How to make the Perfect Burger at home, according to science.

from thick to thin from smashed to steamed even though there are thousands of great youtube videos about burgers i still feel like we're missing something that something we are missing is understanding the fundamentals of making the perfect burger at home now this is not some recipe video touting a burger recipe i have as the perfect one instead my goal in this video is to put us on the pathway to the perfect burger so how do we do that well i think it starts with basic food science in this video i'm gonna run through five different experiments and a couple of taste tests to explain the fundamentals of why and how to make the burgers that we love so much for example what does fatis flavor actually mean how do i achieve beef flavor nirvana why is burger juice lubrication important why do we like crispy burgers does it matter which ground beef i use and what kind of a difference does it make in how it browns or can i make a chicken burger taste beefier than one made with actual ground beef for a dish that's so simple at the surface i have so many questions and making this video helped me have a ton of breakthroughs [Music] i've chosen to focus on the big picture fundamentals that are most relevant to us as home cooks and these should be able to apply to any potential burger preparation and set us on that pathway to the perfect burger and if you like this video i can do a follow-up because there are some topics i wasn't able to hit on in this one like salt the toppings and assembly because i spent so much time energy and experimentation on the core ingredient of burgers and that is the ground beef so with that being said let's break it down here are the three ground beef mixes that we will use for the majority of the experiments i have 93 7 80 20 and 70 30. and googa did a video where he tested out three high fat burger mixes including butter that inspired this video and that's great if you do have this stuff to grind your own but i wanted to focus on these three mixes because i think most of us can find these ranges at a grocery store or the local butcher shop also these blends are kind of evenly spaced across the spectrum so it should allow us to see some clear differences in the experiments and also help explain the food science a little bit better for example right off the bat you're probably seeing some differences in how these look raw with specks of white interspersed with the reddish lean meat and that amount of white beef fat sprinkled throughout is what makes the massive difference in the outcome of a burger now before we shape or smash these let's zoom out a bit and actually look at the two components that make up ground beef in the first place now this should start to set up some light bulbs not only in our burgers but anything that you cook with beef ground meat is made up of two components lean meat and fat and when it comes to burgers things like how the meat is ground will make a difference but this video is already too long so today we are focusing on the fat as noted in meathead for ground beef you want at least 20 fat not 15 and many top chefs now recommend 25 to 30 fat so why does the ratio of lean meat to fat matter so much well it really comes down to one thing beef fat melts this single property of b-fat the fact that it melts makes all the difference in our ground beef choices and here's a simple experiment number one that lays the foundation for so many things in this video i sliced off a section of flank steak and chopped it into a rough ground beef and flank steak is super lean so this is essentially 100 lean ground beef then i took pure beef fat and chopped that up as well now instead of mixing them i actually added 15 grams of each right to the griddle to let them cook and i love little tests like this because they're super simple but they get down to the core food science of it all and in this there are three very important observations first is liquid release take a look at the fat and we can see that it starts to melt and pool at the base of the beef fat pile it's liquid fat it has melted on the other hand the lean meat is releasing liquid but it's not fat it's water this water is pushed out of the meat proteins as they tighten and then it steams at 212 degrees fahrenheit or 100 c so really we have fat versus water release and guess how much weight these lost after being cooked again both started at 15 grams but the beef weighed 10 grams or 66 percent of its original weight and the fat only weighed 3.5 grams or 23 of its original weight so the water most of that just steamed off and was lost in the air but the fat didn't evaporate it was actually just released out onto the pan now this liquid fat release has a profound difference in observation number two browning [Music] when i flip these two over just take a look at them the fat which melted into the pan has essentially shallow fried itself leading to all these crispy brown bits whereas the lean meat just released that water to steam and it's looking pretty gray now we have a couple other tests around browning that we'll get to in a couple minutes but the third observation from this is the beefy flavor if you give these to a stiff guess which one smells beefier it's not the lean mate it's actually the fat and a lot of the flavor molecules that we identify as beefy flavor are actually concentrated in the beef fat not the meat itself and as you can maybe guess these simple observations have a massive effect on two things the flavor and the texture of the burger now for me in my cooking brain this little test started flicking off light bulbs all over the place and this test was done on complete opposite ends of the spectrum 100 fat and 100 lean meat but let's zoom back into what we are testing today because these outcomes will ring true but on much more of a sliding scale for example how much better is the flavor how much better is the texture and let's talk flavor first many of us have probably heard the phrase fat is flavor and that signature meaty beefy goodness that we salivate over in integrate burger is actually not just from the lean beef itself a lot of it as we just smelled is actually from the beef fat for example the prize filet mignon as i've shown on the channel is super tender yes but it's also very lean and as far as beefy flavor goes it is extremely lacking when compared to a rib eye which is due to the increased intra and inner muscular fat that a rib eye has now i've always wondered how strong is the beef flavor in b-fat for example could i add beef fat to ground chicken and would it taste beefier than a lean beef burger well that's exactly what we put to the test i took 170 grams or 6 ounces of 93 7 ground beef and shaped it into