How do I Choose the Best Hamburger Press?

@Sara007 - That is a really good idea! I would have never thought of using a mayonnaise jar to make hamburger patties.

I remember my mom used to use her hands and a cookie cutter as a hamburger press. She had this perfectly round cookie cutter that was pretty deep. She would press the hamburger meat down into a uniform square, and then use the cookie cutter to make perfectly round little patties.

I used to love watching my mom make hamburger when I was a kid because she always let me prepare all the toppings. I am not sure why I found cutting up pickles and tomatoes that interesting. I guess it was just something for us to do together.

If you are in a bind or strapped for cash there is no reason to buy a hamburger press. The best hamburger press I ever used was just an empty mayonnaise jar.

All you need to do is wash the jar really well and dry it. Afterwards you take the lid and put plastic wrap inside it. Once that is done you just press the hamburger meat into the lid.

To get the meat looking nice, just put another piece of plastic wrap over the exposed hamburger and use the jar to roll it flat. This makes perfect patties and is a great way to recycle something around the house.

There is nothing like a summer evening meal of homemade hamburgers on the grill. One of my favorite hamburger recipes uses dry onion soup mix along with the sauces and seasonings. I like the taste of the onion mixed in with the rest of the meat.

I get out my hamburger press about once a month and make up patties to put in the freezer. I have a lightweight, plastic press that is easy to clean and doesn't take up too much space.

Since I make quite a few at once, it goes pretty fast, and I like having all the patties the same shape and size.

I was given a mini hamburger press as a gift, and I use it more than I ever thought I would. My kids love the little mini slider hamburgers it makes, and a little bit of meat goes a long way.

They also work great if you are doing any entertaining and can even be used as an appetizer. I put some saran wrap on the bottom of the press so the meat doesn't stick, sprinkle with my seasonings of choice and they are ready to cook.

I like to serve them with mini buns, or if you don't want the bread, they are great to eat alone. With one press I can make four patties at a time, and my kids love to help.

My family loves hamburgers and since we are on the run a lot, we have them often because they are quick and easy.

I have an inexpensive hamburger grill press that I absolutely love. I will stock up on hamburger meat when it is on sale, and come home and use my hamburger press to make up the patties.

The hamburger press I have comes with small plastic dividers, so I can stack up the burgers in the freezer between the dividers. This way the meat doesn't stick together and you can easily pull out how many burgers you want to grill at one time.

This only takes a few minutes to do, and saves me a lot of money instead of buying the patties that are already made up.

I like the double lid presses for stuffed hamburgers. Instead of just shaping one hamburger, this one allows you to place meat on both sides and a filling between. Have you ever had hamburgers with oozing cheese from inside? That's what I'm talking about!

It does make thicker hamburgers but that's fine with me. You can put any kind of filling as you want- cheese, veggies or other meats like sausage. You just can't put too much of it because it has to fit in the center of the patty. But I think this is the best hamburger press. It's easy to make hamburgers by hand, but putting a filling inside is hard.

I don't think it's worth purchasing a hamburger press unless it prepares two or three hamburger patties at the same time. Otherwise it's going to take as much time as it would to prepare by hand. I would be just as frustrated serving sixty people hamburgers with a single hamburger press as I would be doing it by hand.

If you have kids, I'd also recommend getting a Mickey Mouse shaped hamburger press for them. Believe me, a hamburger in the shape of Mickey Mouse can make the fussiest kid (my son) eat up their food. Don't forget to draw his eyes and mouth with ketchup!

I love barbecues and probably have hamburgers at least once or twice a week. My hamburger press is so great, makes my life so much easier.

I have a heavy stainless steel one. I roll up the meat into a ball, place in the center of the press and close. When you open it up, you've got the perfect size patty and the perfect thickness.

The reason I got a stainless steel and a heavy one is for two reasons. The plastic ones are very light, so for the patty to take shape you actually have to press down on the hamburger press with your hands. The stainless steel one is already heavy so you don't have to do any manual work. You just close it up and the weight of the lid does all the work for you.

The other reason is because the hamburger meat has fat in it, some oil and grease is always going to end up on the press. Plastic ones are not so easy to clean when it comes to oil. I used to have to wash it with detergent and rinse about three times to get all the oil off. It's so much easier to clean oil and fat off of a stainless steel hamburger press.

My mom used to have a Tupperware hamburger meat press. It was just a plastic press, but the nice thing was that it also had a storage option.

It came with several exactly patty-sized plastic dish. You would just use the press to make a patty in each dish. Then you would repeat with all the dishes - and the really brilliant thing is that they would stack together. (There was a lid for the top one, but you could stack a bunch together to save space.)

That way, you could buy giant packs of meat on sale and freeze the patties to use later. I think she started with just four or five of the dishes that she got secondhand and she was always looking out for more at yard sales, thrift shops, etc. until she had amassed quite a collection.

I have a stainless steel hamburger press and I absolutely love it. It is large enough for me to cook several burgers at a time which really saves me a lot of time. I used to cook hamburger patties individually in the frying pan but it would take too long and the burgers would come out a little greasy.

With the hamburger press the excess greasy comes out so the burgers turn out a little healthier than when you fry them. I also use the hamburger patty press to make garlic bread or toast my hamburger buns. I usually put a little butter on my hamburger buns and they really enhances the flavor of the burger.