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if there was a burger Jedi it would be
Kenji Lopez owns the award-winning
author and Internet food legend has
conducted hundreds of breakthrough
experiments on his influential blog the
burger lab today we're on a mission to
debunk some of the most prevalent burger
myths around and to learn some i opening
techniques that will lead to a better or
delicious burger my entire career I've
been taught certain things right right
right right
and then I read your blog and you just
sit in a complete opposite and every
once in a while you find hey like this
thing that everybody's doing all the
time like actually if you actually test
it side by side it turns out that it's
not the best variety so what makes you
unique you take a scientific approach
and then you document it so it's kind of
like for all the haters out there these
are my notes you just go against the
grain and like you and you prove it
right you always want to cut against the
grain today what we're gonna make
actually is hopefully different from any
other burger done on the show before I
call it the best burger for a single
person because you can literally only
make money one at a time it doesn't work
if you try to make too many and in the
process I think we're gonna try and
debunk a few burger myths things things
people say you always have to do and
there's a time we'll explain why you
shouldn't shouldn't this is like a Jedi
Yoda moment forget the ride on your back
here
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when you'll hear a lot of people say is
that Chuck which comes from that you
know the shoulder of the steer is the
best meat for burgers yeah Chuck is a
very good sort of all-in-one meat it
makes it easy like it has you know Chuck
is one of these muscles that works hard
throughout throughout the steers life it
has a lot of good marbling a lot of fat
a lot of flavor development but if you
think of a of a burger as like a nice
blended whisky or a nice blended wine
okay you know you want to take different
elements and make sure that the flavors
between them are balanced as you blend
them what we got here is brisket what we
got over here is sirloin and then right
here we got short rib so let's taste
some of these burger varietals I say we
start with the Chuck which is the one
that you're probably most used to eating
and it's gonna have that sort of balance
and that is like a pretty classic burger
well all right let's move on to the
short rib here there's a lot of richness
but not not too much of depth you know
it's like it feels like all like it's a
very rich yeah if you look it's like
sort of like like EDM you know it's just
saying yeah I like bass one but there's
nothing much above it all right let's
move on to the brisket you get like it's
sort of like a sourness to it out people
describe I think is like serum flavor
like what blood really yeah and now
let's taste us some top sirloin here
Lloyd yes you can't just do a burger
like that no dry it up so we're brisket
I think has a sort of crumbly texture of
sirloin binds better days this day is
more tender as a fire yeah yeah yeah so
what I what I like to do is I like to
combine
about 50% sirloin just to have that sort
of like black blank canvas and that
tenderness along with about 25% brisket
and 25% short rib that makes so much
sense we're using relatively cheap cuts
of meat right you know we're not using
Wagga burger yeah it's a burger burger
should be it's it's ground beef yeah
it's the most democratic food in the
world
we're just gonna cube this up now nice
inched inch and a half chunks so what
we're doing is we're cutting it into
cubes and we're tossing all the cubes
together into a bowl so that when we
grind them you know everything's sort of
evenly mixed together one thing you
might be asking is when should we put
the salt in I need a salt you need yes
good you know bit debated for the
longest time it is it's a biggie I don't
think someone in the fifties or sixties
it was like this is the point you salt
it exactly so you know so a lot of
people will tell you put salt in right
now I think this is a big mistake I have
two burger patties one of them was made
with beef that was salted okay and the
other one was made with beef that was
unsalted I'm gonna do a quick little
experiment for that I think we should
probably head outside
I have here two burger patties identical
except of the fact that in one of them
the salt was mixed into the meat and in
the other one the salt is only on the
exterior okay both of them are cooked so
now I want you to hold that tray there
so I'm gonna throw first this is the
patty that is salted only on the
exterior
you got it hit my nartz okay that was
the unsalted burger burger that was only
filtered in the exterior and you saw I
mean it fell apart just from the force
of me throwing it before it even got
anywhere near you right and that's what
you want in a burger at least that's
what I want in a burger I wanted to be
really so tender then it just hit it
just falls apart in your mouth like
barely barely held together now I'm
gonna show you what happens if you salt
your meat before grinding in or before
forming the pattern is ready you eat
that deeper it gets this sort of rubbery
texture which is in a sausage a good
thing that sort of rubbery snap that you
get in the sausage but not really what
you wanted a burger
don't salt your patties before you grind
it but do assault you're friends with
burger patties you just threw a burger
patty at me
yeah I think you I mean I'm sure we're
good now let's get to grinding the meat
the next myth we're going to talk about
is that your burgers need to be formed
and shaped in a very specific way and
yeah you know for this burger we're
actually gonna not really form it at all
rather than picking up the meeting for
me in the patties all we're gonna do is
kind of gently shape it into a patty
like this super lightly what I like to