a patty then i took 135 grams of chopped up ground chicken breast and mixed it with 35 grams of beef fat that i chopped up to form a franken 80 chicken and 20 beef fat mixed then i formed that into a patty and cooked both of them and as i was cooking them i noticed those same effects from the first test where the fat melts and it actually gives us a pretty killer crust i mean that is the best looking chicken burger i've ever made for assembly i kept the toppings pretty simple with burger sauce three pickles shredded lettuce onions and then i did add some cheese to the burger over the top now instead of testing myself to try to avoid some biases that i may have i actually asked my blindfolded brother to taste them first alright everybody we have a blind taste test contestant my brother i'm gonna feed him both of the burgers and then just ask him two questions here's burger number one fully digest we'll get you a pallet cleanser too okay the pallet has been cleansed time for burger number two [Music] i need this one another bite question number one which burger was juicier i'd say the second one and then second question is which one tasted beefier first one but the first one was dryer which was strange first one tasted drier not as juicy but it tasted better this one didn't taste like much to be honest but it did taste juicier none of them were like my ideal burger to be honest but the first one better flavor but dryer overall second one juicier but i wasn't picking up a lot of beef flavor on that one yeah yeah it just it doesn't have much flavor yeah definitely juicier though i think this one didn't taste like much either it's juicier but i don't know this one this one tastes more beefy to me i like this one better i thought the beef fat would make more of a difference i mean it makes it its way juicier fattier like that but it didn't really make it taste any better so straight up this was the opposite of what i thought was gonna happen the chicken burger with the increased fat was way more juicy it had a nicer crust and was overall just better flavor-wise and while it did have notes of beefy flavor it was still pretty obvious that it was chicken i mean it is still 80 chicken breast at the end of the day the beef burger on the other hand was really dry and honestly this is why i would not recommend this cooking method for 937 ground beef but it still clearly tasted like beef so not what i expected but what did we learn well beef fat is definitely important but it's not the only variable that matters to achieve that beef flavor nirvana we want in a burger and in fact it's really a combination of three things one the b fat two the lean beef flavor and three the mayor or browning reaction which creates the exterior of the crust okay so in general more beef fat is going to mean more beef flavor but there is going to be a point where you kind of go too far for example i've definitely had some greasy burgers that yeah they were enjoyable in the moment but then they kind of sit down like a brick in your stomach which is not so enjoyable after and with that being said we have flavor covered but now let's talk about what fat does for texture which is just if not more important specifically the two most important textural qualities for a burger in my opinion are number one juiciness and two crust formation now for these qualities i wanted to test out two different burger style preparations number one a large pub style burger single patty and secondly the king of the crust the smash burger and to help with crust formation because i know a bunch of you will probably ask me where i got it from check out the griddle press set from today's sponsor made in maiden has been innovating and this is the pre-season carbon steel griddle that is used all throughout this video and as a lover of griddles this is basically how i would have designed this thing this griddle withstands heat up to 1200 degrees fahrenheit and is perfect for cooking on the stove inside but can also be used on the grill outside or even an open flame used inside it's perfect for just keeping it on the stove and it will easily become one of your favorite and most used pans and i didn't even get to the best part it actually comes as a set with this heavy duty griddle press which can be used to increase contact points for increased browning of whatever you happen to be cooking so if you want to get the griddle and press set or any of maiden's amazing cookware head to the link below to get 15 off your order using code ethan and you'll be seeing this thing in many of my videos going forward we'll get to smashing in a second but first let's define what the juices are and why we love them so much the juices that drip from a burger are made up of two things which you can probably guess from the first test we did number one it's the fat that is melted from the ground beef and number two it's the water that was released from the lean meat as it's cooked again because those proteins in the meat tighten up pushing out the water now our goal when cooking burgers is to retain as much of these juices as possible and this really comes down to two things don't overcook your burger the more it cooks the more water releases and also the more fat melts now to combat that secondly you can just add more fat to your burger mix so let's put our ground beef mixes to the test and first up we have what i'm calling the lubrication test lubrication is why the burger juices typically increase our pleasure in the first place i'll explain why in a second but let's do the experiment first for this one i shaped 150 gram patties from each ground beef mix the 937 the 80 20 and the 70 30. then i cooked each one on the griddle to roughly 140 degrees fahrenheit 60 c or medium ish i weighed each burger after it came off the griddle and then to kind of simulate picking up a burger and eating it i took two deli containers as my bun and squeezed those burgers to allow all the juices to fall onto the plate and then i also weighed the juices released now conveniently this ended up being a sliding scale which is kind of what i would expect the 937 retained the most weight but released the least amount of juice when squeezed and vice versa for the highest fat so why is this test important well like i said lubrication and the best way that i could think of to communicate the importance of burger juices is actually by comparing it to a salad vinaigrette so a vinaigrette is made with three parts fat like olive oil and one part liquid like balsamic vinegar and when added to a salad it sticks to the exterior of the salad components enhancing the mouth feel and imparting flavor now the beef juices in our burger are essentially the same thing instead of olive oil and vinegar it's made with