How Fatty’s The Patty
Next up: the beef. This was going to be a little bit tougher. All I knew so far from the In-N-Out Food Quality page was that the beef is 100 percent ground chuck and that it’s never frozen. That leaves a lot of room for interpretation. How big are the patties? What’s the fat ratio?
Serious Eats / J. Kenji López-Alt
Well, sizing the suckers was no problem. I simply had my good man Marios ship a couple of cooked plain patties. They both weighed in at precisely 37 grams . Accounting for the standard 35 percent loss in weight for a well done thin patty, that kicks us up to 57 grams or exactly 2 ounces pre-cookingthat’s 1/4 pound for a Double-Double. A nice, round number. The same size as a Shack Burger, by the way. And a Quarter Pounder, for that matter.
As for fat content, it was time to break out the math guns again. My goal was to figure out the amount of fat vs. protein in a single In-N-Out patty. The information Ifrom their Nutrition Guide:
- A single burger: 16 grams of protein and 19 grams of fat
- A single cheeseburger: 22 grams of protein and 27 grams of fat
- A Double-Double: 37 grams of protein and 41 grams of fat
This meant only one thing: I’d have to grind the beef myself.
Serious Eats / J. Kenji López-Alt
I went to the butcher and got the fattiest chuck steaks I could find and ground them without trimming away any of the excess fat.
In N Out Burger Sauce
One of the most important parts of an In N Out burger is the In n Out Sauce! It is so easy to make and so delicious that you will want to add it to all of your burgers! For the secret sauce, you combine simple hamburger condiments, mayo, ketchup, and pickle relish. And then you add the secret ingredient, and a little white vinegar.
It looks and tastes just like the real thing!
Copycat In N Out Animal Fries
Recreate the magic of Animal Fries at home.
Every restaurant seems to have one special dish its known for. At In N Out Burger, its their Animal Style Fries.
Technically, these arent even on the menu. Theyre part of In N Outs secret menu, the one thats only available to those in the know. Fortunately, thanks to the Internet, thats pretty much everybody.
So anyone can walk into In N Out and order up the Animal Style Fries a basket of golden French fries topped with grilled onions, melted cheese, and Thousand Island dressing. However, since the In N Out chain only exists out west, these special fries were a treat that was truly off the menu for us easternersuntil now.
Turns out, its actually quite easy to whip up your own version of In N Outs special sauce at home. All you need is ketchup, mustard, relish, vinegar, and sugar. And once youve got the sauce, all you have to do is fry up some onions and melt some cheese to turn frozen French fries straight out of the bag into Animal Fries, right in your own kitchen.
So now, this secret menu item is truly open to everybody.
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What Is Burger Sauce
Burger Sauce is usually a creamy sauce made with a combination of ketchup and mayonnaise with additional mix-insthat make it unique and give it extra flavor. Many times youll hear burger sauce referred to as special, house, or secret sauce.
You may be familiar with McDonalds Big Mac Sauce , In-N-Out Burger Spread, and many other restaurants offer their variation of the popular condiment as well. You can even find burger sauce in bottles at the grocery store. I know Heinz and Hellmanns each have a burger sauce product.
Trust me, though, this special sauce recipe is the BEST for burgers and so much more! Its super easy to make, inexpensive, and tastes incredibly delicious too!
The Burger That Has Become A Legend The In
Kenji is a mad scientist genius and author of the not yet released cookbook The Food Lab which is already a best seller on Amazon even though it is almost a month from being released. Have you ever checked out his recipes? He is amazing and of the dozen or so I have made, I have not been let down a single time. He is a total rockstar. Just like this recipe.
Kenji took a ton of time and effort in decoding the components of this In-N-Out Double Double Animal Style and with only a couple of small swaps, I followed it to the letter . If you take care to follow the instructions you will sit down to a meal that will make you feel like you brought In-N-Out Double Double into your kitchen. Dont be discouraged by the steps involved. They are all easy. Lengthy, but easy. And really precise, just like Kenji.
Form meat into four 2 ounce patties, thin and slightly larger than the size of your bun. They are meant to be ¼ inch thick. Heat 1 tablespoon butter in a skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add onions and ½ teaspoon kosher salt to skillet. Reduce heat to medium low, and cook, tossing and stirring occasionally until onions are well browned, about 15 minutes.
Season the patties with salt and pepper. Preheat pan on high and add the patties to the pan. Cook without moving until well browned and crusty on first side, about 2 ½ minutes. While they are cooking, spread about a tablespoon of mustard to the raw side.
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About the Author: Sabrina Snyder
Sabrina is a professionally trained Private Chef of over 10 years with ServSafe Manager certification in food safety. She creates all the recipes here on Dinner, then Dessert, fueled in no small part by her love for bacon.
