Who Invented the Hamburger?
Many claims, one beloved sandwich. The hamburger has several rival birthplaces, from Seymour, Wisconsin to New Haven's Louis' Lunch. The history of the burger and early chains.
A burger at Louis' Lunch, New Haven: Zheng Zhou, CC BY-SA 4.0
From Hamburg steak to sandwich
German immigrants brought the Hamburg steak, a seasoned patty of chopped beef, to the United States in the 1800s. At some point, someone put one between bread so it could be eaten on the go, and the hamburger sandwich was born. Exactly who did it first is one of America's favourite food arguments.
The rival claims
Seymour, Wisconsin, says Charlie Nagreen flattened a meatball between bread at a county fair in 1885. Hamburg, New York, credits the Menches brothers at a fair the same year. Athens, Texas, points to Fletcher Davis in the 1880s, and New Haven's Louis' Lunch says it served a burger in 1900.
Louis' Lunch still cooks its burgers in antique vertical gas broilers and serves them on toast, not buns. It does not offer ketchup.
The first chain
White Castle, founded in Wichita, Kansas, in 1921 by Walter Anderson and Billy Ingram, is widely considered the first fast food hamburger chain. At a time when many people distrusted ground beef, it built small, clean, white buildings and let customers watch cooks prepare their food. Read our White Castle sliders page for more.
A sandwich that conquered the world
After 1945, car culture, drive-ins and chains such as McDonald's, Burger King and later Wendy's spread the hamburger across America and then the world. Today regional styles range from the butter burger of Wisconsin and the green chile cheeseburger of New Mexico to the smash burger trend and gourmet burgers with brioche buns.
Burger styles to know
A classic diner burger is cooked on a flat griddle; a backyard burger is grilled over flames. Smash burgers are pressed thin for maximum crust, while pub burgers are thick and juicy. Sliders are small square burgers steamed on onions. A patty melt is served on rye toast with grilled onions and Swiss cheese, sitting between a burger and a grilled cheese sandwich.
Did you know? The Library of Congress collected Louis' Lunch's story as part of a project documenting local American traditions. Food safety experts recommend cooking ground beef to an internal temperature of 71 degrees Celsius (160 degrees Fahrenheit), because grinding spreads surface bacteria through the meat.
- A burger at Louis' Lunch, New Haven: Zheng Zhou, CC BY-SA 4.0
Text written by Fast Food Run.