beef fat and then water liquid from the lean meat so imagine this piece of burger that i squeeze all the juices out from is a piece of lettuce you know not great but when i add some beef vinaigrette if you will it is light years better now i've separated the components for the test but when we bite into a burger these juices are released into our mouth where it essentially lubricates the tongue and in terms of texture it gives us this glossy unctuous mouth meal now this sounds a little gross when you kind of break it down like that but trust me you and i love this feeling and what's interesting about this test is the differences of the ratios in our beef vinaigrettes i mean juices for example the 80 20 beef juice has much more fat compared to the 93 7 beef juice which you can easily see that layer of beef in the 1820 has already solidified and like we mentioned earlier for flavor the fat of the burger is going to enhance and concentrate that beefy flavor but it's also going to lubricate any toppings sauces or cheeses we have in there as well okay so we got juiciness covered but now let's talk about my favorite quality of a burger and one that i think can turn an average burger into a really really good one and that is the crust here's a quick experiment take a look at these two burger patties and tell me which one you want to take a bite out of pretty obvious choice for me now these burgers were made with identical 80 20 ground beef one of them was made in a pan on the stove and the other i poached in water since water can't get above 212 degrees fahrenheit that burger is never going to brown on the exterior why because the mayor reaction doesn't start to happen at temperatures until it's above 300 degrees fahrenheit the burger i cooked in the pan on the other hand was able to achieve that with no problem because of guess what property we learned from earlier beef fat melts we're coming full circle now i didn't add any extra fat to the pan instead i just got it ripping hot and added the patty the beef fat melted down into the pan and created a layer of thermal conductivity that was able to achieve the requisite browning temperature and give me a nice crust now with this test we are again on two broad ends of the spectrum to kind of prove a point but what i'm really interested to see in is what does the crust look like when you kind of step up in the fat mixes so that's what we're gonna do next in experiment number five the crust formation test for this test i decided to do smash burgers instead of these single patty pub style burgers and i took 85 gram balls from each of the ground beef mixes and then mash them onto a ripping hot griddle with the press i let the crust form for about 60 seconds before scraping and giving them a flip and here are each of them the biggest jump in my opinion is between the 93 7 to the 80 20. we get some clear differences in crust formation and when you take a bite you can definitely feel that extra textural contrast in your mouth now the differences we've seen in these experiments have been pretty narrowly focused and it makes sense that they kind of followed the trends they did but to wrap the video up i wanted to do one final taste test with a full burger and honestly this one did not go like i thought it would for the final taste test i made three identically sized double smash burgers with our three ground beef mixes and for these again i kept the toppings pretty plain which is what i'd normally do i have a bun burger sauce thinly sliced lettuce then some thinly sliced red onion and lastly of course i made the smash burgers with cheese so let's see how these taste one final taste test we have the 937 the 80 20 and then the 70 30 so what should we start with first let's go least fat all right i think oh yeah that's a good burger it's pretty solid yeah 80 20. we'll save our thoughts for the end um once we compare and contrast a little bit more it's good too i love burgers all right last one big step up on the crust on that one yeah wow all right i'm going to finish up so that was pretty interesting um and not exactly what i thought i think the biggest step up was honestly to the 30 70. i agree i don't know about you the crust was way more crispy and noticeably more of the beefy flavor increased fat way better browning you could hear and feel the crisp in there exactly and then honestly not not as much of a difference as i would yeah i would have thought way more different between these two which is pretty shocking to me when you're putting it in a full burger you know cheese sauce lettuce tomato i mean there's not it's not much of a difference yeah i think once you add the sauce once you add the cheese especially in between the layers like when i was going through the tests and we went through them with like single burger patties you can really see massive differences but once it actually is in a full burger not nearly as much as i thought that being said i think the biggest step up was the last one was the 70 30. noticeable yeah if you are going for a 93.7 kind of a little bit healthier make sure you can add sauces add cheeses to it especially between the two patties makes a massive difference because when it was a single patty we had tested yesterday like not great at all right super dry but once you can kind of add those textural components that give you some juiciness it becomes a much better burger so in conclusion here's a little score card with some of the bigger takeaways i have with each ground beef mix there is no doubt that the higher ground beef had noticeable benefits in flavor and crust formation in the test but i found that 80 20 to be perfectly acceptable as well also if your perfect burger is one that can help you watch the waistline a bit using that 93 7 beef and the smash burger technique is definitely the way to go so i hope the observations and basic food science that we learned in this video will help you make better burgers in the future so subscribe if you are new and enjoy the video comment your favorite burger toppings down below and let me know i can do some follow-ups on more burger theory and burger science videos if you guys want to but it's going to wrap it up for me in this one i'll catch you all in the next one peace y'all [Music] you

Channel: Ethan Chlebowski

Views: 2,653,852

Keywords: Ethan Chlebowski, how to cook a burger, burger recipe, hamburger recipe, how to, best hamburger, burger science, how to make a burger, smash burger, pub burger, crisp burger, smash burger recipe, smash burger on griddle, how to make the perfect burger, burger recipe at home, how to cook a burger on the grill, how to cook a burger in a pan

Id: ZorUPMeKgh0

Length: 22min 2sec (1322 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 04 2022