PBS, and Chris Schlesinger, coauthor of The Thrill of the Grill and How To Cook Meat, are ready to walk us through the process.
Above all, you should avoid store-bought meat and get the freshly ground stuff from a local butcher. Our friends at Epicurious explain that it will cut back on any excess bacteria, allowing you to safely cook your burgers medium-rare, but I also think your local butcher will likely have better quality meat, which should always be your top concern. Here are a just a few of the points the burger experts have for us:
Any tips on forming the patties?
"Cold meat and cold, wet hands," says Raichlen. "Chill your hands under cold running water, then work as gently and quickly as possible so as not to bruise or heat the meat." Handling the meat delicately prevents the burgers from getting too dense and firm, and keeping it cold prevents the fat from melting, which would also make the burgers tougher. Both Schlesinger and Raichlen favor thick patties — at least one inch thick — so they can develop a seared crust on the outside while still staying pink on the inside.
What's the best way to cook burgers?
Start with a clean, oiled, hot grill. "First sear them over high heat to develop a crust, then move them to a cooler part of the grill to cook," says Schlesinger. "And be sure not to press down on them while cooking — this will only squeeze out the juices and dry them out." Neither he nor Raichlen recommends barbecue or steak sauces, which just cover up the flavor of a perfect burger. "I take a less-is-more approach," says Raichlen.
In addition to these excellent pointers, Epicurious has links to some good-looking recipes on the Burger School page. The Ultimate Hamburger looks like essential reading and some of the international burgers, like Jamaican Jerk Burgers with Orange-Chipotle Mayonnaise, sound quite tasty.
Here's to some good grilling! Also, if anyone out there has a fabulous recipe or an essential grilling technique, be sure to leave a comment or send us an email.
Posted by Adam Kuban, May 3, 2005 at 2:41 PM
Is it pure coincidence or is it fate that May, the month in which AHT will make its official debut, happens to be National Hamburger Month?
It's probably a mixture of both, but there's no sense wasting time in pondering that, what with Memorial Day around the corner. Yes, the unofficial start of summer—and the grilling season— is upon us, so it was fitting that AHT senior editor Matty found this thread on Ask MetaFilter: Why are my hamburgers falling apart on the grill?
As is the case on Ask MetaFilter, an offshoot of the popular community blog MetaFilter, responses were abundant and helpful. The consensus seemed to be that the original poster was using too-lean beef. Respondents recommended going with 80 percent lean and established an upper limit of 85 percent lean. As "uncleozzy" said:
Agreed about the fat -- 85% lean is the absolute maximum you'll want for making hamburgers (I usually use 80%). Too little fat and your burgers will be dry, flavorless, and fall apart. You definitely do *not* need egg or breadcrumbs to make hamburgers. Those are for making meatloaf.
We wholeheartedly agree: Fat = juicy. And fillers distract from the taste of the beef.
On one of the handful of pleasant days we've had this spring, this reporter fired up the grill for the first time (see above photo). I used 80 percent lean beef, grilling my burgers to medium. Here is the recipe I follow:
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