Like most tender quick-cooking meats, hamburgers taste better grilled over a high heat than barbecued (smoked low and slow). Here’s a way to infuse the evocative spice and smoke flavors of true barbecue into a conventional fast-cooking burger. It uses a smoke-scented barbecue rub. I call it The Barbecue Burger; you might call it smoky nirvana. There’s a lot to love literally—each burger tips the scale at 8 ounces.
Sub-recipes include:
Kansas City Sweet and Smoky Rub
Smoke Wrangler’s Bacon Bourbon Barbecue Sauce
— Steven Raichlen
ON-DEMAND: Listen to Faith and Steven talk about this recipe as well as Steven’s secret to great barbecue.
Excerpted from Barbecue Sauces, Rubs, and Marinades—Bastes, Butters & Glazes, Too by Steven Raichlen (Workman Publishing). Copyright © 2017. Photographs by Matthew Benson.
- 2 pounds ground beef (preferably a mixture of ground chuck and sirloin, about 18 percent fat)
- 2 to 3 tablespoons Kansas City Sweet and Smoky Rub (see recipe link in headnote, or use your favorite barbecue rub
- 4 romaine lettuce leaves (take from near the center)
- 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
- 4 onion rolls or hamburger buns sliced almost in half through the side
- 4 thick strips artisanal bacon
- 4 thick slices red ripe tomato
- 6 to 8 tablespoons Smoke Wrangler’s Barbecue Sauce (see recipe link in headnote, or use your favorite barbecue sauce
- Form the ground beef into 4 patties, each about 3 1/2 inches across and 3/4-inch thick. Make a slight depression in the center. (Burgers rise more in the center than on the periphery, so the slight indentation helps give you an even thickness.) Generously season the burgers on both sides with the Kansas City Sweet and Smoky Rub and let marinate in the refrigerator while you light your grill.
- Set up the grill for direct grilling and preheat to high. Brush and oil the grill grate.
- Lightly brush the romaine lettuce leaves on both sides with olive oil (you’ll need about 1 tablespoon.) Brush the insides of the onion rolls with the remaining oil.
- Arrange the bacon strips on the grill grate and grill until browned on both sides, 3 to 4 minutes per side. (Move them as needed to dodge any flare-ups.)
- Grill the hamburgers until cooked to taste, about 4 minutes per side for medium (160°F on an instant-read thermometer.)
- Grill the lettuce leaves over the hot fire until lightly browned, 30 seconds minute per side. Toast the onion rolls, cut side down, over the hot fire, 1 to 2 minutes.
- To assemble, place a grilled romaine leaf on the bottom half of each onion roll. Top with a burger, then barbecue sauce, then a tomato slice, bacon, and more barbecue sauce. Top with the other onion roll half.
