I made these for a family BBQ a couple weeks ago and they were a huge hit! They are juicy and packed with flavor! I put them on homemade buns I made from the french bread roll recipe posted below. And I topped them with my steak/burger/everything sauce.
To make the sauce I start with equal parts ketchup and brown sugar then add more brown sugar till it's as sweet as I want, depending on what I'm putting it on. Then I add garlic powder, onion powder, black pepper, a pinch of cayenne and a dash of worchestershire sauce. Then, again depending on what I'm making the sauce for, I might add teriyaki, a little A1, liquid smoke, or whatever looks good at that moment. For these burgers I added teriyaki and liquid smoke. Easy on the smoke, I like to smell it more then taste it so you really don't need much, start with maybe an 1/8 or a tsp then go from there.
For the burgers:
I did 3 lbs of 80/20 ground beef
About 1/2 cup teriyaki sauce, just eyeball it.
1 20 oz can of crushed pineapple, drained well. (I dump it in a wire mesh strainer and press it down to drain it really well.)
garlic powder
onion powder OR minced onion
1 tsp liquid smoke
salt
pepper
bread crumbs, eyeballed, start with 1/2 of a cup, adding a little at a time. How much crumbs you need depends on how wet everything is. You have to just go by feel. You want your meat to be dry enough that it will stick together but not so dry that it crumbles, if that makes any sense. Don't be afraid to play with it a bit, this burger mixture is pretty forgiving because of the pineapple and teriyaki.
Don't mix till you have everything in, that way you won't over-mix your meat. Add bread crumbs as you mix till the meat sticks together well and is not too wet. Form you patties into whatever size you want. Now, here is the KEY to making a burger stay together and not fall apart on your grill: put your patties on a cookie sheet or big plate and allow to sit in the fridge for 2 hours or in the freezer for 20 minutes. You want to burgers to be really cold when they go on the grill, they will hold together better because the fat, just like butter, tightens up when it's cold.
Grill and serve on toasted buns with burger sauce and all the pretty fixin's you like!
