How to Grill Frozen Burgers

Grilling hamburgers in your backyard conjures great memories. Mom or Dad, flipping the meat, asking who wants cheese on theirs. The smell of toasting buns means that you’re just minutes away from that first bite. Home cooking something as simple as a burger is unforgettable. Some of our favorite fast-food joints try to tell us that the best way to enjoy your burger is, “fresh, never frozen”. But the truth is this, frozen isn’t a bad way to make a burger at home.

There are a few important keys to remember when learning how to grill a frozen burger. How long can they stay frozen? Do you need to thaw your burger prior to grilling? What is the safest temperature to serve a burger cooked from a frozen state? We want to address these questions for you so that you will know how to make the best burger, so that it is safe, tasty and a time saving tool which we all need to accomplish in our kitchen.

Required Ingredients and Supplies

Grilling frozen hamburgers or any other food starts with your ingredients. Put together your shopping list, and pull out the following items from your pantry.

• Ground Beef – 2 Pounds for a Family of 4
• Seasoning Ingredients – 1/4 tsp Onion Powder, 1/4 tsp Garlic Powder, 2 tsp Kosher Salt, 2 tsp Ground Pepper
• Mixing bowl
• Flat Cookie Sheet
• Parchment Paper
• Zipper-Lock Style Bags
• Meat Thermometer

Start in the Kitchen

We have 2 pounds of ground chuck, a 80/20 blend. This is for 4 people, starting out with 1/4 pound burgers, and one burger per person. You can change up quantities according to your family and friends.

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A couple of additions that you may want to try when preparing frozen patties are simple. A few dashes of Worchester sauce, or soy sauce. Dicing up some fatty pieces of a brisket point or uncooked bacon, finely chopped and adding prior to mixing. Some friends have mixed veal or pork additionally, while other friends added freshly diced garlic or seasoned salt. The options are limitless, either way, you are pretty much assured of a great taste when you grill your frozen burger.

Mix your meats and seasonings, divide your burgers into your desired cooking size, 1/4 pound patties are an ideal starting point.

Making the Burger Patties

Lay out a clean cookie sheet and line with a piece of parchment paper. Lay out the formed patties you want to freeze on the parchment paper, so that they are not touching.

We have found that making the center point of your burger a bit more concave than the outer diameter of the burger lends to less shrinkage when cooking.

Place a second sheet on top, and slide the cookie sheet of burgers into the freezer. Allow these to freeze for a couple of hours, ideally you should check on these after you are finished eating the burgers that you are cooking that day.

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When the burgers are frozen, pick them up and place them into your zipper lock style bag. Once they are frozen they shouldn’t stick together in the bag. You should be able to keep these in the freezer safely for 3-4 months, as long as they maintain a constant freezing temperature.

Now, you should be able to grill frozen burgers whenever you are ready.

Another good trick for your freezer is to freeze a plastic or paper cup of water, halfway full. When it is frozen, place a coin on top of the ice. Check it in the freezer whenever you think of it, or specifically, after a power outage. If you see that the coin has dropped to the bottom of the cup, you now know that your freezer food may have been compromised, and it may not be a good day to use the beef patties anymore. In fact, you might be prudent and replace any perishables in your freezer.

Grilling Your Frozen Burger

How you decide to grill frozen burgers, is different from how you might cook a frozen steak.

We suggest that when you know that you have a busy day, place the bag of your burgers into the refrigerator before leaving for work. You want allow the burgers to thaw as much as possible.

We have found best luck with taking the frozen burgers out of the bag and placing them on a plate that will catch and moisture that comes off the frozen meat.

Also, cover the burgers with a piece of parchment paper. The separated burgers have a lesser chance of sticking together this way.

An important part of grilling properly frozen patties is remembering when you froze the meat, and what you put in it. We always write on our zipper lock style bag all this information so we can rotate them in a first in, first out fashion.

When you decide to grill them, you should follow the recommended instructions. The USDA recommends that you should grill patties when it reaches an internal temperature of 160°. Using your meat thermometer will help you achieve this.

Serving

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After you have cooked the burgers on the grill to the recommended internal temperature, you should think a way to serve them.

The best thing about you making frozen burger patties, is that your family will be impressed that you can make a great meal in what seems like a short amount of time.

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Pull your burgers, and serve them on a toasted onion roll. Garnish with sautéed onions and jalapenos. Warm a thick slice of Cheddar or Muenster cheese. Serve all this along with fried onion rings, corn on the cob and potato salad.

That’s the best way to grill frozen patties. Compliment your meal with Kool-Aid for the kids, sweet or unsweet iced tea or an aromatic brown ale for the adults, but most of all, Enjoy!