say is that once once the beef has been
ground we never pick up the beef again
with human hands the goal that we're
going for here is maximum surface area
for crispness and browning and that's
really why we don't want to press it
flat because you know the smoother
surfaces the less surface area to volume
ratio you're gonna have and so the more
nooks and crannies you have it's like an
English muffin the more nooks and
crannies you have the crispier and
better everything exactly so for you
burger makers at home the key thing to
remember is you want to handle your meat
as little as possible my two basic
toppings on a burger I don't know what
yours are if I had to pick just two
toppings it would be pickles and onions
agree tomatoes when there's season and
and if it's gonna be lettuce for me it
needs to be shredded iceberg alright so
we got our lettuce we got our tomato now
we're gonna go into this onion now if
you look at an onion there's two
different ways you can cut it if you
imagine this is a planet and it's going
rotating around this axis we can cut it
orbitally which is the way like a
satellite would orbit around it right I
want to bring it around it yeah and
you'll get onion rings or you can cut it
from pole to pole it actually makes a
pretty significant difference
Orion's direction you cut it and the
reason for that is because onion cells
are not symmetrical they are they're
sort of elongated in one direction
happen to have this property so imagine
this when you were kid to Jeff like in
my microscope did you ever look at
onions under it I did I mean you see it
looks almost like this it has these like
sort of elongated cells and those cells
run this way they run from pole to pole
so the cells are much longer that way
and they are the other way and the thing
about onions and other alliums is that
that's sort of pungent flavor the thing
or the thing that makes you cry then
think that gives you that pungent flavor
in your nose those chemicals they don't
exist in a raw onion what happens is
when you cut open onion cells there's
these precursor chemicals that come out
and they interact
each other we're and then they formed
these sort of pungent aroma after after
slicing so the more cells you break in
an onion the more like you crying
exactly the more I'll make you cry the
more of those bad flavors it takes all
that stuff out puts it in the air
exactly imagine you're slicing this
onion pull to pull let's go down there
we go so you're slicing it that way
you're essentially just cutting like a
single row of cells and so right now
you've released about whatever you know
one cells worth maybe two cells worth of
stuff in this little section but if
you're cutting across the equator yeah
you're cutting all those cells and
that's exactly what happens when you cut
when you cutting that in across the
equator so all this stuff gets released
you get a much stronger pungency by
cutting it across this that's so cool
man so I got here tiny little skillet so
essentially about the same size as the
burger right and this is plan you want a
sub want that and this this is precisely
why a burger like this is ideal for
people at home by themselves not great
for a restaurant not great if you're
cooking for a crowd because you really
need that sing you need to cook it one
at a time it needs to be in a small
skillet and I'll show you why so we'll
put a little oil in the pan salt smells
kosher salt after this meat has been
ground we have not picked it up with our
berry we haven't seasoned it and we have
not picked it up with our bare hands
carefully flip it over spatula only no
hands carefully so we got our pan on a
smoking pot here it's at around 400
degrees right now we're going to take
our burger patty
as a cook that's gonna render out of it
and it's gonna sort of start to fill up
the pan a little bit and so it's like
deep-frying in its own fat you know so
you get all that extra flavor you get
all that Cristina if you did this on a
platter or a bigger pan all that bad
just drains away how long do you save
first size about a minute about oh yeah
wear it with this side is pretty much
done
you can tell it's loose it's crumbly
yeah and you can see all these little
bits of brown beef they're sort of fried
in their own fat directly on here so
that they have a little bit of a chance
to steam this is gonna keep it all
together exactly what I'm doing right
now is I'm just gonna lay a little towel
over this so that it's sort of yeah
exactly just to soften up that bun a
little bit trap into some of that onion
in Jersey they use a piece of parchment
paper if they kind of make a tent okay
so now we're ready to assemble I'm gonna
put a little mayo down there that's hot
it's nice as opposed to toppings I'm
more of a bottoming right type of guy so
I like to put my little bed of lettuce
and this is for like tectonic shifts
right exactly has to keep this to keep
everything stable oh you could see the
crusts on there the cheese is melted Oh
baby you can see these edges right like
that looks completely different for like
a smash burger but yeah how many nooks
and crannies are in just like sort of
the roughness of it cheers man
you taste how juicy this so this this is
a well-done burger yeah there's not a
hint of picking pink in it but because
of the method of cooking like it comes
out no like super super juicy there's so
much texture going on like it's super
crispy man it's like a burger like
croissant with the dumb flakiness of the
beef mm-hmm that's solid record ood it's
all burger thing there's a lot of like
so-called hard and fast rules about
cooking anything cooking burgers um but
yeah you know sometimes sometimes
breaking the rules gets it to really
delicious delicious results yeah this
proves culinary school and half the
books I've read Rock the burger force is
really with you
well thanks they see it I appreciate it
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you
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