Burgers are one of the easiest things to cook, right?
Make a patty and throw it on the cooktop!
But there's a lot more to doing it right.
So you can avoid the common mistakes people often make when cooking burgers, here are
the finer points that make all the difference.
When burger night rolls around in your household and you've got some meat stashed away in the
freezer, how are you defrosting it?
If you just set it out on the counter in the middle of the morning so that it's ready by
dinnertime, you might want to reconsider.
Food safety guidelines from the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection
Service say that the safest way to defrost meat is either by putting it in the refrigerator
or running it under cold water in the sink.
Why?
It prevents any part of the frozen meat from reaching a temperature where bacteria can
grow and thrive.
It takes a little bit more planning, but it means that you can rest easy knowing your
meat won't get anyone in your family sick.
If you absolutely must speed up the defrosting process, thaw your beef in the microwave.
There are all different kinds of ground beef, which is really just an umbrella term for
any cut of beef that's ground up into tiny bits.
You can make ground beef out of the cheapest cuts on the market all the way up to prime
steak.
You can buy pre-made ground beef at the store, or make your own at home.
And beyond beef, there are all sorts of other ground meats you can add or use to create
your perfect burger.
So before you head to the store, consider your burger goals.
Are you trying to tighten up your waistline?
Is flavor your top priority?
Will you be cooking your burgers on a skillet?
On the grill?
On a griddle?
Many cooks recommend mixing a few different types of meat to achieve your desired flavor
and consistency.
But when it comes to straight ground beef, keep an eye on the ratio of fat to lean meat
on the packaging.
You'll want to use beef that's on the fattier side, with somewhere between 20 percent to
30 percent fat, Food & Wine recommends, to keep your burgers moist and tasty.
"Here we have ground chuck.
It's 80/20.
We're looking for that 20 percent to really bring out all that flavor and that juiciness."
If you're making your own burger patties, pay close attention to how you handle your
burgers.
You really want to take a "get in and get out" approach.
If you knead or work the meat too much, you'll end up with tough, chewy burgers.
You should loosely mix in any seasonings, form your patties, and call it a day.
And when forming your burger patties, take care not to pack the meat too tightly.
Consider aiming for a meatball-like consistency, where the meat is lightly pressed together
with just enough force to maintain its shape.
This gives the lean meat and fat some room to breathe and meld during the cooking process.
Pack your burgers too tightly, and you'll likely have a dense, hard-to-chew result.
"Have you got any floss?"
As for the shape of your patties, generally speaking, consistent size, shape, and density
across all of your patties is the key.
You want nice, even cooking throughout, as well as even cooking across all of your different
patties.
There's also a good reason why so many experienced barbecue cooks insist on putting a thumbprint
in the middle of each patty.
This little trick prevents your burgers from swelling up too much in the center, according
to Delish.
It's such a simple step, but it really helps a burger hold its shape during the cooking
process.
"The secret is to move it as less as possible, the more you move it the more chance you've
got of breaking the burger.
And then look, on."
Before you go overboard and dump the contents of your entire seasoning rack into the bowl
with your ground meat, take a deep breath and step back from the counter.
Unless you legitimately hate the taste of whatever meat you're using, there's really
no need to go overboard with seasonings and mix-ins.
A burger should taste like a burger, and if you use too many fancy add-ins, you're going
to completely overwhelm its flavor.
You and your guests can always add more salt, seasonings, and toppings later, but it's almost
impossible to remove these ingredients if you accidentally added too much.
"No herbs, no chopped onions, no garlic, no soup mix, no mysteries.
Just salt.
Why?
Well, because it actually seasons the meat."
As for when to add the salt, it can be tricky.
If you add salt too early and let your burgers sit for a while, the salt is going to draw
out some moisture that otherwise would have become delicious, flavorful juices.
There are conflicting opinions about this, but The Kitchn suggests it's best to add salt
to your burgers right before slapping them on the grill.
Other seasonings, like pepper or garlic powder, don't have the same drying properties as salt,
so you're OK to add them whenever you'd like.
There's a lot of prep work involved in grilling burgers.
Making the patties, taking off the grill cover, checking the weather to make sure you won't
get drenched.
But don't skip checking your propane level if you're using a gas grill.
Otherwise, after a few minutes of grilling, you may notice that the grill isn't hot anymore
and your food isn't really cooking, because you ran out.
Unless you have a spare propane tank, you'll have to figure out how to finish cooking the
burgers somewhere else.
If you're not sure how to check, some grills are equipped with built-in weight sensors
that can indicate roughly how much propane you have left.
If you don't have one of those, you can weigh your propane tank on a scale, then refer to
the printed empty tank weight to calculate how much fuel is left, according to Ferrellgas.
You can also pour hot water down the side of your tank, then feel for the level at which
the tank is still cool to the touch.
"You'll feel it get extremely cold where there's propane in the tank, so from touch I can tell
this one's about halfway full.
It's enough to tell you whether or not you have enough to cook or you need to go get
some more."
If you're in a rush to eat, you may have cranked up the grill and placed your burgers on the
grate as it heated up.
But you're doing yourself a disservice by not letting your grill preheat, Saveur warns.
"It brings the grill up to temperature which makes the food cook more efficiently, giving
it more moisture, more flavor, and making it more tender."
