Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Elk burger recipe

We've been adding bacon to our burgers for several year now. A venison burger with bacon ground in or added prior to the grill is tough to beat.....

Grind elk no fat added. Mix in raw egg, chopped onion, garlic salt, Lawry’s seasonal salt and pepper. Egg is like a binder. Keeps the burger together.

Telling you guys.....

BEFF TALLOW

If you insist on adding fat. Just a little bit tho

Steak trimmings are a lot better than tallow.

Generally add 10% beef fat when grinding. Not always though. Keep some plain for jerky and chili.

Do the same but use bacon ends and pieces when I can find them. Coarse grind the BE&Ps then add and mix to coarse ground elk (with out suet) and regrind medium.

Any wild game I use for burgers I mix in a handful of oatmeal to help the patties stick together… No added fat here and I serve them a bunch with no complaints.
Salt, Pepper, a bit of pepper flakes and Italian seasoning works for us.

Takman: When having my "Elk Burger" made I have the butcher shop add 15% "beef kidney suet" - this is a sweeter milder fat. Our whole family fights over this burger once its mixed.
Good luck and enjoy.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

Great stuff!

all we do its dice half an onion and incorporate it in the hamburger. 10 minutes a side and you have perfect big burgers... we get 5-6 patties out of a 2lb package. little salt and pepper and maybe bbq sauce

good pure cow elk meat does not need any fat added to the elk burger , i just use Lawry salt and pepper . but if its a bull elk that might need seasonings more ?

Mix in some 2% Greek Yogurt to make the burger stick together if you don’t add fat when you grind. The yogurt helps hold the burger together but doesn’t change the flavor. Season however you like a beef burger.

My wife prefers to mix ground beef with our ground game meat which is what we've done in the past. It adds some fat and she likes it better than straight game meat. No elk this year but I'm enjoying whitetail with no beef or fat added to the grind. She won't eat it so when making burgers, I make hers with beef and mine with venison.

I'm not having any trouble at all with burgers holding together on the grill with no fat, oil, egg or anything added. I mix steak seasoning throughout the ground venison and then form patties. I'm pretty fond of blue cheese and added crumbles mixed in with the seasoning last go-around. Turned out great...

We use Iron Skillet old time burger seasoning mix in our venison burger. Follow the directions on the package or do like we do and don't add any fat. Everybody we feed our venison burgers to agrees they're delicious. My wife even prefers it to beef burgers and so do I.

! elk, grind, grill.

Jerry,

The big problem with game-meat burgers "crumbling" when no fat is added is due to most people flipping them too quickly. Eileen has written about this before, but if you let them brown sufficiently on the "first side," fat-free game burgers hold together very well.

But over many years we have also both noticed that many people (especially guys) somehow think they're not really "cooking" (especially on a grill, but also in a frying pan) unless they constantly dink with the meat. Which is why it crumbles.

Have also seen this even when cooking game roasts. Many guys somehow can't resist starting to cook 'em when the grill (or indoor oven) isn't hot enough--and then turn 'em way too often. The result is pretty much gray, dry meat, all the way through. But evidently some like that....

Thanks John - I think this year is the first time I've gone with straight ground venison with no fat or ground beef added. I'll likely continue doing it this way.

I usually put meat on the pellet grill cold before lighting it and let it smoke at low temperature for a bit before turning up the heat to finish it. Burgers get flipped once only and I don't fiddle with it otherwise

I always add about 5-10% beef or pork fat to our venison.

Have also used breadcrumbs or egg to help make it stick together.

Mix equsl parts of Jimmy Dean’s hot tube pork sausage with the ground elk or venison, add an egg and mix well.

Makes a fair burger.

Kill elk. Make burger. Form burger into patty. Cook burger. Eat burger. Repeat often.

That's my recipe.