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I've been getting wonderful emails and pix from you. Man, you folks
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About Smoke Signals
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|  Smoke Signals is the free email from AmazingRibs.com and Barbecue Whisperer, Meathead.
If you like my website, please click here to forward a copy of this to a friend. And remember: No rules in the bedroom or the kitchen!
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How the Zen Master Prepares a Hamburger
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|  Close your eyes and think of the best hamburger you've ever had. In a restaurant, right? Let's change this. Let's all go from Grasshopper to Burger Zen Master.
Let me guess what is in your memory: You needed two hands and two napkins. The toasty charry beefy scent wafted to your nose as it was escorted to your table. The perfume told your mouth to start the lube moving the moment the plate became visible. It almost smelled burnt, but it was not. As you lifted the top of the bun to add ketchup, you saw that the patty had a mahogany skin and the bun was wet with dark juices that looked like Suwanee River. It was crunchy when your teeth pierced it. The warm salty juices flowed over your tongue followed closely by an assertively deep prime steak flavor, like a steakhouse steak framed by the irresistible bracing flavor of roasted beef fat. The bun was warm, buttery, and crispy on the inside, and condiments amped up the experience, but you really can't remember them. It was the succulent brawny beef that sticks in your mind. The experience ended, reluctantly, with licking the juice off your elbows.
So what are the secrets of a Zen Master's Burger? Finding out has taken me a whole year, a longer odyssey than any other cooking technique I've tried to conquer on your behalf. Whooda thunk the humble burger was such a pain?
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The Zen of Killer Steakhouse Steakburgers
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The succulent Steakhouse Steakburger is the elusive beast that I stalked for years whenever I ate out. Like a wildebeest hunter in the dessert, I came home skunked more often than sated. And when I came home, it turned the tables and stalked me, circling me in my sleep, just out of reach, haunting my dreams. I could not catch it. Not even on my own grill.
My prey is a big fat fellow, about 3/4" thick, weighing in at 8 ounces or so. It wastes no space on the bun. It has a thin rich salty cordovan crust that is redolent of slightly charred tallow, and when punctured by my fangs, bleeds profusely. With each bite it reminds me that a great burger is not just cheap calories wrapped in tissue paper on every corner of every town in America, but a gustatory delight as elusive as any delicacy.
Its natural habitat is the white tablecloth steakhouse where it is treated like hand carved filet mignon, it is broiled or grilled by a flame, but the price is outlandish. On the rare occasion that I bagged one, it left me delirious, in a beef coma. And broke.
So I stopped hunting and set about taming the beast. It has taken me a year to perfect this technique. My effort was a raging success, and just to underscore the point, I serve my Steakhouse Steakburgers in a bowl because they are so juicy. People will ask why you are setting the table with bowls. You just crack a half grin, just a twist in one corner of your mouth, cock your head, and say quietly "You'll see".
What I learned was boggling, and negated almost everything I thought I knew about hamburgers.
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The Zen of Great Diner Burgers
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|  Diner Burgers are small disks, 4 ounces or less, as opposed to big thick Steakhouse Steakburgers. With Diner Burgers, it's all about the browning the meat surface.
In George Motz's excellent guide to the best burgers in the country, "Hamburger America: One Man's Cross-Country Odyssey to Find the Best Burgers in the Nation", 81 of the 100 burgers he describes are griddled, four are steamed or deep fried, and just 13 are cooked by an open flame.
But if you try to do a diner burger in your kitchen, you will almost certainly make the smoke alarm cry, and you will also be crying because you will be scrubbing spatters off the top of the range for hours. Next time you are sitting at the diner counter, notice the huge exhaust fan over the griddle, and how greasy the floors are. So the perfect homemade diner burgers are cooked on a griddle, where else, outdoors, on our grills.
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The Zen of Cheeseburgers
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In 1924, 16 year old Lionel Clark Sternberger, dropped a slab of American cheese on a sizzling hamburger while helping out at his father's sandwich shop in Pasadena, thereby inventing the cheeseburger. Thank you Mr. Sternberger for a great taste combo and an American icon.
