Burgers and Chips

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ -Welcome to "America's Test Kitchen" at home.

Today, I'm making a fabulous recipe for smashed burgers.

Jack's going to tell us what the deal is with vegetable oil.

And Julia's making a batch of super crunchy kettle potato chips.

We've got a real fun show for you today, so stick around.

♪♪ I love a big, thick, juicy burger.

It's tender, it's cooked to medium rare, it's almost perfection.

But what I love about it is that crust on the outside, especially when it gets craggy and a little bit crisp.

Today, I'm going to make a burger that really is all about the crust.

We're smashing burgers.

And it's so fast and so much fun.

I'm going to take you along for the ride.

Now, these cook really, really quickly, as I said.

So we're going to work on all the other components before we actually get to the burger, starting off with lettuce.

Now, you can choose any type of lettuce that you'd like.

I'm going with good old classic iceberg here.

I love the crunch and the refreshing flavor that it adds.

Now, I need to core this, so all you do is you smash the iceberg on your counter.

Just like that.

Flip it over, and you can actually dig out the core.

Pretty easy.

And I'm making burgers for two.

I'm going to take off this little petticoat of slightly wilted lettuce, get rid of that, and go for some of the more crispy pieces inside.

So I'm just going to put aside a couple of nice pieces.

No browning.

And now how about a nice, juicy, ripe tomato?

Summer tomatoes are the best, but if you're buying these in the supermarket in the winter, look for those that are ripened on the vine.

They taste a lot better.

And when you're storing tomatoes at home, store them with this core side down.

They'll actually age a little slower that way.

If only that worked on everyone.

So I'm going to take a paring knife and just cut out this core.

I'm holding the paring knife at an angle here.

Can't smash a tomato to get rid of the core.

And now I'm going to slice this tomato.

If your knife is pretty dull, you can always use a serrated knife for this.

All right, now, one of the hallmarks of some really great smashed burgers out there is that special sauce that you put on the burger.

And again, this is optional.

If you just want to go for ketchup and mustard, go for it.

But I'm going to make a little bit of a special sauce here.

So we're starting off with some shallot.

I need a tablespoon of minced shallot.

Cut it in half with the peel on.

Peel it.

And then since I want this to be really pretty finely chopped, I'm going to make the cuts very close together.

So I'm spacing my knife, oh, about 1/8 of an inch or even less apart.

And take your time.

You see how my hand up here is nowhere near the blade.

So now I'm going to do the same thing, go across here.

And then just take it right over.

Now, I only need a tablespoon.

That looks about right.

Just get any real big pieces there.

And I am going to measure this.

Sometimes I don't measure.

I'll just eyeball it because you have a good feel.

But really this source is all about ratios.

So I'm going to tell you to measure.

All right, who wants a pickle?

We're not just going to slice pickles here.

We're actually going to add pickles to our special sauce.

It's almost a take on a Russian dressing.

So these are just dill pickles.

Gonna spear one here.

Set that jar aside for just a moment.

Now, similar to the shallot, I want to finely chop this.

And I only need about a teaspoon and a half.

So I'm going to cut these in half so I have a nice flat surface.

And same thing as I did with the shallot.

Just make horizontal cuts, and then right across, vertical.

All right, and I need a teaspoon and a half of pickle.

Teaspoon, and that looks like a half a teaspoon.

Now, I want to use a little bit of this brine as well.

Obviously, it's salted.

It's brine.

But it's got some great flavors in it, too.

So we're going to use a half a teaspoon.

Now, of course, we need a creamy sauce.

So we're going to use some mayonnaise.

We use two tablespoons of mayonnaise.

And a little bit of ketchup.

Got a teaspoon and a half of ketchup.

And one of the hallmarks of a really good sauce is that it's tangy, it's salty.

It's also a little bit sweet.

So I'm going to add some sugar.

I've got 1/8 of a teaspoon of sugar.

Remember, ketchup is already pretty sweet.

And 1/8 of a teaspoon of black pepper.

Or if you like it spicy, a little bit more.

All right.

Let me just stir this together.

It turns that nice kind of rosy hue.

That looks lovely.

You're going to want to make a lot of this, too.

And it actually can stay in the fridge for a couple of days.

Now, let's talk about cheese.

We are not using gourmet artisan cheese.

We are using cheese that is individually wrapped in plastic.

These were actually engineered to melt.

So why not use science to our benefit?

So here's some prep.

All you have to do is unwrap the cheese.

And what I like to do, I will just fold that back over so that they stay nice and separated until I'm ready to use them.

When seconds count, this pre-unwrapping of the cheese will come in handy.

And let's talk about buns, nice soft buns.

These are squishy.

They've got a nice flavor, and you should be able to really compact them in your hands before you eat them.

So I'm just going to split these.

