The Perfectly Elusive Perfect Burger

Okay here's my version of the famous Farmer's Daughter burger:

This is the burger made at Farmer’s Daughter Market in Capon Bridge, West Virginia which has been voted best burger in Appalachia for quite a few years now. It's right on Route 50. Road trip!

  • Heat a griddle piping hot to 450 F. You can do this on the stove top or outside. Use laser thermometer.
  • Toast buns. I prefer brioche buns. You can toast them in a toaster or on the griddle.
  • When toasted, place dill pickle slices on bottom of dry bun, followed by onion slice rings
  • Squirt some Heinz Ketchup on onion slices
  • Top bun gets good mayo and a little yellow mustard. If you like pickled cherry peppers, add them to top bun now
  • Get something green ready. Lettuce or spinach leaves. Iceburg lettuce is a nice crunch
  • Form patty with 1/3 pound (5.3 ounces or 151 grams) ground chuck 80/20 - sold at HT and some other places
  • Place patty on hot griddle, cook for 2 mins
  • Flip patty, smash patty (a cup style smasher is perfect for this)
  • Immediately slide sharp scraper under patty, carefully but aggressively scrape patty off griddle leaving nothing behind, flip patty again back to its original side, continue to cook
  • Watch top of patty for grease/juice. When you see juice just start to ooze from inside to top surface, flip a third time. This third flip will take place within about a minute
  • Cook two more mins. While timer is ticking, season top of burger with your favorite seasoning (wet or dry) which must include salt. Then place your favorite cheese on top.
  • When timer goes off, place patty on bottom bun. Add greens. Add top bun. Serve immediately.

Notes: The dry bottom bun is so the burger doesn't try to squirt out of the bun while you are holding it with two thumbs underneath. Sweet ketchup on the onion slices will neutralize the acid of the onions and work its way down through the onion slices and pickle slices. You can add a tomato slice if you want, I LOVE tomatoes, but again, the slippery tomato slice makes the burger want to squirt out which is why I prefer Heinz ketchup. Salt must be added only at the trailing end of the cook. Use melting globe or something (e.g. foil tent) to be sure cheese melts. A melty cheese (e.g. provolone) is best, but if your cheese isn't gooey at the end, wrap entire finished cheeseburger in burger wrap and rest for two minutes.
 
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I just don't do ketchup anymore, only on the side with fries. But everything else sounds awesome.
 
I think there are a number of things that contribute to making a good burger a great burger (there are no bad burgers imho). First of all, you've got to start with great hamburger. It took me way too long to figure out that you can't make a really great tasting burger without a good bit of fat in your raw hamburger. 80% lean is as high as you want to go (as Mark mentioned above). The other thing I learned over the years, and this one is my Dad's fault, is that you want to use only enough pressure forming your burgers to get your meat to hold together. My Dad would knead and mash his burgers into these dense burgers where there were no longer any 'threads' of meat in existence. Forming burgers while retaining those threads is an art form. I actually separate as many of the ground beef threads as possible into a big aluminum salad bowl, THEN form my burgers from there. If you are doing 'smash burgers' it's not quite as important, but it will still make a difference if you don't overly compress your burgers. Finally, I used to try all kinds of burger additions to the meat before molding my burgers. Salt, pepper, oregano, basil, accent, mushrooms or shredded cheese. I think it works much better just to let the beef stand on it's own and season the outside if you feel the need.

I'm sure there are many more considerations, one of the most important being, what kind of grill or apparatus are you cooking your burger on (because HOW you approach cooking the burger is highly dependent on the answer). But this is just a short list of things I've figured out over the years.
 
My obsession with burgers started long ago - and the blame falls on the Sunshine Burger. I had my first one in 1987. It was and is a great burger. They say it's a half pound burger. It's custom made to your specs. If you don't specify, they make it medium. Part of the reason the burger was so good was the seasoning which seemed to amplify the flavor of the high-quality beef. And part of the reason was the tenderness. The tenderness has to come from the fact that the patty is gently formed at Sunshine. It's also slow-cooked! It must take at least fifteen minutes, maybe even twenty minutes to cook a burger on that griddle. Another weird thing about their burger is that, after flipping, they'd place a cast iron bacon press on top of the burgers - usually straddling two burgers at once. You would think you'd want to do the exact opposite. But somehow, it works. Why does it work? I haven't quite figured that out. They put the press on there. Leave it there a while, then take it off. They check for doneness the old fashioned way, by cracking into it and peering at the color of the meat inside. Then they put the cheese on top. Buns are toasted. Burger is sliced in half. Burger is wrapped. Burger is served. All this seems to contribute to burgery goodness.

So I was frustrated for many years - decades actually - that I couldn't replicate their burger.

I still haven't replicated their burger. But at least I can make a good burger, even if it's not a Sunshine Burger.
 
Funny, I've seen a couple burger places sell a 'sunshine burger' but it always refers to a burger with a fried, sunny side up, or over easy egg on top of it. I think a press probably contributes to a good sear on the outside (and that usually helps keep juices inside). But just a guess. Same principle as 'brick chicken'.
 
Yes, I would agree with the sear theory above, except that there isn't one. If you examine the sunshine burger after it's done, there's no sear. No maillard effect. I think their griddle is too low a temp to form the sear.
 
Hmmm that is interesting - wonder why they use it? It probably helps to hold the burger together. Only downside of packing burgers very loosely is it's easier for it to come apart when getting moved on the grill (especially if you aren't cooking on a flat surface like a griddle).

I've wondered if I shouldn't just switch to doing all my burgers (even the ones I'm doing on a pellet grill) on my cast iron griddle plate for that reason.
 
