# Smoked Burger secret?



## jerimiah

I was at my local BBQ supplier and started a conversation with their smoker expert.  He mentioned he had spent 8 years perfecting a smoked burger with no binders in it.  Then promptly advised that after 8 years he wasn't going to share his secret on how to smoke a burger without it falling apart in the smoker.  Anyone have some recipes/ideas they can share on smoking burgers (time/temp/recipe)?  Would love to try my hand at smoking a burger but I don't like to go in blind.

Jerimiah


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## eman

Don'y know if this guys pulling your leg or what but it seems that  you make the burger patty and throw it on the smoker and leave it alone would work.

 Only time i add anything to hambuger besides seasoning is when i smoke a meat loaf . I add two eggs to the mix.

 Smoke em to 170°f

When smoking meat there is no reason to flip it or move it like when grilling.


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## rbranstner

I smoke burgers and stuffed burgers all the time and they don't blow open or crumble. I always like to add an egg or two and some crackers or oatmeal, horseradish sauce and maybe some BBQ sauce in my burgers for flavor and consistency. I smoke them at what ever temp I am smoking the other meat at the time and pull them once they reach 160ish. I guess I have never ran into the issue where they crumble apart. I guess I don't see the reason you can't add a binder. I like the extra ingredients for flavor. But that's just me. I have never tried it with just  plain burger without the extra ingredients because I have never had any reason not to add them.


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## placebo

I agree with eman, there is no need for binders to smoke a burger unless your making meatloaf. I prefer to reverse sear them however. Put em in the smoker for 30 minutes or so to get a good smoke flavor then toss em on a nice hot grill. Yum!


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## SmokinAl

I smoke them all the time with nothing added. They stay together fine.


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## mballi3011

I'm with everyone else here and say that I smoke and grill burgers some. I haven't had many fall apart as long as you don't go playing with your burger. Now that also means no swishing it down too.


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## jerimiah

How does stuffing a burger (say with  chunk of cheese) effect cooking times and the capacity to take temperature?  Would I just leave one burger unstuffed for taking temperature?  I know you cook by temp and not time but how long on average does it take to do a burger with/without grilling (2 hours)?  What kind of wood do you use? Just need an estimate for my first time attempt (most likely this weekend).

Thanks in advance to everyone. 

PS: I bought Jeff's rub and sauce this week to support the web site!!!  I find myself coming to this sight quite a bit.  I might not post as much as I should but I love reading the recipes and tips and seeing the Qview's.  Felt it was time to show my support for the website!!!


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## rbranstner

Jerimiah said:


> How does stuffing a burger (say with  chunk of cheese) effect cooking times and the capacity to take temperature?  Would I just leave one burger unstuffed for taking temperature?  I know you cook by temp and not time but how long on average does it take to do a burger with/without grilling (2 hours)?  What kind of wood do you use? Just need an estimate for my first time attempt (most likely this weekend).
> 
> Thanks in advance to everyone.
> 
> PS: I bought Jeff's rub and sauce this week to support the web site!!!  I find myself coming to this sight quite a bit.  I might not post as much as I should but I love reading the recipes and tips and seeing the Qview's.  Felt it was time to show my support for the website!!!


They cook pretty close to the same as far as I have seen but I suppose it all depends on what you stuff them with and how thick your burgers are. I take the temp the same as I would with any cut of meat I just stick a thermometer in one of them or after an hour I will check them with my instant read thermometer. Depending on the temps you are smoking at and what finishing temp you are looking for they are usually done in 1-1.5 hours from what I have experienced. I just double checked my post on my first stuffed burgers which were huge (1lb of meat in each) and I was smoking at 250 and they were done in an hour. I am usually throwing burgers on while I am smoking something else so some times I may be smoking at 225 and some times I could be as high at 275 so I just have to watch the internal temp of the burgers to know when they are done but that should give you a general idea of how long to expect.


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## scarbelly

I have done a lot of burgers too and I agree with Ross that about an hour maybe 1.30 is all you need for them. Depends on temp. I mostly stuff with onions, jalopenos, cheese. I usually cook the onions first to get them carmalized. Nothing like them at any restaruant I have found


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## meateater

You can add some pink salt and they will stay solid, oops did I just give away my secret?


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## caveman

That guy with his 8 year old burger secret is pulling your chain.  What a bunch of hooey!!  Get them patties made & smoke some burgers up & you will find out quickly that they don't fall apart.  If you want to stuff em, stuff em.  I give mine a tad more time when stuffed.  Like RB said, like Eman said & like Mark (mballi) said.


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## nwdave

I'd be looking for a different store or refuse to talk to "the Expert".  Only time my burgers crumble is when I add too much goodness to them, then I figure that's my fault, not the meat.


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## tzem143

Just did some tonight. A little sp&g and did mesquite wood at 250. Pulled off at 168 internal and let rest for 5-10 min. Awesome!!!  It would be hard to go back to grilling them. Loved the flavor.


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## lamar

Here is an alternative that works well as long as we have low temps.  I cold smoked a  couple of chuck roasts keeping the temp in the smoker below 40 for six hours yesterday.  Ground it up this am.   Have some good tasting burger.