And then I'm just going to put about a tablespoon of this sauce on each of the bun tops.

Oh, yeah.

All right, what are we missing?

How about some beef?

Now, I've got some ground beef that I picked up at the supermarket.

8 ounces of ground beef here.

Now, the reason that I am recommending that you get supermarket ground beef instead of grinding at home yourself, that's because they tend to grind the beef pretty fine.

It's actually pretty tightly compacted.

That tight grind is actually working in our favor.

It releases a sticky protein called myosin each time that they grind the meat.

And we want that sticky protein to be released here because these burgers are very delicate.

They're very thin.

So we needed to add a little bit of cohesion.

So this is 8 ounces, again, of 80% lean.

Now, that sounds a little bit fattier than we usually call for, but that's also by design.

These burgers cook so quickly, and they're very thin.

They're cooked to almost well done.

So you want a burger that has a bit of fat in it.

So you can go with 80% lean up to 85% lean.

But anything that's leaner than that is going to give you a really dry burger.

So I need to zero off my scale.

I'm went ahead and lined it with a little bit of plastic wrap.

I like to do that any time I'm working with raw meat.

And again, I need 2-ounce patties.

As I weigh them, I'm just going to put them on this plate.

So I've got the meat all portioned out here, and I'm not going to put these into patties.

I'm just going to shape them into loose balls at this point.

I don't want to compact the meat.

We're going to save the actual smashing and forming of the patties to when the burgers hit the pan.

So that is all the prep.

Looking good.

I'm going to go wash my hands.

It's time to start cooking, and we're going to heat up our pan.

I'm using a great 12-inch cast iron skillet.

It really heats up well.

It's going to give us just the right crust.

I'm going to add 1/4 teaspoon of vegetable oil to my pan.

It's really well seasoned, but every time you use a pan, it's a good idea to give it a little bit of oil.

And then just smear it around the bottom just to make sure that it goes into all of the pores of the pan.

Now, this is a cold pan.

This is why I can do it without tongs.

All right, and now I'm going to turn the burner to medium-low, and I'm going to heat the pan for five minutes.

Just started my timer there.

Cast iron heats up really slowly and quite unevenly.

So if you blast it with heat at the very start, you'll end up with some hot spots in your pan, and cooler spots, obviously.

So for more even heating, just over a medium-low heat for a good five minutes.

So while that's heating, let's talk a little bit about my saucepan here.

Now, we're using this as a burger press because we noticed that when you go to press a burger using a spatula, your hand is offset from the spatula and you end up going in it at an angle.

And it's hard to get a really nice flat patty.

So we're going to use the saucepan.

This is just a little saucepan here.

And I've wrapped some foil over it so that it can stay nice and clean.

And I'm going to use this as a burger press.

I'm going to grab the sides of it and just press straight down.

So we're just going to wait for our pan to heat.

So I'm starting to see a little bit of smoke in the pan.

I know it's hot enough.

It's preheated.

So I'm going to turn up the heat to high.

So I'm going to take two of these mounds of meat.

Got to work fast here.

So I'm going to place them about 3 inches apart in the skillet.

There we go.

And then use that saucepan.

I'm grabbing the sides, not the handle, to really smash these down.

You don't have to worry too much about being very aggressive.

We want these to stick to the skillet.

So that's why we're smashing them in the pan.

I'm going to hit these with about an 1/8 of a teaspoon of kosher salt and a little bit of pepper to taste.

And we're going to let this first side go for 2 minutes so it can get some really beautiful brown color on that first side.

All right, so these are looking great.

3/4 of the top of these patties are no longer pink, so that's a good indication that these are ready to be flipped.

And you can see this spatula is necessary, a super thin one, so that we can flip these over.

Ah, look at that beautiful color.

And really get in there because the burgers are sticking to the pan.

And again, we want that.

Amazing.

So only 15 seconds on this second side because the burgers are pretty much done at this point.

All right, that's about 15 seconds.

Let me slide this off heat.

So now I'm going to put these on our bottom buns.

And now I'm going to put a slice of cheese right on top.

Start the melting process.

And we'll work on our second batch of burgers.

So same thing.

2 minutes on this first side, flip it over, another 15 seconds on the second side.

All right, that looks great.

I'm going to slide this off heat again.

And the heat of these patties is just going to finish melting all of that cheese.

Oh!

Before I put the bun tops back on, we're gonna add our fixings.

A little bit of iceberg here.

Let's weigh down this lettuce with a little bit of tomato.

And now the top goes on.

That's looking pretty good.

All right.

Now, look at that.

Those patties are all crust.

Still juicy.

Oh, and the cheese is melted.

Mmm.

I just got a little hint of that pickle sauce in there.

Mm, nice and bright and tart.

It's just the right amount of toppings, a little bit of tomato, a little bit of that crisp iceberg.

