# White castle hamburgers **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** food-cooking\ **Created:** [May 27, 2003, 7:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723 "2003-05-27T07:27:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Scumpup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce73a5/32.png) [@Scumpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Scumpup)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 11:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/21 "2003-05-28T11:36:03Z")
According to the book “Big Secrets,” White Castle burgers get their characteristic flavor by putting the onions on the grill first and then the meat patty on top of the onions. The meat is, therefore, actually steamed by the onions rather than fried. No liver. ---
**Author:** ![NutMagnet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ea5d25/32.png) [@NutMagnet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NutMagnet)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 11:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/22 "2003-05-28T11:42:08Z")
In the Northeast US, they’re “murder burgers”. Can’t even look at one, let alone eat it. ---
**Author:** ![Susanann](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/7ab992/32.png) [@Susanann](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Susanann)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/23 "2003-05-28T12:59:13Z")
White castles taste much better than McDonalds. White castle does not franchise, and were much too slow to expand. The last time I checked, they were privately owned, the Wall STreet Journal did a story on them a number of years ago. You can now buy them in the frozen foods in many states where they dont have an actual restaurant. (No need to get a bag before you drive down to visit relatives in Florida anymore) . There is so much salt in White castle hamburgers, that they last for weeks in the fridge. ---
**Author:** ![critter42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7ba0ec/32.png) [@critter42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/critter42)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/24 "2003-05-28T15:09:58Z")
Southern boy born-and-bred here, with a Yankee (ok, St. Louis-ian) wife. I can most assuredly make the statement that White Castles **!=** Krystals !! I grew up on Krap-tals, then my wife introduced me to White Crack when we went to St. Louis to visit her parents. NOT the same - not even close! I will never, ever, ever eat another burger from that WC-wannabe chain that sprout like infected pimples across the face of the South. If I don’t get at least 2 sackfuls on our trips to St. Louis, it’s been a wasted trip. Yes we have the frozen WCs in the Krogers here, but it just doesn’t taste quite the same as fresh-made (still LY better than that OTHER place, though). Sorry for the GD hijack, I just wanted to clear up the misconception that Krystals is in ANY way comparable to White Castles. It’s not, and never will be. The OP’s question, however, has been answered previously. By goverment regulation, anything labelled “100% beef” CANNOT contain anything but muscle-based meat. critter42 ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_L.A](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnny_l.a/32/1084_2.png) [@Johnny\_L.A](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_L.A)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/25 "2003-05-28T17:03:37Z")
I’m still curious: What do they do to the meat to get it the consistency that it is. I mean, when I buy ground beef at the store it’s “chunkier”. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d26b3c/32.png) [@Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Blue_Sky)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/26 "2003-05-28T17:28:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Johnny L.A. \* > \*\*I’m still curious: What do they do to the meat to get it the consistency that it is. I mean, when I buy ground beef at the store it’s “chunkier”. \*\* If we told you, we’d have to kill you. NEW AT WHITE CASTLE: JOHNNY L.A. BURGERS! ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 7:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/27 "2003-05-28T19:17:49Z")
Well, I’m moving down to Florida, And I’m gonna potty train the Chairman Mao. Gonna make the governor write my doodoo a letter, child, And I’m gonna grind me up a White Castle side out of India’s sacred cow. –Butthole Surfers, “Moving to Florida” ---
**Author:** ![Salieri2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c67d28/32.png) [@Salieri2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Salieri2)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 10:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/28 "2003-05-28T22:08:05Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Johnny L.A. \* > \*\*I’m still curious: What do they do to the meat to get it the consistency that it is. I mean, when I buy ground beef at the store it’s “chunkier”. \*\* Meat shmeat. I’m pretty sure all these claims of actual cow muscle in WC ‘burgers’ are wishful thinking/coporate coverup. Go to your average greasy spoon diner at closing time. Scrape the day’s worth of schmutz off of the grill. Smear it on a small bun. _That’s_ your slider. _That’s_ why it has the consistency of leftover food shmeg. Because it _is_. My Chicago-bred husband introduced me to these abominations at the beginning, unfortunately, of what became the world’s longest 4-hour car drive. I had to hang my head out the window like a golden retriever to escape the horrible aftermath of the horrible beforemath. I think I ate exactly one before wishing I were dead. After he ate a few I would have wished we were _both_ dead, that we’d hit a guardrail, go over a bridge and die in a ball of flames, except for the fact that the smoke would be so toxic sea life would crawl up the beaches and die, on both US coasts, from which we are practically equidistant. He used to eat sacks of them in college. I’m pretty sure pot had a great deal to do with this. Did I mention I don’t like them? ---
**Author:** ![tempsbaby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eb8c5e/32.png) [@tempsbaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tempsbaby)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/29 "2003-05-28T22:13:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Eva Luna \* > \*\*Here in Chicago, we call 'em “sliders,” because the greasy coating makes them slide right down your throat. Most people I know won’t eat them sober. I do about once every 10 years, once I’ve finally rid my brain of the memory of the last experience. \*\* I MISS them to… Been to that White Castle MANY times… ahhhhhh 8 mile strip clubs and sliders…mmmmmmm ---
**Author:** ![occ](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8c91f0/32.png) [@occ](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/occ)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/30 "2003-05-28T22:45:47Z")
My guess on the consistency of the meat is that they just chop it much finer. I’ve had plenty of “high-class” burgers where the meat was much finer than the standard hamburger grain, and I imagine White Castle does the same thing. When your patty is that tiny, having those big shreds of burger doesn’t work all that well; you need that stuff ground _fine_. ---