There are two important guidelines:
1) The cheese must be melted. It cannot be cold or hard.
2) The cheese must enhance the composition of the sandwich, not clash with it.
There are two ways to go when adding dairy to your cow: Melting cheese, or spreading cheese. Here's my take on the tricks and techniques for great cheeseburgers.
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A Taxonomy of the Different Species of Hamburger
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|  Once upon a time, hamburgers were the All-American inexpensive meals that Dad was allowed to immolate in the back yard until they looked, and tasted, like black hockey pucks. Then came McDonald's and burgers became tan and tasted like a tanned hide.
To the observant burgologist, there are at least a dozen distinctive species and subspecies of burger. Like sports teams, everyone has a favorite. Most hamburgers are distinguished mainly by the condiments. But condiments don't make the burger. The meat does. And how you cook it.
In this fun article I get to play culinary anthropologist and study the major species of burger. If I've missed a legit style, let me know.
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Toppings, Bottomings, and Meathead's Burger Glop
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The Sutter Home Winery's Build a Better Burger Contest puts a lot of emphasis on the condiments. "In my opinion," says James McNair, Honorary Chairman and Head Judge, "the meat patty is a major component of a good burger, but remains only one part of a burger. The bread, as Alice Waters stated in my first book on burgers, is equally important, and great condiments can elevate a plain burger into a sensational taste treat. At BBB we certainly want the patties, whether made from beef or another protein, to be high-quality, well seasoned, and nicely cooked, yet each of the other elements must be equally as good and exciting. Our contest is about creativity and good cooking, not about simply perfecting the old tried and true."
Me? I'm all about perfecting the old tried and true, so I keep the condiments simple and let the beef shine through. Here's how I approach the subject, and my recipe for Burger Glop.
You also might enjoy The Zen of Ketchup and The Zen of Mustard.
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The Zen of Hamburger Buns
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|  "It requires a certain kind of mind to see beauty in a hamburger bun." Ray Kroc, founder of the McDonald's chain
The key is to choose a bun that:
(1) Won't dull the flavor of the beef,
(2) Is large enough to envelop the patty,
(3) Allows the patty to take center stage,
(4) Is firm enough to hold together when wetness attacks it,
(5) Is soft enough that you don't have to bite down too hard and squeeze out the juices, and
(6) Is squishy enough to form fit around its payload so things don't fall out.
Here's some bun inspiration.
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Grinding Your Own Burgers for Quality and Safety
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|  "I'm not telling you, 'Never eat a hamburger'. Just eat the good ones with real beef, you know, like the ones from that Mom-and-Pop diner down the street, and it's so good that when you take a bite out of that burger, you just know somewhere in the world a vegan is crying." Homer Simpson
When you grind your own hamburgers you are assured of the freshest meat, just the right fat to lean ratio, and you know that the meat hasn't been contaminated by an improperly cleaned grinder. Here's how to do it.
Also, I have made a study of the safety of burgers, and I have learned that E-coli can kill. Here's how to make safe burgers.
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Save This Link
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|  If you like all the info I give you for free and would like to help me buy charcoal, copy this url link and save it: http://tinyurl.com/yazmwlq. It takes you to Amazon.com and tags anything you buy with my affiliate code so I get a small referral fee. It works on anything from grills to diapers and it has zero impact on the price you pay. Low prices, fast delivery (often free), good refund policies, and often there is no sales tax, are the best reasons to buy from Amazon.com, but clicking on that link before you shop helps me devote more time and money to you. Thanks!
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Great Gifts for the Barbecue Fan
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 Visit the AmazingRibs.com Gift Shop for a chuckle. There are now more than 30 steak-themed designs, about 20 hotdog-themed designs, and more than 30 wine-themed designs. Order aprons, hats, shirts, sweatshirts, intimate wear, and
other apparel for men, women, kids and pets, beer mugs, posters, and
other tschotschkes.
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