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From Scratch CheeseBurger
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Ingredients

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Soft white buns of your choosing, if you want to go all out and bake your own, I use this recipe. (Just give them more space in the baking pan than she recommends - 6-8 in a tray, not the 12-15 that recipie does)

 

Topping

2 parts chopped cherry peppers

2 parts finely chopped cucumber

1 part finely diced red onion

Apple cider vinegar

Sea salt

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Meat 

50% ribeye steak

50% sirloin

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Sauce 

3 parts mayo

1 part dijon mustard

1 part pickling liquid

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Other 

1/4 white onion per burger

American cheese ( 2 slices per burger)

neutral oil

Sea Salt

Balck pepper

I don't know if there's anything as satisfying to cook as a classic cheeseburger. I like to make mine fully from scratch because I enjoy doing it, but what I would say is the real value added is grinding your own meat, not baking the bread. A standard supermarket bun is just fine, freshly baked is nice, but the difference between home ground mince and supermarket is where you'll see the real jump in quality.

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My burger has evolved a lot over the years, but I keep coming back to a very classic style - two thin patties with American cheese and a bit of grilled onion. American cheese - as The Menu tells us - is a must as it gets the best melt and kinda combines with the sauce.

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Now I'm back in the UK, I usually make my own pickles, either refrigerator pickles, or the quick pickle mixture detailed here. We don't (a fact that should disgrace the nation) have the 'full sour' dill pickles American's love, and anything you can get in a supermarket will be far to sweet (like a bread and butter pickle). For a burger, I think, it has to be sour to counteract the richness of everything else. If you're in a more civilised country and have acess to proper full sour dill pickles use them, either by themselves or mixed with diced cherry peppers which I find add a nice contrast.

The cheeseburger is one of the great culinary accomplishments of mankind. This is where I'm at in trying to capture that experence. 
 

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  1. Chop and combine the topping ingredients (you want 1-2 tbsps per burger), but you can make extra, it'll keep. Cover with vinegar and mix in 1 tbsp of salt per cup on vinegar.
     

  2. Each burger is going to be 2 patties of around 4 ounces, so get at least 10% more meat than that as you'll lose a tiny bit prepping and grinding. (And again, you can make more than you need and use it for other things, this'll also make great meatballs or koftas).
     

  3. Dice the meat into 1 cm cubes removing any tough connective parts, but keeping the fat. Together with the blade and grate of your grinder, put this in the freezer for about 20 minutes until stiff but not frozen. This will help it grind. Push through the grinder on a medium setting. Don't overwork it. Allow the mixture to remain lose.

     

  4. Prep everything else - mix your sauce, peel the cheese slices, finely chop the white onion, and get your pan hot (I use a cast iron for this). Cut your buns in half and put them sliced side down into the pan for a minute or so, until the middle is lightly toasted. Then bring the pan up to the temperature you would use to cook steak (or even a little hotter) and add a little neutral oil. When you're ready to start, cover the top and bottom of your first bun with a heaped tsp of the sauce. 
     

  5. Unless you have a very big pan, you'll likely need to do these one at a time - but they only take a couple of minutes. Just make sure everything else is prepped.
     

  6. Scoop out a handful of your mince. On a large chopping board make it into two disks a little larger than your buns diameter. Do not over work - you want it to have some texture, not be patted flat. These will be quite thin and seem very flimsy - held together by a bit of browning and a prayer, as Kenji Lopez-Alt puts it.
     

  7. Season one side of them well and using a spatula (they may be too flimsy to stay together in your hands) put them seasoned side down. You should hear a sizzle. Top each patty with a thin layer of the white onion.
     

  8. You're only going to brown one side of these, but you want to get a really good sear on it, so wait until the burger is almost fully cooked, with just a bit of pink remaining on the onion side, then flip and cover each patty with a slice of American cheese. Cover the pan and leave for 20-30 seconds for the cheese to melt.
     

  9. Place on patty on top of the other, then both into the bun. Top with 1-2 tbsp of the pickle mixture (being sure to drain it) and add the bun top. Allow to rest for 2-3 minutes and serve immediately. 
     

  10. If you have everything prepped you can make a few of these quite fast, but it doesn't scale super well (at least in a home kitchen) 

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