Beef Short Rib Burgers - Recipe Help?

Tonight I am planning to to duplicate (or at least attempt to imitate) the absolutely ridiculously tasty beef short rib burger my girlfriend and I ate at Blackbird for lunch last week.

We asked our server if they braised or did anything to the short ribs first and he said to his knowledge, they cut the short ribs off the bone and grind them. I have searched all over the internet and cant seem to find a recipe or hint on what else might go in the burgers. I am assuming they will be fatty enough to bind so I don't think an egg will be needed.

As of now, my plan is to cut the meat off the short ribs, grind in our kitchen aid attachment, add salt and pepper, form into patties and grill.

Anyone else with experience or insight for attempting to remake this delicious burger?

Abe,

The new Hubert Keller book, Burger Bar, has a recipe called New York Strip Surprise Burger which includes, as a main ingredient, braised short ribs. They are shredded and then stuffed into chopped NY strip with spices, herbs, etc. This is the first burger I want to try from the book.

Bill/SFNM

Bill/SFNM wrote:Abe,

The new Thomas Keller book, Burger Bar, has a recipe called New York Strip Surprise Burger which includes, as a main ingredient, braised short ribs. They are shredded and then stuffed into chopped NY strip with spices, herbs, etc. This is the first burger I want to try from the book.

Bill/SFNM

Hubert Keller, not Thomas Keller.

Darren72 wrote:
Hubert Keller, not Thomas Keller.

ooops. Thanks. Fixed original post

I, too was thinking braised, or possibly sous vide? I think the collagen break down of long and slow cooking unleashes the juicy beefy goodness of short ribs. Perhaps the ribs are cooked sous vide to a temperature of rare and then assembled and grilled to order? Is this burger ground? Or is it filled with shredded short ribs?

I'm pretty sure that they put Taleggio cheese on the burger, if that helps...

Thanks for the tips, I will certainly pick up some Tallegio cheese.

Maybe they were sous vide to rare because the burger was cooked to a beautiful medium rare which I dont think braising would allow.

Due to time constraints tonight maybe I will just grind them up raw and see what happens. I will report back on how they turn out.

I've read here or on a wine board of people mixing some Short Rib meat in with chuck to "beef up" their burgers. I've been meaning to try it (now that I've got a grinder) but have not....

Hubert Keller's Website contains recipes from his TV series, including the short rib show which featured his burger:

http://www.fleurdelyssf.com/recipes/202_3.pdf

All I can suggest is to trim off as much connective tissue and fat as you can before grinding - and the meat will still have plenty of fat in it.

Thanks for all the tips, I made sure to trim all of the fat, ground them up using the medium plate on our kitchen aid, added salt, pepper and a touch of garlic powder.

I formed the patties loosely by hand and let set up in the fridge for a bit, grilled them to a nice medium/medium rare and shaved some Parmesan over the top and then added some well done bacon I had cooked in the oven.

While they didn't taste exactly like blackbird's rendition, they were absolutely the juiciest, tastiest burgers I have made at home. Next time I I use less salty cheese and nicer buns, but these are absolutely getting served at our next BBQ.

Again, thanks for all of the help.

Went to a community garage sale in Palatine and just scored a
Porkert #12 Bolt Down Grinder w/ Deluxe Accessory Kit 15-1201

for $3.00

So I went and purchased some boneless short-ribs and a chuck pot roast
cubed it all and chilled in the freezer for 15 min (not quite enough) and ground it
all in my new grinder with the 3/16 plate. I think it would have been easier if the
meat was colder and if I had trimmed most of the connective tissue as that stuff gummed up the
plate pretty bad....
Burgers will be grilled on Sunday.

I think it would have been easier if the
meat was colder and if I had trimmed most of the connective tissue as that stuff gummed up the
plate pretty bad....

You are right, if the meat is colder, to the point where it is starting to feel more solid (i.e. frozen), it will grind through the fat and connective tissue much easier. I used to have problems with my manual grinder (that I picked up for $5 at the Ark on Lincoln) until i started chilling the meat to the point where it was almost frozen.