**Author:** ![tanookie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/48db29/32.png) [@tanookie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tanookie)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/31 "2003-05-28T23:02:52Z")
I went to Atlantic City over Christmas vacation in college as I was on the bowling team and we had a tournament there. Our coach and the team captain devised to take us for the best burgers we had ever tasted in our lives. I believed them. We ended up at White Castle. These burgers were horrible and I did not finish mine. I was then ill for the entire ride home from NJ to MA. (this was our fond farewell dinner) Freed from the van ride from hell and looking for sympathy I relate my tale of woe to the boyfriend. At the mention of white castle his eyes light up and he asks if I brought him any. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![slipster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@slipster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slipster)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 11:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/32 "2003-05-28T23:05:32Z")
For decades Avis Meyer, a journalism professor at St. Louis University, assigned first year students to do a report on WHite Castle. Their findings were consistent over the years, and matched information reported from time to time in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. (The St. Louis area is, I believe, still the only place west of the Mississippi to have White Castle restaurants). The burgers are 100% beef. They are ground very, very finely, and are steamed rather than grilled. Even burgers ordered without onions are likely to have onions mixed in with the beef, and are exposed to a good deal of onion through the steam vapor, as the cooking surface is continually smeared with onion chips. An urban legend in St. Louis says that after a White Castle restaurant on the south side was torn down, a peculiar chrystaline “boulder” was found beneath it. It turned out to be an accretion of onion chips which had washed down the drains over the years. In the 1970s a study headed by Dr. Barry Commoner at Washington University in St. Louis concluded that White Castle’s were the only fast food burgers effectively free of carcinogens. In short, various know it all wiseguy cracks about how the burgers are unwholesome are apparently without foundation. I say this as someone who cannot tolerate the burgers myself. As a kid I thought they were ambrosia; then, about twenty years ago, I found they made me royally sick. I still like the fries, though, which are cooked in the same grease as their fish. ---
**Author:** ![Parallax](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bbce88/32.png) [@Parallax](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Parallax)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/33 "2003-05-28T23:15:22Z")
White Castle rocks! There used to be one just minutes away from my grandparents’ house in New Jersey and we’d get them whenever we went down there. After they moved they would pick up several dozen whenever they went back to visit relatives and we’d eat a whole ton and then freeze some for later. Now that you can get them frozen they grab some for me every so often and I’ll pig out on them. =) They aren’t something that I could eat all the time but they are definately YUM! =) ---
**Author:** ![slipster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/df705f/32.png) [@slipster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/slipster)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2003, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/34 "2003-05-28T23:22:47Z")
Another thought: There is a recipe for making a kind of pate or dip from White Castle burgers which is popular in parts of St. Louis. The result tastes a good deal like braunschweiger, another St. Louis delicacy, and this may have helped foster the belief that White Castles have liver in them. Braunschweiger, incidentally, is like White Castles in that there are a lot of wise ass jokes about its alleged impurity which are without foundation. The distinction between braunschweiger and liver sausage is that regulations require that the ingredients be limited and very pure in order for sausage to be labeled as braunschweiger. ---
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/35 "2003-05-29T04:24:01Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by slipster \* > \*\*The St. Louis area is, I believe, still the only place west of the Mississippi to have White Castle restaurants. \*\* IIRC, they opened one in Arizona. I know that they used to ship them out there because of a family who raved about them constantly managed to convince the town to pony up enough money to buy a truckload. It was an annual event for a number of years, and I seem to recall that the folks at WC decided to finally build one out there. ---
**Author:** ![lno](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a8b319/32.png) [@lno](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lno)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/36 "2003-05-29T04:40:02Z")
White Castle, the Crave Case, and poor, sweet, innocent Tyler. The memories… ---
**Author:** ![Elenfair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/cc9497/32.png) [@Elenfair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elenfair)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/37 "2003-05-29T11:56:09Z")
(Innocent Tyler is right, lno.) I’ve never had the joy of… tasting… white castle hamburgers. For some reason, I think I’m quite happy to live with my innocence… ---
**Author:** ![BMalion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e274bd/32.png) [@BMalion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BMalion)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/38 "2003-05-29T12:24:50Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Eva Luna \* > \*\*Here in Chicago, we call 'em “sliders,” because the greasy coating makes them slide right down your throat. \*\* and slide right out, too. ---
**Author:** ![Kilvert\_s\_Pagan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/c37758/32.png) [@Kilvert\_s\_Pagan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kilvert_s_Pagan)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2003, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/39 "2003-06-01T13:09:18Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by AskNott \* > \*\*Next time you’re in the grocery, check the prices on ground beef and liver. Then ask your roommate why White Castle would mix in something that’s more expensive than ground beef itself. \*\* Dave Thomas said the same thing years ago during the “Wendy’s uses worms” hysteria. ---
**Author:** ![japatlgt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/df705f/32.png) [@japatlgt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/japatlgt)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2003, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723/40 "2003-06-01T13:32:22Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Eva Luna \* > \*\*Here in Chicago, we call 'em “sliders,” because the greasy coating makes them slide right down your throat. \*\* Also known as “greasy slides” or “gut bombs.” White Castle’s on the other side of town but I have Krystals 1m in either direction. Wendy’s is closer still so if and when I have a Mac Attack I just get a #2. 🙂 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/white-castle-hamburgers/177723.md?page=3)