I make sliders much more often than I do full-sized burgers. I’ve made all sorts of them. From chicken chorizo patty melt sliders to cedar-planked beef sliders, to grilled Big Mac sliders, I just love sliders. These grilled chipotle Ranch sliders have such fantastic flavor. A little heat. A little smokiness. The sauce really kicks up that great cooked-outside flavor. They’re highly addicting.
Dangerously Addicting
The chipotles in adobo not only add great heat to the grilled chipotle Ranch sliders, they also keep the patties very moist and tender. I topped them with mayonnaise mixed with a bit more chipotles in adobo for a nice creamy (and spicy) finish. Not too hot, mind you. Just a great spicy flavor.
Of course you can make these in full-sized versions too. Instead of 8 patties form the meat mixture into 4 patties and make ‘normal’ burgers.
These grilled chipotle Ranch sliders have such fantastic flavor. The chipotles in adobo not only add great heat to the sliders, they also keep the patties very moist and tender.
I served these fantastic deluxe onion burgers three different ways over three nights. Two were on buns, and one was bun-less. All three versions were absolutely fantastic. The patties have a nice kick to them, thanks to the spicy V8 juice and some sassy Russ & Franks BBQ sauce (substitute your favorite if you can’t find Russ & Franks). The onion soup mix gives them an almost meatloaf like flavor.
My first take on these burgers was topped with Swiss cheese, BBQ sauce, and sautéed mushrooms. Man was this ever one tasty burger. Nice and messy, too. Like I like them!
Then, I served them topped with BBQ sauce, Swiss and French fried onions.
Here’s the bun-less take of my deluxe onion burgers! Great comfort food!
Nice ‘N Spicy
Because of the V8 juice you can use fairly lean ground beef in these burgers without fear of them drying out. If you use spicy V8 you’ll get a wonderful kick to them too! If you don’t like the kick, just go with regular V8 and you’ll still have a wonderful dish!
Wow, talk about a burger that just rocketed to the top of our favorite-to-make list. These campfire burgers are just packed with flavor, inside and out. The patties are not boring, combining ground beef with cheese, bacon, Worcestershire sauce and just a hint of smokiness. And then there’s the caramelized onions. Caramelized onions are a wonderful thing but adding balsamic vinegar to them makes them spectacular. And finally, a lightly smoky creamy sauce to top it all off. These burgers are messy, which keeps with my motto: messier is better.
Make Extra Onions. And Sauce.
I recommend making more of the onions than the recipe for these campfire burgers calls for. As in doubling it. On the off-chance that you have leftover onions they are also fantastic on grilled hot dogs. I also recommend making more of the sauce. It’s great to have on hand for, well, hot dogs again, but also po boy sandwiches or even as a dipping sauce for chicken nuggets.
I like to use a burger press when I make burgers. It, in combination with some patty papers, enables me to crank out a whole bunch of equally-sized burger patties in no time at all with little cleanup.
These campfire burgers are just packed with flavor, inside and out. The patties are not boring, combining ground beef with cheese, bacon, Worcestershire and just a hint of smokiness.
I had to make these as soon as I saw them. The idea of mushroom mixed with ground beef to form burgers appealed to me. I knew that the mushrooms would add a lot of moisture and plenty of earthy flavor. These blended smash burgers have a slightly different taste and texture than my usual 100% beef patties. They are definitely moist and a little more apt to fall apart, so you have to be a bit careful when flipping them on the grill. They’re good burgers, just without quite as much meat.
Classic Tastes
Once you’ve made a smash burger or two you’ll find them to be as easy to make as the non-smash ones. And like any other burgers, they’re open to all sorts of toppings. Sometimes I go crazy. Sometimes I go classic. These blended smash burgers are a lot like my classic all-beef versions. Just not quite as beefy but kinda beefy in another way, you know?
The equipment
Here’s the equipment I use. You can get by using two cast iron skillets. Use a larger skillet for cooking the burgers, and a smaller one to smash the burgers and keep them flat. Since I’m a cooking gadget collector, I prefer to use a few more tools.