I have been using short rib in my burgers the past few times I have grilled out with excellent results. I typically use about half short rib and half of another cut (i.e. sirloin, chuck). I would think that using all short rib might be overkill and would be almost too juicy/fatty, or maybe it's not possible for burgers to be too fatty.

I too have found that short ribs on their own gets too fatty.

As far as a gummed up grinder, running a piece of bread through after the meat will help you get the last bits of meat left in there as well as help clean things out a bit.

I ground up 4 lbs of beef yesterday....bought 2 1/2 lbs chuck steak & 1 1/2 lbs boneless short ribs....sliced 'em all in strips about an inch wide, seasoned w/ 2 tsp/lb Old Bay...chilled in freezer for 45 mins....had the KA Food grinder attachment in the freezer also...salt & peppered all the beef...put the KA on speed 4 and ground away.

Some complain the KA is not up to the task....overheats and so forth....take a look at the worm gear's driven end - the square part - it's easy to turn w/your hand....put back in the body, attach blade and plate and just snug up the retaining ring - you should still be able to turn the driven shaft ok with the ring just snug...now turn the retaining ring a little tighter and you probably won't be able to turn the shaft - no matter who you know.... that will probably heat up the stand mixer just to overcome the ring's friction, let alone grind meat.... anyway, if mush starts coming out , just stop, clean any gristle off the blade and let 'er rip.
I cook 'em in a cast iron frying pan or cast iron griddle with a blob of bacon drippins' ...never have put 'em on a grill.

Cooks illustrated ran a recipe last summer that used short ribs. It was for classic diner style burgers. Great recipe and a really good burger.

drshoebocks wrote:Cooks illustrated ran a recipe last summer that used short ribs. It was for classic diner style burgers. Great recipe and a really good burger.

Watch which recipe you use from CI, though: their latest burger article was "How to make a well-done burger taste good" which involved turning it into meat loaf (addition of a panade).

Here's a very recently-run recipe on FN that looks pretty good. The new Brookhaven Market in Burr Ridge has really nice-looking bone-in short ribs, and I'm going to try this in the next few days. I'll report back.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emer ... index.html

If you're anywhere near Burr Ridge, drop into this extrordinary supermarket, if only to sight-see. You would be well advised to bring a cooler, though.

mhill95149 wrote:Went to a community garage sale in Palatine and just scored a
Porkert #12 Bolt Down Grinder w/ Deluxe Accessory Kit 15-1201

for $3.00

So I went and purchased some boneless short-ribs and a chuck pot roast
cubed it all and chilled in the freezer for 15 min (not quite enough) and ground it
all in my new grinder with the 3/16 plate. I think it would have been easier if the
meat was colder and if I had trimmed most of the connective tissue as that stuff gummed up the
plate pretty bad....
Burgers will be grilled on Sunday.

On one of the Good Eats shows, Alton also put his grinder in the freezer to make the grinding process go much smoother.

Made these Hubert Keller burgers today: ground brisket stuffed with short-rib meat, topped with amadeus cheese, served on a home-made ciabatta bun with butter lettuce and heirloom tomatoes:



Without question the best I have ever eaten.

Bill/SFNM

I just got around to reading Saveur's burger issue from a couple of months back last week. They discussed using various cuts of meat and I was drawn to their description for ground short ribs making a luscious burger.

This past weekend Sunset Foods had Niman Ranch short ribs on sale for $3.99/lb. Picked out the leanest ones (still plenty of fat) and had the butcher grind them up. I added salt, pepper, thyme, and ground porcini's and they were the best burgers that I have made in a long time (and my wife and daughters agreed). Rich, deep, beefy flavor, great texture, and unbelievably juicy. Highly recommended.

I look forward to experimenting with other cuts. Not sure I will be grabbing a package of already ground beef for a while.

Short Rib Burger - Burger for the obsessive.

Homemade pickled red onion w/habanero and jalapeno









Knife cut short ribs







Caramelized onions, butter/olive oil, salt, pepper cayenne.





Pticek's bakery hot dog buns, cut in half pan toasted.*



Assemble, eat







Short rib burgers were terrific, though next time I will dice the meat slightly finer.

Enjoy,
Gary

*Pticek's buns were on-hand frozen from a cooking demo I did a few weeks ago. Slowly defrosted and pan toasted they were terrific.