I love hamburgers.

I am currently trying to live a slightly more healthy lifestyle and have had to cut down on my consumption greatly. When I do have one, however, it has to be absolutely divine – and this can only be guaranteed with lots of care and attention, which meant that the last time I indulged in some I prepared them myself.

It all started innocently enough. My brother invited a few common friends over to my place for burgers because he knows I can cook a mean burger, so given that we hadn’t had any in ages I decided to go all out.

The first decision I took was not to put all my eggs in one basket. Given the occasion I could not risk making a mistake in the recipe – so I opted for sliders and came up with five different patty combinations. So we had a target: six of each of the patty varieties and thirty 3″ (10cm) buns.

I wanted to allow for quite a bit of freedom, so I prepared garnishes and left them in the centre of the table, then everyone could create a different combination per patty. For each of the (meat-based) patties I used the same mixture of beef:

• 70% brisket, 30% topside, minced twice and chilled to around 7^oC (45^oF).

The combination of cuts makes for a slightly fattier but much tastier burger. Chilling the meat serves two purposes: it makes it easier to keep the patties together without additives and it delays the interior’s cooking time, which will help you achieve a crunchy exterior and moist interior.

I made four meat-patty varieties in all:

• Plain – Just added some freshly ground pepper
• Onions – mixed some finely chopped onions into the beef.
• Spicy – mixed in paprika, chilli powder and onions
• Italian – This was the weirdest experiment. I mixed chopped tomatoes, cubes of parmesan cheese and chopped Milano salami in with the beef patty.

The fifth was considered by my guests to be an abomination – falafel burgers based on this recipe from the BBC. No surprises here, even though I usually love them, they paled in comparison to their meat-based cousins so this is the last time I’ll mention them.

The selection of garnishes included:

• Onions
• Tomatoes
• Gherkins
• Jalapenos
• Three varieties of cheese
• Ketchup and Mayonnaise

Everyone could create their own combination every time I served a round of burgers. I was grilling them for 3-4 minutes per side; toasting the buns for 2-3 minutes on another grill just before serving them.

It is crucial to allow the surface to heat up as much as possible before placing the burgers on it – this will help crisp them slightly on the outside while allowing the centre to remain moist. You must never press the burgers down with a spatula while cooking them, you’ll only be draining the juiciness from them.

The result was, as expected, a set of some of the finest burgers I have tasted in years (if I may say so myself). My personal favourite was the second variety, the one with very finely chopped onions (pictured above), but all of them seemed to make a hit. The “Italian” burger generated interest, but we all agreed that the plainer the better.

I still have a lot to learn about the hidden art of hamburgers, but trust me, following in my footsteps will set you on the right path.

(#19 of 366 X 2012 project)