Preheating your grill to a high temperature sears the burgers, just like you might do
with an expensive steak.
Searing creates that wonderful brown crust that's just packed with flavor and can help
keep juices inside your burger.
That won't happen if you let your burger heat up slowly with your grill.
Searing is a chemical process, known in the food world as the Maillard reaction.
That reaction occurs when a food's sugars and amino acids react to produce flavorful
compounds.
Another bit of important grill prep is to take a few minutes and thoroughly clean your
cooking surface.
Think of it this way: You wouldn't toss raw meat into a gross, dirty, charred pan and
then put it in the oven, would you?
You should hold your backyard barbecue grill to the same standard.
Even if your grill has a cover or lid, it still sits outside in the elements, collecting
dust, dirt, yard debris, and other nasties.
Plus, that charred residue can actually harbor bacteria and cause your burgers to stick to
the grates, making it much more difficult for you to flip them or pull them off the
grill intact.
There are a number of different ways to clean your grill, ranging from soaking the grill
grates in hot, soapy water to a quick-and-dirty scrubbing or washing if you need your grill
to be clean ASAP.
Unless you're using a smoker to cook your meats over the course of an entire day, grilling
isn't really a "set it and forget it" type of cooking method.
It's easy to get distracted if you're manning the grill at a party, but you really need
to give your burgers your full attention.
Most grills have hot spots, areas that are much hotter than others, according to The
Kitchn.
If you're not already intimately familiar with your grill, this could be a recipe for
disaster if you're grilling up a dozen burgers for a crowd.
If you turn away from your grill, even for just a minute or two, the patties on these
hot spots could burn very quickly, and that's a recipe for disaster.
Even if you are familiar with the hot spots on your grill, you still need to pay attention
for the entire cooking time.
Sometimes this means rearranging your burger patties during cooking to make sure none of
them sit on the hot spots or cold spots for too long.
Other times, it means flipping some patties sooner than others.
It's also a good idea to stay right next to your grill from a safety perspective.
You can never be too cautious around open flames and hot coals or highly flammable gas.
Who doesn't love a good cheeseburger?
It's a simple concept, right?
Cheese on meat.
But there's actually an art to making the perfect cheeseburger, and it all comes down
to timing.
Cheese is fairly delicate and melts rather easily, so you really don't want to put your
cheese on top of a screaming hot burger inside the grill.
Do this and you'll end up with messy cheese all over the place, everywhere except the
top of your burger.
"This gonna get messy too."
Wait to put that slice of cheese on until just before or just after you remove the burgers
from the heat.
They'll still be plenty hot to melt the cheese to just the right consistency, and more of
it will actually stay on top of the burger than drizzling down.
Or you can place the sliced cheese on the bottom bun, then put your cooked burger patty
on top, as Southern LIving suggests.
This gives you the freedom to then put the rest of your toppings and condiments on top
of the burger, while still getting a nice melty cheese consistency.
If you've seen your dad bring a knife outside and cut into one of the burgers to check for
doneness, using the result to inform whether or not it's time to pull all the burgers off
the cooking surface, don't model your behavior after him in this case.
You're releasing all the juices you worked so hard to preserve throughout the cooking
process.
And checking your meat's color doesn't necessarily tell the whole story, especially if you're
using a mix of meats or non-traditional burger meat.
With ground beef, yes, you can use the pink color to help gauge your burger's doneness.
But this just won't fly with a burger made of ground pork or turkey, which both tend
to retain a pinkish hue even when they're thoroughly cooked.
And what's "thoroughly cooked?"
Technically speaking, you should never, ever eat raw or undercooked beef, as it may contain
harmful bacteria like E. coli.
"I asked for mid-rare, but it's, like, raw."
"It looks a little raw."
So consider investing in a meat thermometer.
This handy kitchen gadget removes all the guesswork out of cooking burgers and other
meats.
You can simply insert the probe and get the meat's temperature in a matter of seconds.
For ground beef, the USDA recommends cooking burgers to an internal temperature of 160
degrees Fahrenheit.
And if you're throwing some other entree on the grill at the same time as your burgers,
you should know that the recommended cooking temperatures vary greatly for other types
of meat.
Chicken, for instance, needs to reach a temperature of 165 degrees Fahrenheit, while salmon only
needs to reach 145 degrees.
Make sure you're using the thermometer properly by inserting it into the thickest part of
the meat and ensuring it doesn't poke out the other side or touch any of the grill elements.
After you grill up your burgers, you may just want to sit back and relax with your dinner
and a beer.
But you've got one more job to do.
Once you've pulled your burgers off the grill, bring the plate or pan you used to bring out
the raw meat and any utensils you used back inside.
Put them in the dishwasher immediately or wash them in the sink with hot, soapy water.
While you're at it, be sure to sanitize your entire kitchen counter and anything else the
raw meat may have come into contact with.
You can use hot soapy water to clean surfaces, but the USDA also suggests using a solution
made with 1 tablespoon of bleach per gallon of water.
You should also wash your hands for at least 20 seconds, and encourage anyone who's helping
to do the same.
"I have recently been placed in charge of garbage, do you have any that requires disposal?"
"No, it's totally empty."
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