There is one thing I struggle with many times a year, and that is what order to assemble my hamburger in.

So we can focus on the issue let's assume we are making a standard hamburger with cheese out of the best ingredients possible.

Consider the standard cheeseburger to have these items. Bun, patty, cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, mustard, mayonnaise, ketchup, and relish(pickles may of course be used in place of relish, and preferred. Feel free to add ingredients but please do not subtract any.

What order do you assemble it in? Lettuce on the bottom? Mustard and relish together on the top bun? Onions touching the tomato? The patty touching the bottom bun?

These are my struggles. Help me find my solution, for I am destined to make a hamburger in about a hour or two.

Assembled in this order, from bottom to top.

Bread/bun.

Burger.

Cheese.

Bread/bun.

From bottom up.

Toasted Bread

Mayonaisse

Tomato

Salt and Pepper

Fat Gherkins Sliced

Burger

Cheese

Onion

Lettuce

Ketchup (on the lettuce not the bun)

Mustard

Toasted Bread

I do not claim this to be the best way, but it works great for me.

@MooseyMcMan Well that's easy to figure if you put nothing else on it, perhaps I should clarify and edit my previous post.

Consider the standard cheese burger to contain these items.

Bun, patty, cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, mustard, mayonnaise, ketchup, and relish.

@leebmx: What are gherkins?

The order doesn't matter. It really doesn't. It's what you put in that matters. Don't overcrowd it with ingredients that overtake the taste of others, you need to find the perfect balance. For instance, the ketchup/mayo/relish combo is an overkill, only made by beginners. You need to be more confident in your taste and pick only the finest of ingredients.

( read this with a broken french accent )

Pickled cucumbers where I come from.

The order for me is more of a structural thing. I like to put the tomatoes and gherkins at the bottom, under the meat, because that way I can get in four slices of tomato and one fat gherkin all sliced up and not have to worry about them sliding off the top of the burger. Also you have to have the cheese on top of the burger so you get that texture all together in the bite. What kind of degenerate puts their cheese at the bottom under the tomato and burger? Lettuce also has to go at the top so you get a nice fresh crunch before you sink into the squidgy goodness of the meat and cheese.

So structural and textural I suppose. Although I have always put the mayonnaise on one bun and the mustard on the other and have often wondered if it would taste different if I just mixed it up on both. However I have always been too scared to try.

Isn't that just a pickle?

No, because what if it is an onion or a cornichon or an egg or a walnut...I could go on.

A Gherkin is a pickled cucumber, not a pickled anything else.

Going off of wiki, "A pickled cucumber (commonly known as a pickle in the United States and Canada or generically as gherkins in the United Kingdom)."

Just a regional thing then.

So if someone says pickle where you are they just mean a pickled cucumber?

Duder that's way too much glop on your burger... at that point you might as well go with a veggie patty for all you'll be able to taste it. Take all that extra stuff and have a salad with mustard dressing on the side.

Bun bottom, mayo (homemade, trust me), ground black pepper, burger, cheese, bun top. If you must accessorize then a very thinly sliced onion round on top of the cheese and/or some minced garlic mixed in with the mayo is okay.

Take a dill pickle spear (or a full size dill pickle, if you want) and stick it next to the burger. Fries/chips go on the other side.

Pretty much. Though I suspect plenty don't know pickles are originally cucumbers. They need to re-air that episode of the Magic School Bus that taught the pickling process.

@leebmx: I have tried your method and it is not, in my opinion, perfect. The bottom bun soaked up too much tomato and having the lettuce touch the hamburger caused it I get warm, I do not like warm lettuce.

I will update when I try another stacking method.

This is why I only put cheese on my burgers. So much simpler.

As a fake professional hamburger man, here's my advice:

bun > mayo > (condiment) > lettuce > onion > tomato > cheese > patty > bun

Apply mayo to top bun first, because that's the only place that makes sense. Place condiments (ketchup, mustard, relish, etc.,) in the concave of a slightly curved piece of lettuce so they don't flow out. Leave top bun and lettuce aside for final assembly. Place patty on bottom bun, then stack ingredients in appropriate order.

I recommend against using so many condiments because they overpower the original savory taste of the patty, and you typically don't want that. If you must, use one only and in moderation. If you really want to use all three, then place each on separate flat layers of the burger to prevent unnecessary messiness. An alternate placement of ingredients without condiments would be to place the lettuce under the tomato to prevent it from interacting with the cheese, or under the patty to prevent it from making the bottom bun too soggy too quickly.

A general rule to follow when making sandwich type foods is to place the most voluminous ingredients at the center with a bottom heavy inclination.

Bun-Patty-Bun.

There I said it. I don't want anything on my burger but the burger. Some ketchup maybe.

Where do you put the lettuce normally so it doesn't touch the hamburger?

bread>all the things>meat>all the things again>bread

Cant make a burger without doubling the dose of crap on it.

Always have the lettuce/salad at the top, you never want it to be crushed by anything else apart from the bun. The cheese + sauces etc. should all be on top of the meat - the obvious direct meat-cheese combo is what you go for when you can. This is the law.

From the example ingredients:

Bun, patty, cheese, lettuce, tomato, onion, mustard, mayonnaise, ketchup, and relish(pickles may of course be used in place of relish, and preferred.

I'd go (in visual order):

Bun

Lettuce

Tomato

Onion

Pickles

Mayo

Ketchup

Cheese

Patty

Bun

As far as I know, "the" good hamburger-building order is (bottom) bun > condiment (any) > meat > cheese > tomato > pickles > onions (fresh, maybe red) > lettuce > condiment (any) > bun (top)

Putting tomato between the meat and pickles/lettuce is important, like you said warm lettuce is not great and they can lose the crunch easily by getting cooked. And obviously you'll want the cheese right on top of the meat. I personally like to have onions closer to meat (say, right above the cheese) because I like it a bit warm and it can take the heat. Caramelized onions should be placed close to the meat for the same reason the meat shouldn't get close to the crunchy stuff.

