American · Main · From the menu Brasa
Homemade burger patty
Hamburguesa de la casa
Chuck and short rib ground coarse, formed loosely, seasoned only on the outside and cooked over fierce heat. No egg, no breadcrumbs, no onion in the mix.
I have taken the dimple out. It is one of those things everybody does, and the one source that examines it rejects it outright. What that source does insist on, and I already had right, is that salt goes on the surface and never into the mix: worked into the meat it activates the protein and you get a dense, springy patty that eats like a sausage. Worth saying that the chuck-to-short-rib ratio below is mine — nobody publishes one.
Ingredients
- 800 g beef chuck
- 400 g short rib or brisket, well marbled, for 20 to 25 per cent fat overall
- Flaked salt and coarse black pepper
- 6 brioche buns
- 6 slices of a good melting cheese
- Butter for the buns
- Whatever you like on it: pickles, onion, lettuce, tomato
Method
- Cut the meat into 2.5 cm cubes and put them in the freezer for no more than thirty minutes, until firm at the edges but not frozen.
- Grind once on a coarse plate, or pulse in a food processor for about a second at a time, fifteen to twenty pulses. Coarser than anything you can buy, and never grind it twice.
- Weigh into 200 g portions and form them into pucks with the lightest possible hand, about 2 cm thick. Do not compress or roll them, and do not press a dimple into the middle.
- Refrigerate at least thirty minutes.
- Salt the outside of the patties only, in the last minute before cooking. Salt in the mix makes the texture springy and there is no undoing it.
- Get the grill or a cast-iron plate properly hot. The patties should sizzle loudly the moment they land.
- Cook without pressing or moving. Turn once, add the cheese immediately, and use a probe rather than the clock.
- Toast the buns in butter, cut side down, while the burgers finish.
- Rest two minutes, build, and eat standing up.
Serve it with. Grilled corn, and the sauces off the salad table.