And the cheese is melted just perfectly.

I'm going to call that one smashing burger.

And if you want to make smashed burgers at home, remember these keys.

Use 80% lean ground beef, shape into 2-ounce mounds, and smash the burgers right in the skillet.

From "America's Test Kitchen" at home, fast and fabulous smashed burgers.

I'm going to smash it in my mouth.

♪♪ -I love olive oil and use it every time I can.

But there are cases in the kitchen where olive oil is a mistake.

Think about it.

Do you really want your carrot cake to taste like olives?

No, you want to be using a neutral, i.e., flavorless vegetable oil.

So I've got some choices here on the table.

But let me start by explaining an important thing about refined versus unrefined.

So some of these oils -- the peanut, the avocado, the coconut -- come in unrefined versions as well as refined.

The unrefined ones are going to taste like the plant.

That's not what we want here.

We want the refined -- absolutely tasteless.

Remember, this is a cooking medium, not a flavoring agent.

So let me break down the choices and explain what we like in the test kitchen and what I like at home.

So corn oil, fine in almost every application that we tried in the kitchen, except in mayonnaise.

It was a little sour.

Next up, canola.

Also fine in most applications, except for frying.

It has fatty acids that break down and oxidize and kind of taste a little fishy.

And honestly, I don't want my doughnuts to taste like fish.

Peanut oil, great for high heat, especially frying.

Makes amazing French fries, but it's more expensive than the rest of these.

Which leaves us with the best all-purpose choice, which is a blend like Crisco blend.

This is multiple oils, so you get the best of all worlds.

It's also inexpensive.

So then two more vegetable oils that are in the news a lot and I want to tell you a little bit about.

Avocado oil here is super high in monounsaturated fats, just like olive oil.

And so it's got those health properties people are excited about.

Cooks really well.

It can heat to 500 degrees.

It's great for sautéing.

It's really expensive, though.

So that's the downside.

Coconut oil is perfect for vegan baking.

It's solid at room temperature, just like butter.

And for cakes and cookies, where you're looking to replace the butter, this is the choice.

So all of these vegetable oils, their cooking properties are pretty different from each other.

You may want multiple vegetable oils in your pantry so that you can do multiple things in your kitchen.

♪♪ -If you've never made potato chips, you are missing out, because they are hands down the best potato chips you will ever eat.

And it's easy.

You just need three ingredients -- oil, salt, and potatoes.

Now, the choice of potato matters here.

You want to choose russets or more specifically, Burbank russets.

Potato chip manufacturers actually use specialized potatoes that are high in starch and low in sugar so that they don't burn.

But a russet Burbank is as close as you're going to find at the supermarket, and luckily, you can find them everywhere.

So this recipe uses a pound of potatoes, which is just two good-sized potatoes.

Now, when you're choosing your potatoes at the store, be picky.

Find really nice-looking potatoes that are roughly the same size so that the slices cook at the same rate.

Also, you want to scrub the heck out of them.

You want to take not only the dirt, but that outer layer of skin.

That way, they'll taste nice and clean.

So when you're scrubbing, use warm water and a good sponge and just scrub, and you'll see they'll start to change color as you take that outer skin off.

All right, those potatoes have been scrubbed thoroughly.

You can see they're entirely a different color now because this tender skin is going to fry up really nicely, and you'll get that flavor, but you won't get any of that gritty dirt.

Now that they're properly scrubbed, it's time to slice them up.

Now, we have to slice them really thinly and really evenly so that they cook at the same rate.

Actually, you want them to be 1/16 of an inch, which is impossible to do by hand, which is why you need a mandoline.

I'll show you 1/16 of an inch.

And yeah, you should measure it.

There we go.

So I'm just going to take my time, slice these up.

Being mindful of the fingers.

Now, how far down you go when you get to this nubbin, totally up to you, but in my house, I'd rather be safe than sorry.

So we'll set that aside.

The potatoes are sliced, and now it's time to think about how we want to flavor them when they're out of the oil, because this is the fun part.

You can make them any flavor you want.

In fact, I'm going to make today my favorite, which is salt and vinegar.

And it's pretty easy to do.

I'm just going to use a spice grinder here.

I'm going to grind up some salt.

This is 1/2 teaspoon of table salt.

And then some of this.

This is dehydrated vinegar, which is very cool.

You can find it at some specialty stores or online.

We're going to use a tablespoon of it.

We're just going to blend it with the salt because that'll make it easier to sprinkle over the chips after they're done frying.

[ Whirring ] We also have a lot of cool variations like barbecue and ranch and so on, and you can find those variations on our website.

So toppings ready, potatoes are done.

It's time to get frying.

Now, choosing a pot for frying your potato chips is an important one because you want a pot tall enough where you can fit 2 quarts of oil, which is how much you need to fry chips, but also so that there's enough headroom over the oil so that it doesn't bubble out all over your stove and make a mess.