The griddle
First, a griddle. You can buy griddles that sit on top of your grill grates or ones that replace them. Just about every grill I have has a griddle on it. I use them for a lot of things, not just smash burgers. You want one that can be placed over the hottest part of your grill so it gets screaming hot.
Next, you need a burger press. You can use a heavy cast iron skillet, like I mentioned. Or get a burger press. For easy cleanup I wrap mine in foil first. When I’m done, just peel off the foil and toss. Super easy. Get a press that’s at least big enough to cover two burgers. You only smash one at a time, but if you want to keep them flat, you want to rest the press on top so bigger (and heavier) is better. Plus I’ve found that a bigger, heavier press tends to stay on the burgers whereas a smaller, lighter one is hard to keep centered on the burgers, specially if you have a bunch of them cooking at once.
Next up, a dome. While not 100% required, it does speed the time it takes to melt the cheese and it does it in a nice even fashion. In my opinion you don’t really need one if you’re using a super melty cheese, such as American, but for thicker slices like say a deli pepper jack, you want the cheese to melt before you over-cook the burger and that’s where a dome comes in handy.
Lastly, you need something to clean your griddle. I like to clean mine when I’m done cooking, but you can do it at the start instead. I use one of these pad holders with a griddle cleaning pad. Then I add a bit of water to my griddle then use the pad (connected to the holder) to scrub off any big chunks and get up some of the grease. I don’t go crazy with it, I always heat the heck out of my griddle before cooking, but I get the worst. The long arm on the pad holder makes it perfect for scrubbing a hot griddle, too.
Place chopped mushrooms and ground beef into a large bowl.
Sprinkle with salt and form into 4 large balls (or 5-6 smaller ones, which means of course you'll need more buns and toppings!).
Fire up your grill for medium-high heat. Place a griddle or a large cast iron pan over the highest heat.
Add the oil and spread out a bit.
Place the balls of beef on the griddle and let cook for one minute. Just let them cook, don’t mess with them.
Take your press and flatten out the patties. I like to use the point of the press and work my way around the ball first, doing a little section at a time and then, finally, I press down on the entire patty to flatten it out. You can also just flatten out the ball all at once. At this point I also like to season the patties some more.
Let the patties cook until you start to notice a little char along the edges. Flip, season again if desired, and continue cooking another minute or so until the other side is charred. The burgers are thin so they will cook very quickly so watch out.
Top patties with cheese and let cook another 30 seconds to melt the cheese.
Toast the buns. Remove, add the patties.
Add remaining ingredients to assemble the burgers.
Devour immediately.
Notes
After you make a few smash burgers the process becomes very easy and always delivers great results.For added flavor, saute the mushrooms first. Let them cool completely before adding to the beef.
License to Grill is one of my all-time favorite TV cooking shows. Aired by Food Network Canada, the show, hosted by Chef Rob Rainford, always contained the best outdoor cooking recipes. Although the show no longer airs, you can find a lot of recipes (like this one for maple mustard pork burgers) from the show at the License to Grill blog. I really miss that show, it was one of the best cooking shows to ever be broadcasted. I think a lot of TV chefs could learn from it.
Goodbye Beef?
When I first took a bite of these wonderful maple mustard pork burgers my first thought was “oh my goodness, I may give up beef burgers”. They’re just that good. The onion and garlic in the patty adds great flavor and keeps the meat tender and moist. The glaze… well, the glaze is absolutely fantastic. It’s a combination of sweet and tangy that gets nice and crusty over a very hot grill. I will be using the glaze on other pork dishes, such as grilled tenderloin or pork sliders.
We love our taco seasoning mix. It has a great spicy flavor that is perfect with ground beef for tacos. For fajitas we use this mix. Fajita seasoning mix doesn’t just have to be used on fajitas. We enjoy it mixed in (about a tablespoons worth) with sautéed bell peppers and sweet onions (one each medium green and red bell peppers and a medium sweet onion). The combination makes for the perfect burgers and hot dogs topping.