Additionally: fried eggs go on the cheese, beetroot goes under the meat.

Another tip is to cut the bottom half of the bun slightly bigger than the top half for better structural integrity (especially after biting into it).

@audiobusting: The problem with putting the condiment right next to the bun - is the bun will absorb most of it, especially when you bite down and push on the sauce. You're left with far less sauce on the meat and more on the bun.

Edit: Oh man, DUDE THE BEETROOT RIGHT NEXT UNDER THE LETTUCE.

@zero_ said:

What can I say, I like my bottom bun bloody red. Maybe it's just me but I really like the bun to get a bit soaked with beet juice.

I guess your point on the condiments is right, but putting it in the middle doesn't give that extra initial oomph that you get right after biting it (which is why I put condiments in the first place). It depends on our take on condiments, I guess.

-Bun

-Lettuce

-Red Onion

-Gherkins

-Burger

-Cheese

-Fried Egg

-Pineapple

-Jerk BBQ Sauce

-Bun

BEST BURGER EVER!!!!

The most important aspect is containing the ketchup. Using the cheese to keep it from soaking into the bun is important.

Bun

Lettuce

(the rest)

Cheese

Ketchup

Burger

Bun

I'll just leave this right here.

Bun
BBQ Sauce
Onions
Tomato
Bacon
Ketchup
Mustard
Pickles
Cheese
Patty
Lettuce
Bun

Bun

Mayo

Lettuce

Onion

Tomato

Ketchup

Burger

Mustard

Bun

Use the sauces like glue to ensure the other stuff doesn't fall off, patty should be in contact with bottom bun and the vegetables on top of that.

Funny, now that I think of it I assemble my hamburger in the same order as I learned when I was a burger flipper at a fast food joint in highschool.

bun

sauce (ketchup or mayo or some sort of flavorful sauce)

onions

lettuce (burger depending)

bacon

mustard

cheese

patty

optional extra slice of cheese

bun

Also pickles on a burger are fucking vile and you are a horrible person for doing that to a perfectly edible hamburger. D:

@leebmx: Bottom bun, 2condiments, lettuce, tomato, burger, cheese, onions, other 2 condiments, top bun.

I probably should have mentioned that is my standard way.

There might be something in the lettuce thing now you mention it, I might try your order next time. I hadn't really thought too much about why my burgers tend to fall apart as well. This has been a very illuminating thread.

The only acceptable configuration for a hamburger:

Bun

Mayo

Onions

Pickles

Tomato

Lettuce

Cheese

Patty

Bun

If you want bacon, it lives between the pickles and tomato

Bottom to top

• bottom bun
• ketchup and mayo
• burger
• cheese
• (french fries if I feel like it)
• lettuce
• ketchup and mayo
• top bun

@hunter5024: @mooseymcman: @mikkaq: @oldguy:

ewww...... I never understood having a hamburger without any toppings. At that point you might as well just make a bowl of beef and maybe spoon some of it onto a slice of bread. Then again, I am not a heavy beef-eater, so I do not appreciate the flavour of pure beef like some people do.

Here is the hamburger recipe I used last week:

• Freshly grind my meat mixture (10%veal, 30% pork, 60% well-marbled ribeye) and I make sure that it is not handled too agressively (the less you handle ground meat the more rough the surface. The rougher the surface area the more crispy the outer shell can get without you overcooking the innards).
• Make a patty shape by gently pressing down with a plate
• season with salt and pepper then let the salt do its thng for forty minutes
• Make crispy onions by taking a red onion and soaking it in milk for a bit, then tossing it in a mixture of mostly corn starch with a bit of powdered chicken stock, onion powder, garlic powder.
• Deep fry those onions till crispy, then toss them in a bowl with salt and pepper.
• Cook Bacon to desired doneness (I prefer a crispier bacon, I also make my own bacon from pork belly)
• Mix a homemade mayo using roased tomatos, olive oil (can be a bit tricky, so most people should probably use canola or corn oil), egg yolk, dry mustard, salt, pepper, and a bit of lemon juice (I used meyer lemons)
• Heat up a small cast-iron skillet
• Cook one patty per skillet, flipping the patty every thirty seconds until the meat reaches a temperature of 72 degrees celsius. The temp will raise after cooking and the meat will be medium well (since all beef is loaded with e-coli, it is statistically dangerous if you undercook ground meat. The reason why it is safe to serve a steak rare is because the e-coli sits on the outside of the cut. You can cook away the e-coli on a steak, but with ground beef the e-coli gets mixed into the center of the meat)
• Place freshly sliced cheeze on the patty (for some reason I always see orange cheeze whenever I visit America... that shit is foul. Use something that is not heavily processed instead. I like a Gruyère cheeze myself)
• Toast the bun lightly
• Assemble the burger
  • Bottom of the bun - make sure that the bottom of bun is thick sliced (a good reason to not buy pre-sliced Kaiser rolls like Wonderbread brand Kaisers) or it will get soggy, and who likes a soggy bun?
  • Homemade Mayo
  • Bacon (This protects the bottom of the bun better than veggies can)
  • Patty with melted cheeze on top
  • Crispy onions
  • Tomatos (I used fresh sliced heirloom tomatos from my garden)
  • Lettuce
  • Thinly sliced pickle with a Hot + Sweet flavour
  • The top bun (with another layer of homemade mayo)

Damn that was a tasy burger. \(^o^)/