So we made 14 hamburgers to find out how every common mistake substitution and alteration affects a burger.

Three Ideal burger begins with a quarter pound of room temperature.

80% lean, 20% fat ground beef that is slightly mixed before being pressed into around Patty.

It's seasoned generously with salt and pepper before being placed on a hot cast iron skillet for 2.5 minutes, thin flipped and cooked for an additional two.

While cooking, the petty loses 16 g of weight or half announce, leaving it at 3.5 inches in diameter.

Three exterior forms of crispy dark brown crust that isn't very greasy, leaving little residue on the top.

Bun burger is tender and easily cuts with a knife.

Toppings are cool and all, but what about putting all that flavor directly into the patty like adding an extra ounce of a go to condiment like cheese or salsa right into the meat on the grill, The salsa begins to bubble and boil while the cheese oozes out and fries to crispy perfection.

The salsa burgers wait nets negative, boiling out 32 g or over an ounce and moisture with the cheese patty not far behind it with the cheese, the top of the burgers, brown and crispy with Brent cheese painting the surface.

But because of all the water and salsa, this burger was barely able to achieve the Malad reaction, which is what gives you that coveted golden browning and caramelization.

However, the additions didn't prevent the burgers from cooking to medium rare, with both staying juicy and tender with the salsa, giving the burger a smoky, zesty flavor and the cheese making it well, cheesy.

Not all pans are created equal.

Perhaps a non stick or a stainless steel is all you've got to work with in a non stick.

The burger shrinks over 4 g more than in both a cast iron and a stainless steel, and both burger struggled to get even browning.

While neither pan prevented the burger from cooking to a solid medium rare, the nonstick did result in a dryer burger feeling a bit indulgent.

Adding extra fat like an egg or an ounce of sour cream to your burger mix is one way to pack in flavor on the grill, the sour cream forms of dark crust on the burger, whereas the moisture in the eggs immediately begins to sizzle.

With the addition of the egg, Burger loses about the same amount of weight as the original and leaves the patty with an even crust around the edges, whereas the sour cream leaves it looking but not tasting.

Burnt when left to cook for two minutes on each side.

Both burgers overcook slightly.

End are on the drier side with the egg, adding a meteor texture closer to meat loaf.

Three extra fat and the sour cream, however, really pulls its weight, leaving the burger rich and decadent with a slight tang e smash burgers more your gym.

Take the same recipe.

Put smush it.

The thin patty loses about twice the weight as the original, and while got nice and brown across the surface, it was so thin that in the short four minutes of cook time, it overcooked slightly, resulting in a still delicious yet slightly less tender bite way.

All know the cardinal rule of a good burger.

Don't touch it until it's time to flip it early on the patty begins to break apart, losing bits and pieces to the pan, since it's never able to properly seal.

The top of the burger turns an unappealing splotchy brown with flakes of burger seasoning the top bun.

While the inside is rare, it's filled with spiderwebs of stringy fat and crumbles with just a little bit of pressure.

No, in the same vein, pressing on a burger walk cooks is usually advised as, ah, hard, no pressing down forces out the liquid you need for perfectly juicy patty, leading it to lose more weight than any other burger in the lot.

While pressing down did have the added benefit of a darker, more caramelized crust.

Inside, the burger was overcooked, tough to chew and super dry.

There are plenty of tricks of the trade to tell if a burger is done, But for those of us who find most or all of them confusing, it's tempting to just cut the thing open and take a peek.

When it's cut on the pan, all the savory juices pull out and evaporate, leaving the burger almost 20 g lighter than the original.

The burger is left looking less than appealing But aesthetics aside inside the burger is unevenly cooked and slightly over, while also being tender in some parts, chewing others and all around dry.

Believe it or not, ground beef is pretty finicky.

A light mixes all it needs.

Keep going and raw meat loses any definition and turns an unappealing grayish pink on the skillet.

The patty begins to shrink quickly, resulting in the tallest patty of the lot, complete with the visible dome Inside.

The meat is gray with fatty strings that looked like string cheese.

It's dry, leaving the meat so tough and rubbery.

It's like munching on a rubber band.

If you're looking for healthier burger, you can trade the 80 20 ground beef or something with the lower fat content with less fat to render out while cooking.

There's far less moisture to help form that coveted cold and crust on the surface.

On without it, the burger spills the remaining liquid from all sides after cooking for two minutes on each side, the burger is pink and rare inside, both out the extra fat.

It's dry over cooked steak, much juror than its counterpart, and while it is still tasty, there's just far less flavor.

Overall, you season your Patties, and then you got distracted for a while.

No big deal right.

When the salt hits the meat, it begins to draw moisture to the surface, which hits your hot pan becomes steam and is re absorbed back into the patty.

When the burger is seasoned too early, a pool of juices form on the surface, evaporating the hot pan before the burger has time to absorb them, Releasing all that flavor into the ether because of the added liquid on the pan across never properly forms inside the burgers, juicy but far less so than the original.

And without that extra moisture and browning, the meat is tasteless in comparison.

Ideally, you let your meat hit room temperature before cooking, but you forgot to take out of the fridge and you're hungry.

Now the patty drops over 20 g more weight than the original, though in diameter remains almost a full centimeter larger.

Inside, the meat is a bit tough, with strings of unr under DFAT throughout.

And while the patty is technically rare, the coloring throughout is much less consistent.

It's super dry and falls apart easily with the slightest pressure So if you're trying to experiment your way into the ideal hamburger, there's a lot you could screw up along the way.

But with some happy missed aches, alterations or substitution is you might just find your perfect Patty.

Yeah, yeah.