So a Dutch oven is perfect, and this is vegetable oil, although you could use peanut oil.

And I'm heating this up over medium heat until it registers 375 degrees.

Medium heat is important because as the oil temperature dips when you add the cold potatoes, it'll climb back up slowly.

And the rate at which that oil temperature climbs determines what kind of texture you'll have.

So medium heat is perfect.

All right, we're at 375, so it's time to add the potatoes.

I'm gonna add them a handful at a time.

Want to sprinkle them into the oil.

Some of them will stick together.

That's okay.

You want to get them into the oil as quickly as you can and as evenly as you can without having them stick.

And also, I should point out, I have this remote thermometer hanging out on the side over there monitoring the temperature of the oil as you fry.

That's just really handy because the oil temperature is going to fluctuate as the potatoes cook.

And that will determine what kind of chip you get, if you get a crisp chip or crunchy kettle chip, which is what we're after.

Now I'm going to gently stir them around, try to prevent them from sticking to each other, although some sticking is inevitable.

And that's when you get those chips that are kind of curled around each other for the big crunch, which are kind of a favorite of mine.

So I'm going to stir this around.

And for the first 2 to 4 minutes, we're just going to wait for that oil to stop bubbling so vigorously.

It's going to calm down a bit, and the temperature of the oil is going to drop down to the 240 zone, which is just perfect.

So these chips have been cooking for about 2 minutes.

And you can see the bubbling has come down significantly and the oil temperature has dropped.

Now it's hovering around 240, 250, which is perfect.

I'm going to adjust the burner as I need to to make it stay in that temperature zone for the next 5 minutes.

Monitoring the temperature of the cooking oil is crucial if you want a crunchy chip.

Here's why.

When slices of potato are plunged into frying oil, the temperature of the oil drops.

In this case, from 375 down to 240, 250, where it hovers for a few minutes.

We call this temperature range "the gel zone."

Potatoes contain water and starch granules, which are made up of starch molecules.

Once in the gel zone, the starch granules absorb water and swell until their molecules separate and form a gel.

As the oil temperature rises to 300 degrees, trapped water converts to steam and begins to force its way out at a moderate rate while letting the starch molecules fit back together.

By the time all the water is driven from the chip, the starch molecules have lined up into a partially ordered matrix that contains some empty spaces.

If we turn down the heat so that the oil takes longer to reach 300 degrees, the potatoes will simply spend too much time in the gel zone.

This means that the trapped steam inside the gel will force its way out at a much slower rate.

And in turn, the starch molecules will have more time to line up into a tighter configuration, leaving very little space between them.

This is a hard chip.

If we turn the heat up so that the oil reaches 300 degrees more quickly, the potatoes will spend too little time in the gel zone.

This means that the trapped steam inside the gel will force its way out at a faster rate.

And in turn, the starch molecules will have less time to line up, leaving behind a looser configuration with lots of space between them.

This leads to a delicate, crisp chip.

So for the perfect kettle chip, it's important to let those potatoes hang out in that 240- to 250-degree gel zone for about 5 minutes before letting that oil temperature continue to climb.

The chips have been cooking in this 240-250 zone for about 5 minutes.

And now the temperature of the oil is going to climb further, to between 280 and 300, which is perfect for getting them brown and crisp.

And so it'll be about another 6 minutes or so.

And of course, if the oil gets too hot, you just adjust the burners so they don't burn.

These chips have been cooking in that 280-300 zone for about 5 minutes, and they are perfect.

Look at this color.

Mmm.

Now, one thing you learn as you start to cook these is that they darken in color when they come out of the oil and they start to cool.

Now, when they're warm is the time to season them because that's when the seasoning sticks.

So I'm going to take this vinegar salt that I made, sprinkle it all over.

Mm.

All right.

I'm just going to let these cool for a little bit.

And notice I have them resting on several layers of paper towels on top of a wire rack.

This just helps drain away any of that excess oil and helps them cool more quickly.

These chips have cooled nicely, and now it's time to enjoy them.

[ Chuckles ] Oh, hello.

I mean, look at that chip.

You can't buy a chip like this.

You can only make them.

And thank goodness it's easy.

[ Crunches ] [ Chuckles ] That crunch is everything.

And I know it looks like a lot of vinegar powder, but it has a very mild flavor that is actually milder than the ones you buy at the store.

So it's nice, and it goes well with something cold and frosty.

Ah.

This is heaven.

So if you want a little slice of heaven, remember three things -- use russet potatoes, slice those potatoes evenly to be 1/16 of an inch thick, and monitor the temperature of the oil as they cook.

From "America's Test Kitchen" at home, the ultimate recipe for crunchy kettle potato chips.

Mm.