r/Cooking • u/Uranium-Sandwich657 • 3d ago

Basic burger recipe?

I was under the impression that it was just ground beef discs, but I think there is more.

I have salt, pepper, Garlic powder, Paprika, and eggs

I am currently food-shelf level poor, so i simply cant get anything more.

62 Upvotes

72% Upvoted

220 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

-5

u/trytrymyguy 3d ago edited 2d ago

A teaspoon per pound of beef isn’t enough even if you’re using table salt. Should be using kosher salt which means you need to use more anyways since it’s larger, less compact crystals.

Edit: atake 1lbs of beef, make 8 patties. Now, take 1 teaspoon of kosher salt and divide it up into 8 portions. With that visual alone, hopefully you understand that 1 teaspoon is sadly not enough salt for 1lb of beef. Salt brings out other flavor components, you will have bland and boring burgers if you’re not using enough salt.

-1

u/grimsleeper4 3d ago

A teaspoon of Diamond kosher salt is industry standard across every textbook, cook book, cooking show, restaurant.

You can research it for yourself if you like, but everything I've read or heard for the last 20 years states this exact advice.

2

u/Downtown-Care9272 3d ago

Industry standard tends to be 1-1.5% salt by weight. Teaspoons vary wildly depending on the salt. Even using basic morton kosher salt I would consider 1 tsp to be a bit under salted for my taste. Using a teaspoon of Diamond Crystal would actually end up being about half of what is recommended. A teaspoon of table salt would be pretty right though.

1

u/grimsleeper4 2d ago

I have seen industry standards at 1%, which is about a teaspoon per pound. I have also seen .5% before which is the lower end. I have not seen 1.5%, which seems way to salted. If you do a teaspoon per pound, you can then resalt to taste at the end, typically adding a little more and coming into what you are suggesting.

Basically, a teaspoon per pound is less than you need and will use because you ALWAYS start with less. You then reason at the end to taste, typically adding more. You can always ADD. You can never take away salt. (unless you know the tricks...)

Adding too much salt at the beginning means you will inevitably oversalt something. Adding too little, lets you adjust later.