Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
Key Takeaways
- This burger seasoning blend enhances flavor in beef, turkey, and plant-based patties.
- Combine kosher salt, garlic powder, onion powder, black pepper, mustard powder, and optional spices to create the blend.
- Season patties 15 minutes before cooking to avoid moisture loss.
- Customize the blend to your taste and nutrition needs, adjusting salt and spice levels as preferred.
- Maintain food safety by using clean utensils and avoiding contamination from spice jars.
This burger seasoning blend is a super-zesty mix of pantry spices guaranteed to add Flavor, with a capital “F”, to your ground meat patties. It’s perfect for beef or turkey burgers and also works with plant-based ground meat.
Cookout season may be in full swing, but use this seasoning any time a burger craving hits. When feeding kids, I leave out the cayenne pepper, but this seasoning has a good track record with the under-10 crowd!
Ingredients
- Kosher salt
- Garlic powder
- Onion powder
- Cracked black pepper
- Dried chives, optional
- Mustard powder
- Cayenne pepper, optional
Combine all ingredients in a small jar or container and shake well to mix. Sprinkle over both sides of burger patties about 15 minutes before cooking.
Best Burger Cooking Tips
This spice blend is especially terrific on turkey burgers, but it also works well with beef and other types of ground meat. Try it on Impossible or other plant-based ground meat, too.
Wait until about 15 minutes before you are ready to grill or cook your burgers on the stovetop before seasoning them. Otherwise, the salt will draw moisture out of the meat.
Before tossing your burgers on the grill or into a pan on the stovetop, make a large dimple in the center of each patty. This helps them cook more evenly and keeps them from puffing up in the middle.
Note: Grill grates should be well-oiled, especially when cooking turkey or chicken burgers.
Is This a Healthy Spice Blend?
This blend is not designed to add nutrition to your burger. It’s here to amp up the flavor of homemade burger patties. That said, many of the ingredients—garlic, chives, and black pepper—do have health benefits.
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You can also customize the blend to suit your taste and nutrition needs. Decrease the amount of salt, or leave it out altogether, if you are watching your sodium intake or have high blood pressure.
Want more garlic flavor and health benefits? (Chives offer similar health perks for your heart.) Bump up the garlic powder. Prefer extra bite? Add more black pepper or mustard powder. This blend is flexible.
Food Safety and Spices
When measuring spices, wipe spoons between dips into different spice jars. If the spice does not cling to the spoon after wiping, you don’t need to reach for a fresh spoon.
A word about spice jars: They can get grimy. 😝
Food-safety research has shown that spice jars can harbor plenty of germs. In fact, some of this research was conducted in kitchens where turkey burgers were being prepared!
That’s one good reason to have your burger seasoning blend ready to use in a separate container. It keeps you from having to handle and reach into several different spice jars while working with raw ground meat.
🚿Wiping down spice jars occasionally with a disinfectant wipe or washing their exteriors is also a smart move.
Other Spice Blends You May Like
Paprika Plus Spice Rub adds excellent, bright flavor to chicken, pork, and seafood with both regular Hungarian paprika and smoked paprika.
Chermoula, a North African blend of spices and herbs, tastes amazing on salmon.
And if it’s a Tuesday, try this Taco Seasoning on chicken.
Best Burger Seasoning
Equipment
- 1 Small jar
Ingredients
- 1½ Tablespoons salt Kosher
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 1 teaspoon cracked black pepper
- 1 teaspoon dried chives optional
- ½ teaspoon dry mustard
- ¼ teaspoon cayenne optional
Instructions Start Cooking
- Wash hands thoroughly, lathering with soap and rinsing with running water before gathering spices.
- In a small jar, combine all spices and shake well.1½ Tablespoons salt 1 teaspoon garlic powder 1 teaspoon onion powder 1 teaspoon cracked black pepper 1 teaspoon dried chives ½ teaspoon dry mustard ¼ teaspoon cayenne
- Sprinkle each side of your burgers with about a quarter teaspoon of seasoning 15 minutes before grilling/cooking, gently pressing in as you would a dry rub.
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