Use This Everywhere
You can also sprinkle a bit of this fajita seasoning mix on hot dogs, grill them, and serve them on buns topped with the fajita-seasoned veggies. Add a little cheese too. We chopped the peppers and onion for the hot dogs. More fajita seasoning is a good thing.
We seasoned a few home-ground beef patties with the mix, grilled them, then served them topped with the veggies, which were sliced.
Make a big batch of this and keep it in an airtight container in your pantry. This mix is perfect on beef. For chicken fajitas, try my chicken seasoning.
Fajita seasoning mix doesn’t just have to be used on fajitas. We enjoy it mixed in (about a tablespoons worth) with sauteed bell peppers and sweet onions (one each medium green and red bell peppers and a medium sweet onion), which we then used to top burgers and hot dogs.
It was our anniversary. That required something special. Something big. What? Go out for dinner?!? Nope. Time to fire up my 25 year old grill that we bought when my wife and I were dating and make Fritos Crunch Burgers. What says “Happy Anniversary” like a big ole juicy, dripping, crunchy fantastic burger? Chips. A perfect beef patty. Chili. Cheese. Onion. All on a great toasted bun. Yep, this was an anniversary that we’ll both remember for sure!
Just Do It
Don’t over-think these Fritos Crunch Burgers. They don’t need turkey chili. Or Ranch Fritos. Or some fancy fru-fru imported cheese. These aren’t those burgers. Save that stuff for another day, another burger. Make these and enjoy them. And smile. We did. Heck, we aren’t going to have them every day*. It was a special day that required a special burger.
And yes, you read that right. We bought a grill when we were dating. If you want to know if your marriage is going to last its when your wife-to-someday-be says ‘yes’ to a new grill when you’re still dating!
*Well, ok…. I might have made these two days in a row. I admit it.
Oh me. This is why today was a happy day. A very happy day. I made smash burgers with zesty sauce. Nothing could make me happier. Perfectly cooked patties with that awesome smash burger crust. Lettuce. Onion. And then there’s the sauce. The amazing sauce. Everything good is in the sauce. Including soy sauce. That’s where this sauce went from fantastic to amazing.
The Best Burger Sauce?
I can’t say enough how great these smash burgers with zesty sauce were. And they checked one of my required boxes for burgers: messy. The messier, the better. If it isn’t messy it doesn’t have enough ‘stuff’ on it. These burgers have stuff and then some.
Making these burgers isn’t difficult. You don’t need a bunch of fancy equipment or a lot of time. Just a hot griddle and a burger press. Any griddle will do, whether it’s on a grill (I use my Weber), cooktop, stove or even a standalone outdoor flattop. Just get those patties nice and thin and use quality fresh toppings. And a great sauce.
My wife got me hooked on thick-cut bologna burgers and sandwiches. They are like the grown-up versions of the bologna sandwiches I had as a kid. I get the deli to cut chub bologna 1/2″ thick and then either fry, grill, or smoke it. Then I slather the bologna with Ross’ Pool Room sauce and serve it on buns topped with onion and pimento cheese. Yeah, that’s a Southern bologna burger right there!
Keep It Simple
Any pimento cheese will work on these southern bologna burgers. I didn’t go crazy making one of my more complicated versions. Simple is just fine. For a bit of a kick substitute pepper jack cheese for the Colby or add a minced seeded jalapeno pepper.
I almost always use Blue Plate mayonnaise in the dishes I make. I think it is the best around. If you can’t find it locally you can pick it up online for a fair price.
I highly recommend that you shred or grate your own cheese at home. Don’t buy the pre-shredded or pre-grated stuff. It has stuff added to it to keep it from sticking together. That ‘stuff’ affects how the cheese melts. Get the real stuff.
I slather the bologna with Ross’ Pool Room sauce and serve it on buns topped with onion and pimento cheese. Yeah, that’s a Southern bologna burger right there!