Sabrina Snyder is a professionally trained personal and private chef of over 10 years who is the creator and developer of all the recipes on Dinner, then Dessert.
She is also the author of the upcoming cookbook: Dinner, then Dessert Satisfying Meals Using Only 3, 5 or 7 Ingredients which is being published by Harper Collins.
She started Dinner, then Dessert as a business in her office as a lunch service for her coworkers who admired her lunches before going to culinary school and becoming a full time personal chef and private chef.
As a personal chef Sabrina would cook for families one day a week and cook their entire week of dinners. All grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning was done along with instructions on reheating. As a private chef she cooked for private parties and cooked in family homes in the evenings for families on a nightly basis after working as a personal chef during the day.
Sabrina has been certified as a ServSafe Manager since 2007 and was a longstanding member of the USPCA Personal Chef Association including being on the board of the Washington DC Chapter of Chefs in the US Personal Chef Association when they won Chapter of the year.
Sabrina lives with her family in sunny California.
Every Time I Land In Las Vegas To Visit My Family My Dad Takes Me Straight To In
If youre lucky enough to live on the West Coast, you know and love In-N-Out!
For over 70 years, In-N-Out has been a family businessand its so popular across six states that theres often a line. This chain has plenty of well-known items on its menu, and the special In-N-Out sauce makes their signature burgers just that much better. Its often mistaken for Thousand Island dressing, but this spread has its own distinct flavor.
You can learn how to make In-N-Out sauce, which means its possible to make copycat In-N-Out burgers at home, with a side of Animal Style fries. Trust us. Youll thank us for it later!
Read Also: Can You Eat Bbq Sauce On Keto
How To Caramelize Onions
Next, I made the caramelized onions that go on top. Finely chop your onion and then cook them in vegetable oil. Cover them and allow them to cook slow for about 30 minutes until they are golden and soft. Watch your heat and dont let them burn. Uncover them once they have started to brown and caramelize and cook for about 5 more minutes. Add in 1/2 C water and simmer until the water evaporates. These can be made ahead of time and set aside.
Lets Take It Step By Step
1. Combine all ingredients in a bowl and stir. Make sure all ingredients are incorporated.2. The sauce tastes best after letting sit covered in the fridge to let the flavors combine for at least an hour.3. Store in a sealed airtight container in the refrigerator for later use on many other tasty dishes.
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Can I Make It Ahead Of Time
You can easily prepare the caramelized onions, secret sauce, and burger balls ahead of time:
- Caramelized onions: Prepare them up to 5 days in advance. Store the onions in an airtight container in the fridge until its time to assemble.
- In-N-Out Spread: Assemble the sauce and store it in a sealed jar or container in the fridge. It will stay fresh for up to 2 weeks.
- Burger balls: Use clean hands to roll the burger balls a few hours before serving and store them in an airtight container in the fridge immediately after.
Juicy Indoor Burgers With Burger Sauce
One of the best things in life is a big, classic juicy burger and today that is just what we are talking about with these Juicy Indoor Burgers with Burger Sauce.
Making a great burger is one of those things that people are all trying to accomplish. But the real key to a good, juicy burger is really more simple than youd think. Some people try adding all sorts of fancy ingredients to their burger patties but after years of making burgers and studying the art of a good burger I think this is exactly where people go wrong.
One of my *very favorite* cookbooks that I own is The Food Lab by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt. In the book, the author studies the science behind cooking. Through this book, I learned a lot about the science of cooking burgers and highly recommend you read about it . But here are the top 3 rules Ive gathered from Kenji:
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How To Make A Burger Amazing With Homemade Burger Sauce
Our favorite way to make hamburgers is to season the ground beef well with seasoned salt , mix the meat well then form it into patties. Make the patties larger than you want them to end up because they will shrink while cooking. Then grill or pan fry the burgers until cooked through.
More Burger Topping Ideas:
- Crunchy fried onions
- BBQ sauce
- Cheese American, pepper jack, swiss, provolone, etc.
- Relish
Can I Make It Animal Style
The key to an animal style In-N-Out burger is to grill each patty with yellow mustard and top it with extra secret sauce, pickles, and caramelized onions. Use an extra two onions when youre caramelizing them for the sauce and slice some pickles to add to the bottom hamburger bun. If you end up with extra onions or pickles, they make a great topping on french fries.
Also Check: Make Your Own Sauce Kit
In N Out Sauce Recipe
We sadly do not live in an area that has In n Out restaurants. The closest one to us is probably a 6-7 hour drive from our house.
