The perfectly grilled burger is a thing of mouth-watering beauty. Flawless grill lines, a hint of deep golden brown char, seasoned well, with a hint of pink, and every bite a juicy morsel. You don't need to be a trained cook to recreate the experience in your backyard; it just takes a little know-how to create a burger you, your friend, family, or guests will be raving about for months.
If you've never tried grilling burgers before, or if you find yourself frustrated with grilled burgers a little too charred, dry, underdone, or unimpressed, we're here to share the secrets to grilling the perfect burger every time.
The Meat and the Fat Counts
The road to perfect starts with a great foundation, and a burger can only be as great as the meat, and the fat in the meat, that you choose. While lean meat is a healthier option, its fat content is the best flavoring for your burgers. But why does fat make such a big difference?
Fat is flavor. But how exactly does it make a burger better?
- When oxidized, fatty acids produce carbonyl compounds that contribute to flavor potency.
- Fat may act as a storage for the delicious aroma characteristics released during cooking and eating.
- Fat is less resistant to force than protein. Meaning marbling can influence the tenderness of the burger meat, allowing for higher heat and the meat to remain fall-apart even when accidentally cooked longer.
- The fat affects your burger's juiciness and enhances the meat's water-retaining capacity.
Whether you are making burgers from beef, chicken, turkey, fish, or even vegetables, the best thing to ensure a better burger is to have enough fat in the mix.
The primary burger ratio should be 80/20: 80% protein, 20% fat.
Always Season Your Burgers
You don't have to go complicated with the seasonings or rare. You can keep it as simple as salt and pepper, but for a perfect grilled burger, you need to have seasonings—in the burger mix before forming the patties. Many burger aficionados have rather passionate opinions on what seasonings should and should not be used, and which ones make the best burger—luckily, perfect seasonings depend on your tastes or the tastes of those you'll be cooking for.
What are some other basic seasoning combinations you could try?
- Salt, pepper, and garlic powder
- Salt, pepper, paprika, onion powder, and garlic powder
- Salt, pepper, brown sugar, garlic powder, onion powder, cayenne pepper
If you're new to grilling, there's no shame in keeping it simple when you start and then exploring other seasonings as you go, so don't feel pressured to use anything outside of salt and pepper if you don't need to.
If you are considering adding a "secret" ingredient like Worcestershire sauce, the time to use it is when seasoning the mix before creating patties. But again, we do recommend keeping the flavors simple—try not to overuse sauces, eggs, milk, and so on, especially during your first burger grilling experience and when grilling with beef. It's easy to use too much mistakenly and have your burger either fall apart on the grill, dry up, or even be overcooked.
When you've perfected your perfect burger, you'll have the foundation down pat, and then you can open it up to experimenting with ingredients and flavors later on.
Don't Overwork When Shaping
Next up is shaping the patties. Overworking the patties, especially when made from beef, chicken, turkey, or fish. Overworking can lead to tougher burgers. If you do not like touching raw meat or that the meat sticks to your hands, feel free to wear gloves. An easy way to begin shaping is to divide the burger mix into equally sized piles. Take a deli container lid or a flat lid, gently place it on top of the meat, then press down gently to form patties.
To prevent your patties from balling up or curling up, take your thumb and make a small divot in the middle of each one.
Keep Them Cold
While it makes sense to take a steak out of the fridge for 15-30 minutes before cooking to ensure an even sear, with ground meat in burger patties, the opposite is what you want. Keep them chilled and in the fridge for at least 30 minutes or overnight before taking them straight out of the fridge and onto the grill. Why?
- The most important and prominent is food safety. Never leave raw meat out, especially meat that's been handled and seasoned for long periods.
- Ground meat burgers are delicate. The warmer they get, the quicker the fat will render, causing them to lose shape and fall apart. You want your burger to keep its shape.
- Moisture plays a key role in creating the perfect grilled burger. When cooking the burger, the moisture closest to the edge will evaporate first. When a patty is at room temperature, there's no liquid water to evaporate, which can prolong the cooking time, resulting in a dry, overdone burger.
Pretreat, Preheat the Grill and Cook the Burgers Fast
Pretreat your grill to get it ready for the burgers, as you'll want to cook them fast. Make sure the grill is clean. Next, you want to preheat and oil the grill with vegetable or canola oil while it is preheating—not before.
What's the best grill temperature? To get that flawless crispy outside, tender, moist, and juicy inside—preheat the gas or charcoal grill well before you get those patties out of the fridge at medium-high heat. Once it's preheated, the grill is ready when the oil begins to smoke, and then you'll want to place the patties directly over the heat.
On The Grill
Place your burgers on the grill indentation side-up and then leave them. We can't stress this enough—it can be tempting to try and arrange them differently or nudge them, but resist. The less you touch them, the better your burger will be. Additionally, one other important thing to remember: do not press down on them! When you do, you squeeze out everything that makes your burger flavorful and juicy.
Wait roughly 5-6 minutes before considering flipping them. The best way to tell if a burger is ready to be flipped is that you can do so without it sticking, and the cooking side will have gorgeous grill marks.
The perfect doneness for 8-ounce burgers is:
- Medium Rare: Cook for 7 minutes or until internal temperature reaches 135 degrees F
- Medium: About 8 minutes to cook or until internal temps reach 154 degrees F
- Well done: About 9 minutes or until internal temps reach 150 degrees F
Last, to perfect that grilled burger, you'll want them onto a plate, topped, and served as soon as possible for the most unbelievably moist, tender, savory burger you've ever cooked!
We hope we've made your taste buds tingle and inspired you to fire up the grill and make yourself the best-grilled burger you've had yet!