Putting patties in the smoker and cooking till done works well too as stated in above posts.


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## dingo007

I;ve been pondering the smoked burger deal for a while now..haven't done anything about it....busy with a few other meat projects..I have two thoughts and would appreciate feedback;

(i) Grind, spice and bind my chuck with Cure #1, then cold smoke. My idea here is I could make a bunch of burgers and freeze them for later.

or

(ii) Make my burgers and try the reverse sear method. I usually make em around 1/3lb so should be thick enough for a 30-60mins cold smoke and then bring up to rare, Sear over charcoal.

I like the first idea as I can keep some in the freezer and just grill em up. The second sounds enticing, just not sure if reverse sear will work on ground meat.

Thoughts?


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## gary s

If his are falling apart he must be using a  100 / 0 blend too lean.  I use 80/20  Never had that happen to me

Gary


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## carnivore371

I'm glad I checked here first. Smoke burgers for weekend dinner it is. Looking forward to it!


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## lumbo tim

lamar said:


> Here is an alternative that works well as long as we have low temps.  I cold smoked a  couple of chuck roasts keeping the temp in the smoker below 40 for six hours yesterday.  Ground it up this am.   Have some good tasting burger.
> 
> Putting patties in the smoker and cooking till done works well too as stated in above posts.


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## lumbo tim

How do you cold smoke and keep the chuck below 40 ? Sorry I am a novice


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## noboundaries

Wow, this thread started back in 2011.  I don't cold smoke yet, so can't help you Tim.

I use an 85/15 blend of ground chuck, season with Mont Steak Seasoning, then dimple the patty. Most of my patties are 6-7 oz. 

I do something I coined called grill smoking, and it kind of fries the burgers to get the best of grilling and smoking. I use a well seasoned paella pan, put it on the Kettle over a HOT fire of charcoal and wood chunks, usually hickory or mesquite. Then I spray the pan with oil and throw the patties in the pan. Put the lid on the Kettle and let them grill smoke for 6-8 minutes.  They caramelize real nice.  Flip them and repeat.  Check IT and adjust time to remove at 165F.  I used to eat them like steak, medium rare, but no longer. 

The paella pan gives a great crust on the meat.  The smoke from the chunks gives a great flavor.


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## dirtsailor2003

lumbo tim said:


> How do you cold smoke and keep the chuck below 40 ? Sorry I am a novice



Kind of depends on the type of smoker you have. 

Most of use use some sort of external smoke generator and pipe the smoke into the cold pit. 

For me I use my vertical gas smoker and my smoke tubes from A Maze N smokers. If the outside temp is low enough I place the tube right in the pit. If not I place it in my mailbox mod and pipe the smoke in.


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## bregent

lumbo tim said:


> How do you cold smoke and keep the chuck below 40 ? Sorry I am a novice



It probably helps if you are cold smoking in Maine in the middle of Winter :)


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## Firewolf96

I take a pretty different approach than most people and I am willing to share my "secret".
I run a 30" Masterbuilt electric smoker with cold smoker attachment.
Using 10 lbs of beef (I have used 73/27 and either 80/20 or 85/15, can't recall), I mix in a homemade taco seasoning (I just grabbed one online that sounded good and modified it as I mixed the seasoning together in a bowl prior to applying to the meat).  Burgers cook fast and I try to take the low and slow approach.

Mix the seasoning in thoroughly - this means 20-30% of the seasoning at a time.
I form my patties thick, if I remember correctly - at least 1 inch, maybe 1.5?, so they don't cook too quickly, but about 1/3 or 1/4 lb each.  They end up like sliders, some larger.
Filled the smoker and started the temp at 200-220 for about 45 minutes max, then dropped it to 180 for almost 1.5 hours.  At this point, gauge what you want to do with the temps for the last 30-45min - raise it up to 200 get the juices coursing through and wetting the outside, or drop it to 160 to dry the outside and get a more solid smoke flavor.  I feel like when it dries the outside, the smoke comes through stronger - might just be me.
Honestly, I may have tweaked the temps up and down a couple times during the cook.  I like the effect it has when you fluctuate the temps.
I do this long smoke/cook to get more smoke flavor in these burgers.  I feel like less than an hour doesn't do it justice.

I made a large batch (36) of these and about the same number of brown sugar burgers (I can post both of these recipes if anyone is interested...that is, IF I actually wrote it down this time) and had people try them.  You almost don't want to put anything on them they were so good.  Literally, I ate a number of them without buns, cheese or condiments.

Please note: nothing was added to make these stick together and zero fell apart.

And FYI, microwaving them until you see the juices coming out is totally OK.  I didn't want to wait any longer when I was reheating them. :)


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## sauced

SmokinAl said:


> I smoke them all the time with nothing added. They stay together fine.



Same here!!


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## hb99

I've smoked burgers a number of times, but I prefer adding the egg, breadcrumbs, Worcestershire sauce, etc.

Once you put them on the rack there's no need to touch them.  I cook mine to 160F.  

IMO, they taste great...even cold.


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