The smash burger has become very popular over the past ten years or so, even as it has been around for about a century. You might think it would be tough, but it is not. It seems apparent that the reason it is tender is that the fat renders within the burger, and a lot of it doesn't really have a chance to escape. And the fat that does escape leaves empty space behind. The cook is so fast, that when the burger is served piping hot off the griddle, there is rendered fat encapsulated within the burger. Hence you get a juicy burger, a tender burger, with the crust to die for. The liquid fat within the burger makes the burger tender, even though it had been smashed. Pretty ingenious.

So I think you can apply that strategy to other more conventional burgers, thicker burgers, if you're careful and clever.

I also think that's one of the reasons a griddle is an excellent and superior tool to use to cook a burger - better than an open grate on a Weber, for example.
 
Boone said:
Hmmm that is interesting - wonder why they use it?
Click to expand...

I've been asking myself that question for forty years. :ROFLMAO:

I mean, the press will help the burger make good contact with the griddle, and therefore it would speed up the very slow cook. So maybe that's it. I dunno.
 
There are so many factors involved too. Like what temp to cook a burger at. I had a really bad grease fire on my pellet grill the last time I did burgers. I didn't clean the grill immaculately beforehand, but the main reason I had the fire was that I cranked it up to 500. I think going forward I won't go above 400 when doing burgers.

Doing burgers on a pellet grill, most recipes call for you to 'smoke' the burgers for 30 minutes ahead of time at 170 or below, then pull them off and crank to a higher temp to finish. I sort of like the flavor that creates.

And I am so going to cook burgers tonight after diving into this thread.
 
:ROFLMAO:

Tell me about.

Thing is, there are a lot of techniques, but it's difficult to say one is better than the other when they all result in a great burger. So I just do what I'm in the mood for and what I have time for.

Speaking of fires in the grill, Guga on YT has a burger recipe that involves lighting your burger on fire. It's pretty good too! I've made it a bunch of times. Best to do it outside, however ;)

You take a flat cast iron griddle, preferably one without a lip on it, and put it on your hot Weber so that the edge is straddling the hot coals below. Cook the burger like you normally would. Then flip it in a way to deliberately cause the grease to spray up into the fire. The grease will ignite and your whole griddle will burst into flames. :D

Just let it burn. The flames go out quickly, and you're left with that maillard char effect that you want - all over the surface of the burger.

And it's entertaining when the guys come over. :cool:


Edit: Here is guga's flame technique

 
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I did that unintentionally when I set my pellet grill on fire, lol.... Only problem was, I had no way to put the fire out quickly other than shut the lid and wait. If I could've managed to pull them off after about a minute they'd have been amazing. Lol...
 
I’m not a big fan of the smash burger. I like a good thick loose patty. Interesting what you say about Sunshine not having the Maillard effect on their burgers. I do the same with mine. Cook them in a skillet over low heat for a good while till they reach the high 130’s. All I do is find good beef, add a little salt and cook it like that.
 
Because it's just me (and I lack knowledge on grilling, lol), I like my Foreman. I had to get a new one at the start of Covid. It's easy, and some trial & error led to me find the correct timing of flipping and pulling the plug early so burgers come out perfectly medium. Fifteen bucks back then, copper-infused, easy cleanup. Also good for chicken...I even did a big fat filet on it for Thanksgiving a few years ago, came out the perfect mid-rare and juicy with pretty diamond grill marks.
And the whole house smells good afterward.
 
So many right things in this thread:
  • 80/20 beef
  • Seasonings on the outside of the burger, not mixed with it
  • Grilling, cooking temp
  • Tightly formed, but not too tight
  • Toasted buns
  • Several other things
One thing not mentioned along the 80/20 ground beef point, it matters a lot where to buy your ground beef. I will not get ground beef at chains like Giant, Food Lion, Wegmans, etc. Always, always find a good local butcher. 80/20 ground beef varies a bit from place to place. Find a butcher you like and hope they stay open for years, avoid the shitty chains joint ground beef.
 
Busch1724 said:
One thing not mentioned along the 80/20 ground beef point, it matters a lot where to buy your ground beef. I will not get ground beef at chains like Giant, Food Lion, Wegmans, etc. Always, always find a good local butcher. 80/20 ground beef varies a bit from place to place. Find a butcher you like and hope they stay open for years, avoid the shitty chains joint ground beef.
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I wish I had a good butcher near me but no dice. I get my hamburger from HT. My favorite is the 80/20 ground chuck.
 
Absolutely. I use HT ground chuck all the time.

I'm not exactly sure where you're located, but you must be not too far away. You should check out Boarman's Market in Highland. Take your time and peruse the aisles. Check out the sausage. Check out the beef. Check out the short ribs. Check out the tri tip. Check out the fresh wings. Almost all of it is local. I guarantee you will love it.

And yes, I know what you mean about the smash burger. I mean, I do like the smash burger, but I like plenty of other styles too. So I mix it up. Sometimes you want something thick, something you can sink your teeth into.
 
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Sometimes I get a 'hankerin' for burgers the way my Dad did them growing up. He would pack the meat as tightly as humanly possible. They were almost round as he made little attempt to flat them out. Several hours before cooking them, he would hit them with some worcestershire sauce, then brush on a very thick mix of BBQ sauce with a bunch of dried parsley and minced onions in it. And he would cook them on a Hibachi grill. Totally weird way of making burgers, but damn if they weren't good. I don't know how much occasionally making them is just nostalgia, but I do enjoy them that way.
 
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