If there's one way to impress you're friends at a BBQ it's by making homemade burgers from scratch. Cooking anything impressive requires a little preparation, know-how and perseverance through several steps over a period of time. This is also true of making this barbecue hamburger recipe. Here's how you can do just that in 5 easy steps.
Step 1. Choose the best ingredients you can afford, especially the ground beef (minced if you're a Brit). Get the beef from a local farmers market if you can. This will be important because the meat will be best quality, which will show through in the end result. Also the cattle are likely to be organically reared by a local farmer who really cares about their welfare. Should you skip or ignore this, the results will be just as average as everyone else's. Anyway, the ingredients you need are:
1 pound (450g) of leanest ground beef 1 medium onion, chopped A large hens egg 4 slices of bread (cut off the crust) 4 tbsp finely grated Parmesan cheese 1 tsp each of salt and pepper
(This should make 4 decent sized hamburgers - double or triple the amounts according to numbers/appetite).
Step 2. Mix it all together in this way: blitz the onion and bread in a food processor (or chop very finely). Then put them in a suitable bowl with the rest of the ingredients and mush the whole lot up with your hands, until it's evenly mixed and you can squash it out between your fingers. Then break it into four roughly equal balls. Next comes shaping the patties. This can be a very critical step. It demands concentration and your full attention. It could be best for those who could do it in this way: Here's a cool trick if you want uniformly sized and shaped patties: I use a plastic jar lid, it's about 4 inches across and 1 inch deep, and off a big peanut butter jar. Gently push the required amount of hamburger into the lid, and use your thumb to press a hollow in the centre of the patty.. The reason that this will be significant is so that the hamburger won't bulge in the middle whilst cooking and will cook evenly
Step 3. There are two basic ways to cook a hamburger (beefburger if you're a Brit) - one is to broil it (that is grill it, if you're a Brit), or to grill it over charcoal or gas (i.e. barbecue if...never mind). Assuming you intend to barbecue, sorry grill it, either over charcoal or gas my tip would be to use a hinged gridiron. The reason for this is so that you can put all the patties in to grill - and when the time comes to turn them over, they can all be turned over in one go. Also, it is good to use a hinged gridiron or grill basket, because your homemade hamburgers are less likely to break up during cooking, and will come out looking perfect. This also has the effect of reducing the amount of fat that runs out onto the coals, thus reducing flames - flames aren't a good thing in barbecuing.
Step 4. Watch how long they cook for - 5-7 minutes in total each side over a medium hot barbecue grill. To go into detail and elaborate on that a little, concentrate and don't over cook them, and also don't allow any flare ups to occur. If there are any flames due to juices dripping on to the coals have a spray bottle on hand to blast them with water. Step 5. Serve however you like them. In a fresh burger bun is great - but no one says you have to do this. Here are a few extras to try serving some of the following with your excellent barbecue hamburgers.
slices of cheese e.g. mature cheddar sliced pickled gerkins sliced pickled chillies ketchup tomato chutney mayo chilli sauce.
Additionally, gently toasting the burger buns is a nice touch. Finally, when you have followed the above tips closely, you can tell your guests that this barbecue hamburger recipe is your signature dish! (Since they they will be perfect).