A bit too far to drive for dinner not that we haven’t thought about it a few times. LOL! Thankfully we travel fairly frequently and get the opportunity to do road trips like our California Big Trees road trip we did last year.
This year we took a road trip from Spokane all the way to El Paso and back visiting epic national parks for my husband’s Park Ranger John website. It was such an amazing trip and took us to cities with In n Out Burgers which was a total bonus.
I knew that I wanted to make an In n Out Sauce recipe so we could enjoy this great sauce at home. During our Southwest National Park Road trip I brought with us multiple plastic containers so I could bring home packets of In n Out sauce from the restaurants. I stashed them in our cooler and kept them cold the entire way home through a heatwave.
Once we were home I started working on making sure our recipe tasted just like the restaurant recipe. I love having the real sauce in the house so we can compare flavors as I add and change the recipe until we get it just right.
We went through quite a few Air Fryer French Fries making sure this recipe was just right. It is really cool knowing that IN-N-OUT Burgers has been using the same sauce since 1948.
Do you have a favorite IN N OUT menu item you love to order? Is it on the secret menu?
Ingredients
Add Everything And Mix It All Together
Once you have your ingredients ready to go, get out a small bowl. Dump every ingredient into the bowl and stir well. A regular spoon will do the trick, so you don’t need to use any kind of fancy mixer here. Once everything is blended well together, it should get that orange color that you’ll recognize from In-N-Out. This is an excellent sign, and you’re making significant progress. Now, the sauce it ready to set.
Also Check: All Clad Stainless Steel Sauce Pan
Animal Style Caramelized Onions
Ingredients:
- 6 large onions, diced
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 8 tablespoons water
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 1 tablespoon sugar
Directions:
1. Heat the oil in a large pan over medium-high heat. Add the onions, salt and sugar to the pan.
2. Reduce the heat to medium-low, cooking the onions and stirring occasionally until they begin to brown, about 20 minutes.
3. Add four tablespoons of water to the pan, stir, and cook until the onions are dried down and the water evaporates.
4. Add four more tablespoons of water to the pan, repeating step 2 above. The onions should be a dark brown and soft. Remove the onions from the pan set aside until youre ready to assemble the burgers.
Total cooking time for the onions varies, but it should take about 40-45 minutes of cooking to get soft, sweet, dark brown onions.
This recipe makes enough caramelized onions for 4-6 burgers.
How To Make Copycat In N Out Animal Fries
Directions:
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How To Make In
This recipe is as easy as chop, mix together and enjoy. The sauce will keep in the fridge for up to five days, but trust me it never lasts that long. We love it on burgers, with potato wedges, on top of meatloaf, drizzled on grilled chicken, and even spread onto sandwiches. All-in-all, a great condiment to keep on hand.
In N Out Burger Recipe
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This copycat In N Out Burger recipe may just be better than the real thing! Give it a try and see!
For some other yummy burger recipes check out these Teriyaki Hamburgers, Sweet & Spicy Turkey Burgers and Juicy Lucy Burger
I grew up with a mother who was born and bred in California and thus a huge fan of In-N-Out Burgers. I on the other hand was born in California but raised in Wisconsin, a state with no In-N-Out within a 1,000 miles or more. It wasnt actually until I was an adult myself on a trip to California that I experienced my first In-N-Out burger. From that time forward anytime I am in a state with an In-N-Out, my internal hamburger radar manages to find one.
Given the fact that I live in Oregon I was pretty excited when I ran across a copycat In N Out burger recipe. Now, I know there are those of you out there that dont think In-N- Out is so great and I respect that but for you fellow In-N-Out fans, todays post is for you I have no idea if this is how they really make their burgers but it is a good burger. In fact, my husband thought it was better than In-N-Out.
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How To Use In
Jennifer Schwarzkopf for Taste of Home
Of course, the most obvious recommendations are to use the sauce as a spread on a burger, and as a topping for a fresh pile of fries.
However, there is so much more you can do! Hopefully, the following list will spark even more ideas for eating this legendary In-N-Out sauce.
- Spread on toasted brioche for a grilled chicken sandwich
- Top a meatloaf sandwich on sourdough
- Use for a baked potato bar
- Replace tartar sauce for a Friday fish fry
- Spread on crackers and top with pastrami or corned beef for hors doeuvres
- Top a wedge salad, in lieu of buttermilk dressing
- Spread on bread to elevate a classic grilled cheese
- Eat with eggs and hash browns for breakfast
- Use instead of mayo on a BLT
- Dunk deep-fried mushrooms, jalapeno poppers or chicken fingers
Put this In-N-Out on anything your heart desires. We cant wait to hear what you come up with! In the meantime, thank you to In-N-Out for existing and inspiring our recipes at home. The real In-N-Out sauce is divine.
