Burger in the Oven

I'll admit it. I am an Adam Roberts fan. You could say that he is one of the top 5 influences of this humble experiment of mine. So naturally when I googled "How to broil a burger in the oven," I was very happy to see this 2011 post of his come up first. It gave me all of the inspiration that I needed to make a delicious burger out of the 1/3 lb of lean ground beef that I took out of the freezer this morning while I was making coffee.

Some of you may still be stuck on one part of that last sentence.

Yes, this burger was made with 95% lean ground beef.

Do not fear for my (remaining) sanity, my friends. I will admit, up front, that I stuffed this burger with 1/2 tablespoon of cold butter before I put it into the oven. So yes, you can keep reading. I'm not blowin' smoke here.

I'm not going to go into a tedious step-by-step for this recipe. All I did was mix the meat with a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce, stuff a chunk of butter in the middle of the patty, and roast the burger on a rack at 475 degrees for 14 minutes, plus another 30 seconds to melt the sharp cheddar I placed on top.

Next time, I may cut the cooking time down by a minute or possibly two, but if you're looking for a solid medium (cooked all the way through with the interior meat retaining just a hint of beefy color,) 14 minutes is perfect.

As far as I'm concerned, a burger can be elevated by its toppings. I am extremely lucky to have a big jar of Casey and Nate's homemade dill pickles in the refrigerator. In homage to my mother, I sliced one of these slightly spicy, perfectly dillified mini cucumbers and piled the slices on my toasted english muffin base with ketchup and dijon mustard.

My burger was accompanied on the roasting rack by a thick slice of yellow onion that had been sprinkled with kosher salt. (I flipped this onion over and set it on top of the cheese for the last 30 seconds... a step that is 100% unnecessary except for the fact that it made a pretty picture.) While the meat was resting (I did not want all of that wonderful butter to squish out onto the plate by biting or cutting into the burger too soon,) I pulled the onion apart and added it to the burger platform I was creating.

I will be making my burgers this way from now on... that is, until I get a grill.

(I did not have any aluminum foil to line the pan. However, I did create a bed of salt under the burger so that I did not set off the house-wide fire alarm with the dripping, smoking juices from the meat. This was surprisingly easy to clean up, taking minimal elbow grease under some hot water.)

Oh, and for those of you still questioning the juicy deliciousness of this burger...

Finger-drippin' good.  

Boom.