Top Your Burger With Caramelized Onions Like Nico Hulkenberg
Sure, we've made burgers already in 2024 — but I promise you haven't had a burger like this
Welcome to Grand Prix Gastronomy! In 2024, this series is dedicated to cooking the favorite dishes of every driver on the grid.
The Foods That Nico Hulkenberg Loves
For some reason, I struggle to imagine Nico Hulkenberg enjoying anything. He kinda seems like one of those dudes who doesn't have a personality of his own so much as he just gravitates to any number of things that are popular at the moment. But the man has actually provided some interesting answers regarding his favorite food!
Nico claimed in 2016 that his favorite food was sushi — but we have quite literally just made sushi. So, I grabbed another answer from The Times, where he professes that he loves a world-class cheeseburger with caramelized onions. Y’know what, Nico? Me too. Lets's make that burger.
(I know we did also make a burger for George Russell's favorite dish, but my goal here is to present a different preparation! I also just kinda…. squished ol’ Nico into the calendar, since this wasn't a dish that fit well anywhere.)
This Week's Recipes
Nico Hulkenberg says he likes caramelized onion burgers, and goddammit, I'm gonna give that man the best caramelized onion burgers in the universe.
I initially had grandiose plans about grinding my own brisket (hence the brisket burger recipe), but I'm gonna be honest: I couldn't be bothered. I bought some ground wagyu and utilized the spice blend. I also pulled from a How Sweet Eats recipe for inspiration on sauce and caramelizing the onions — but I ultimately got a lil off the rails with this one, because I was like, if I'm already caramelizing onions……… why don't I just make french onion soup burgers.
So, combine the following recipes with some gruyere cheese, and you're on the money.
Core Recipes:
Grilled brisket burgers (mostly for the seasoning blend)
Cooking Burgers With Caramelized Onions
If you're going to do this properly, set aside plenty of time for your onions. Every caramelized onion recipe is like “it'll take 45 minutes” and that is a goddamn lie. You wanna cook these bad boys low and slow, ideally to the point where they are nothing but a mush, and that's going to take 90 minutes or more.
So, we're starting with the onions. I put my mandoline to good use in getting extremely thin onion slices, which will do wonders in reducing the cooking time. (If you don't have a mandoline, make sure your knife is SHARP.)
Melt some butter in a skillet and stir in the sliced onions with a dash of salt and maybe a little bit of pepper if you're crazy. Stir these bad boys every now and again — but for the most part, just let them sit and do their thing over medium-low heat (bordering a little further on the ‘low’ side). The recipe says it'll take 20 to 30 minutes. Don't let them lie to you.
The great news is that while you wait, you can assemble the rest of your meal!
I'm pulling the garlic herb aioli recipe from the How Sweet Eats blog; basically, you just mix up mayo, basil, parsley, rosemary, garlic, and some pepper — but to add to my French twist, I also mixed in a bit of Dijon mustard. Not too much. Just enough to add a little bite.
Let that vibe in the fridge while the flavors mingle, and get to work on your meat. I started with two pounds of ground wagyu and mixed in an egg, plus a spice blend consisting of brown sugar, garlic, onion, chili powder, thyme, smoked paprika, dried mustard, salt, and pepper — though you can do whatever you like here. The sweet/spicy spice blend worked great for me, though. It contrasted really well with the sweetness of the onions and the char from the grill.
Divide your meat into four and form up some patties, then let those chill in the fridge for a while to set up. At this point, your onions are probably still nowhere near being done, so enjoy a glass of wine while you grate your gruyere.
When it's time, grill your burgers until they're cooked through, then remove from the heat and cover with your shredded gruyere. I popped the burgers and my (opened) brioche buns under the broiler for a hot second to get everything toasty/melty.
To assemble this burger, start with a hefty layer of your aioli, then add your burger with its melty cheese. Slap on the caramelized onions, and voila. The best burger in the world. Serve it with some fries of your choice.
So, What's The Verdict?
Well, I kind of already spoiled the verdict on this, but oh my god. This recipe is perfect example of what happens when you take your time to layer flavor into all of your ingredients: the meat, the onions, the aioli. Nico Hulkenberg recommended a winner.
There were a few things that worked really well in this recipe — the first being caramelizing the onions until they were downright jammy. I'm sure a more textured caramelized onion would have been good, too, but the fact that it basically just turned into a sticky layer of incredible flavor is such a win. Like I said, take your time on this step. It's sooooo worth it.
Next, the meat seasoning worked perfectly. I don't know about you, but when I look at burger recipes, so many of them are just like “add salt to your ground beef” and that's the sum total of the spice blend. Hell no. Not on my watch. You don't have to go overboard, but mixing in a little sugar plus a little heat plus some savory herbs will go a long way toward making this the best burger of your life. It was good enough that my husband just ate the burger topped with cheese and onions on its own the next day.
My only critique here was my aioli — I didn't buy fresh herbs, and I think this sauce would have really benefitted from them. The dried rosemary in particular was very, um, textured. It wasn't an issue when it was on the burger, but it did preclude me from using the aioli as the dipping sauce for my fries. Small critiques, yes — but it's all about the little things.
I have to hand it to Nico Hulkenberg: The man has taste. I also have to hand it to myself: nice work on turning a fairly straightforward prompt into a gourmet dish.
Ready… Set… COOK!
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