I’ve done them in the toaster using the Bagel setting.
You know, I used to have a toaster oven that had a bagel setting, which only turned on the bottom elements. Then it broke and the and the one I got to replace it didn’t have a bagel setting. And it took me way to long to realize that if I just turned the bun (or bagel) over and used the broil setting I’ll get the same effect.
I’ve been meaning to try Ernest Hemingway’s burger recipe, as documented in his notes to his household staff in Cuba in the '40s.
There’s a LOT going on in those patties. It’s almost more of a big meatloaf patty than a burger. It sounds rich and juicy, but I just haven’t gotten around to trying it yet.
I made those once and agree that they’re mighty fine.
Speaking of burgers, the wife said “Hey, let’s go get one” about an hour ago. So we went to Five Guys down the street. Two cheeseburgers, one small fries and two milkshakes and I’m $50 poorer. I remember when it was just one storefront in Virginia and a good place to get a cheap, fresh burger. And I like mayo, but this thing was swimming in it.
Yeah, going out for burgers, even fast food burgers is a big ‘nope’ for me these days. There was a point where you could get something hot, filling, fast and reasonably cheap if you were in a hurry. That was becoming rare before COVID and that plus inflation has put paid to that. I hit a Whataburger on the way home from the airport at 10:00pm 6ish months ago, because I hadn’t eaten all day and was going to be too tired to cook. A basic cheeseburger combo was $11 after tax.
Soooo not worth it, even given what inflation has done to food prices, especially beef.
The hand-written note seems to indicate it’s supposed to be called the Wild West hamburger.
What about the other note, the jumble of words above “ingredients”? Looks like “grated apple cheddar cheese melted in carrots.” What’s it look like to you?
I’m not sure what the underlined word is but I don’t think it’s “melted”. It sounds like a basic recipe for cheese slaw. Perhaps it’s the salad referred to in the “let the meat rest while you make the salad” step.
[nitpicky peeve]
There was no such thing as a “smashburger” in the 60s. Why the world has decided to take a brand name and use it to describe a thing that already existed as if it’s a special new invention is beyond me. Applying it retroactively to something that existed before the brand was trademarked is even more baffling.
(I’m not judging you, Chefguy… or if I am it’s in good fun 
)
[/nitpicky peeve]
“Smashburger” has been used before Smashburger trademarked it (assuming it’s trademarked.)
Dairy Cheer’s Smashburger goes back 50 years:
(And I have Google books cite of its “smashburger” going back to 1984).
Regardless, while that is somewhat an esoteric usage, I don’t understand your nitpick. We can use current nomeclature to describe things in the past. For example, here in Chicago, it seems all of a sudden our thin crust pizza is called “tavern-style pizza.” Not sure when that happened, but in the last twenty years. I can still say, when I was a kid, my favorite tavern style was from Vito & Nick’s, even though we didn’t call it a tavern style back then. (and I called it “Nick and Vito’s” then.)
I think you’re staying that “smashburgers” already existed in the 60s, but they were just “hamburgers” then, right? But, no, not all burgers were “smashburgers.” Weren’t most pre-portioned into the proper shape and then cooked on the griddle? Some, I presume, were smashed in the style they are today, but in the 80s, I didn’t see that. At any rate, at one point it became useful to add in the taxonomy of burger styles.
Good meat to bun ratio. Smashed style is better. A good burger tastes good if you eat the patty by itself. People who decry adding spices and substances to meat because “this makes it meatloaf” are simply wrong - what matters is taste, and not too much tradition. A mix of tasty food cheese and cheap melty squares is best.
80/20 ground beef, thick burger, cooked 4:30 on each side.
From the bottom up, it’s bun, burger, ketchup, dill pickle slices, sliced onion, lettuce (may be leaf or shredded), top bun.
To be fair, their small fries will feed a family of six.
I don’t like to add anything to the beef. I salt and pepper the patty while it’s cooking - that’s all it needs.
I read somewhere once that older burger recipes (like the Hemingway recipe I posted upthread) tended to incorporate binders because the ground beef available in those days was considerably fattier than the stuff you buy at the grocery store now and was prone to falling apart if you cooked it straight, and wasn’t as flavorful either, hence the spices and other flavorings.
“Mixed,” then? That would be an interesting salad with unmelted cheese.
Apple seems like it would work in a cheese slaw, especially if there’s no cabbage. I get the impression that Papa was not a fan of leafy greens, seeing as the note at the bottom says to dress the burgers with soy sauce, onion, garlic, and tomato, but makes no mention of lettuce.
(Another note on the recipe: Spice Islands stopped making “Mei Yen powder” decades ago, but according to a reporter who contacted them asking for the recipe, it’s 9/9/2 of salt, sugar, and MSG, and you should add a dash of soy sauce for every teaspoon you use in a recipe.)
I sometimes order a burger at a nice restaurant where they ask how I’d like it done (medium rare), but I don’t think I’ll ever eat a fast food burger again because I can make a burger way better than they can.
I’m not really a snob, just practical.
When I was working aboard NAS Jacksonville some decades back, the Navy Exchange served what they called a Florida Burger - a patty on a bun with swiss, grilled mushrooms and onions, and sour cream. It was my go-to lunch for some time. I may have to make myself one.
Well, they weren’t called “smashburgers” back then, just “hamburgers”. Every diner made them that way, as did the pre-McDonald’s burger joints. I used the term “smashburger” in my post because that’s a term that everyone understands. I could have said that “I’m a fan of hamburgers that have been made from 80/20 ground beef that has been loosely shaped into a ball, then plunked down on a hot griddle and mashed down until it’s about a quarter inch thick and quickly fried on both sides prior to plating”, but that seems a bit unwieldy.
I find that interesting, as I make griddled burgers with meat as fatty as 60:40, and there’s no issue with the meat falling apart. I suppose it’s probably a matter of technique, but something like a smashburger fares fine with fatty meat. I doubt the ground beef would have been much fattier then.
Once you add breadcrumbs/a panade/similar and eggs to it, it becomes more of a salisbury steak or meatloaf to me in concept and experience. It might still be good, but it’s not what I’d want if I want a hamburger. It’d be a bit like expecting a ham sandwich and getting bologna.
ISTR having read that ground beef in the '50s was close to 50% fat. I don’t have a cite. I believe it was on one of those “regrettable food” type websites that catalogue bizarre recipes from the postwar era - savory Jello salads and mackerel pudding and pineapples oven-roasted with hot dogs and stuff of that nature.
It’s funny, because as I look online, it seems half the cites say leaner meat falls apart more, and half say fattier does. IME, fattier does shrink a hell of a lot, but holds together, especially if you handle the meat a lot (like hand mix a bunch of spices and stuff like onions inside your burger, which seemed to happen a lot back then.) I don’t recommend that, at least for myself with anything called a “hamburger”, as that messes with the texture and turns your burger more into a dense sausage than the somewhat airy texture of a gently handled burger. Leaner meat is the one that ends up more crumbly and a little more difficult to keep together for me, though it’s been at least a couple decades since I’ve tried making burgers with anything leaner than 80:20.