Stuffed Cheeseburgers!

Stuffed Cheeseburgers are easy to make and basically a blank protein canvas (Thanks Greg Rempe for the phrase).  The options to stuff burgers is limitless - whatever you can possibly imagine, you can jam between two patties of meat!

For today's stuffed burgers, I used ground chuck.  There is enough flavor in whatever you are stuffing to overcome any flavor shortcomings using a lesser grade meat but the ground chuck was perfect!  I stuffed these burgers today with bacon and blue cheese crumbles. 

 

The ingredient list is short - about 5lbs of ground chuck, 2lbs of bacon, and 12oz of blue cheese crumbles.  Add in some onion rolls and some extra slices of medium cheddar to top it off.  I added two eggs and some salt and pepper to the ground chuck for a little seasoning.

 I cooked up some thick cut bacon until it was pretty crispy then diced it up into small pieces. 

I added the eggs to a bowl, a few teaspoons of sea salt and course ground black pepper along with the meat and combined well.  I separated the 5lbs of ground chuck into 12 equal portions -each was rolled into a ball between the size of a golf ball and a base ball.  Lay out a long piece of wax paper and flatten the 12 balls into equal size patties.

Place a generous portion of blue cheese crumbles and diced bacon onto 6 of the 12 patties.  Then place its' twin onto it's buddy.

Press the edges together until they are sealed and then reform the patties into a ready for the grill piece of art work.

  

 For this cook I used my WSM 22.5 - the finest charcoal bullet smoker ever made - I added some chunks of apple wood and oak to get some really great depth of flavor into the meat.  I didn't use any dry rub on the outside of the meat for this cook letting the wood and the ingredients do the job.

Stuffed patties and sausage on the smoker!

 

 Since these were cooked on a smoker in indirect heat, I didn't have to worry about flare ups from the fat rendering from the meat.  If you were going to cook these on a gas grill or on a charcoal grill, I would try and sear each patty for a few minutes per side and then finish them on the indirect side so they come up to the desired internal temperature nice and slow.

Use a thermometer to check the internal temperature of the burger.  This one was pulled at 145F which is medium well.  Even at this internal temperature it was still pretty juicy.  I prefer mine a medium rare / rare and it was awesome!  Toast the bun on the smoker for a few minutes while the cheddar is melting on top of the burger and you are ready to eat!