Everyone should know how to cook burgers for a crowd, unless you’re absolutely sure you’ll never throw a backyard barbecue. Or, unless you’re absolutely sure you’ll never be at someone else’s backyard barbecue, and will want to tell them that they’re doing it all wrong. 😉

Social Learning:

What you’re creating with the baking dish, rack, foil, and oven is a make-shift steam table. It’s important that you get this right – hot liquid, a good seal on the foil, and an oven warm enough to create steam in the covered baking dish without raising the heat so high that you’ll bake the burgers. If you do get it right, when it’s time to serve the burgers and you remove the foil, obvious puffs of steam should escape. The burgers should be glistening with moisture, and they should feel obvious pliable as you lift each of them out of the pan to place on a bun. I strongly recommend you do a trial run with a few burgers, to practice this a few weeks ahead of time.

Everyday Cooking:

I’m serving burgers using this method for my annual summer barbecue this year, to 30+ guests. That’s a once-a-year thing for me, so I guess this recipe is, by definition, “special occasion.” But these aren’t really “special occasion” burgers. They’re everyday burgers – but very good ones. What’s special about this post is that I’ve borrowed ideas from the catering world that allow me to make very good backyard burgers for a crowd with logistical perfection that does not require too heavy a lift. You certainly could fancy-up these burgers if you wanted to. I’d rather save that for a time when I have only a couple of guests.

You may feel strongly that the only way to correctly barbecue is to serve the burgers no more than five minutes after they leave the grill. I agree if the number of guests is equal to or lesser than the number of burgers you can grill at once. If it isn’t, you wind up either serving your guests in shifts. Or cold burgers. Or worse yet, having guests wait in line, looking over your shoulder, telling you just exactly how they want their burger done. You’ll get it the way I make them, folks. I do make them medium rare, and anyone who wants one done more, they’re welcome return theirs to the grill on their own for a few minutes. (I’ll do it for them, maybe. 😉 )

Burgers held in the oven this way are excellent – not at all second-rate or “leftover.” There is no cost that I can perceive in terms of texture or flavor. As often as I’ve tested this, the burger that comes out of the oven two hours later is just as good as the one that comes right off the grill. This allows you to plan to finish grilling the burgers just as guests are expected to arrive, and serve them an hour later (with padding time in case you need it). 

The only caveat is that they need to be well-seasoned when they hit the grill. Make a trial run a few weeks ahead of time, to be sure you’ve got the seasoning right. 

Ingredients:

• You can make your own burgers and freeze them (which you should research before trying). You may be able to buy them pre-made fresh and freeze them. Or you can buy pre-made, already-frozen burgers.
• Grilling them frozen will make it easier to get a fantastic sear without overcooking the inside. Another advantage of grilling frozen burgers is that you can make or buy them way, way, way in advance – hopefully when you’ve caught them on sale, which for mid-summer, might be Memorial Day.
• It’d be nice if you could match your bun count to your burger count exactly, but I wish someone wold explain to me why frozen burgers come in six packs, while buns come in eight packs.
• If you are buying pre-made, frozen burger patties, consider having a few of those packs be turkey burgers. Some of your guests are likely to prefer it, and turkey is a lot less expensive than beef.
• If you’re making cheeseburgers, American is the correct choice, but do as you will. Maybe swap out a small amount of that American with Swiss. I won’t fault you for that. Some people won’t want cheese, some people will want double cheese. If you have leftover cheese, well, when was the last time you made yourself a nice grilled cheese?

Cooking Tips:

Whenever holding hot food for service, educate yourself about food safety and don’t rely on my opinion. 

Leftovers:

You should have leftover burgers when you’re done feeding your crowd. You never want to have exactly the number of burgers that you need, for fear that if you miscalculate, you could wind up with not enough food. Burgers actually leftover quite well. Refrigerate the cooked patties all by themselves, undressed, un-bunned. When you’re ready, pop a bun in the toaster on a very light setting. While that’s going on, microwave a patty for 30 seconds, or as much as a minute, interrupting the microwave when it’s got about 10-15 seconds left to add cheese, if that’s what you want. You won’t be disappointed. It’ll be a bit more done than it originally was, but it beats a cold cut sandwich hands down.

Hamburger buns don’t keep well. If you think they’ll be around for more than just a few days, freeze them: separate the tops and bottoms and lay each pair side by side on a baking sheet. Slide the sheet into the oven until the buns are rigid, one-to-two hours. Then, wrap each bun pair in plastic, making sure that there is plastic in between the two halves. Slide each half into a gallon-size freezer bag, and freeze for no more than a month or two. They’ll thaw in less than an hour on the countertop, or in a toaster – especially if your toaster has a “frozen” setting.

Servings for 30 People:

For a large party, plan on 1.66 burgers per person, depending on how extensive the appetizers are, how many sides there’ll be, and how long you expect the party to last. Not everyone will eat two, but almost everyone will eat at least one. Here’s a sample breakdown for a 30-person party: multiply 30 by 1.66, round up, allocate 20% of the burgers to the 1-burger crowd, 25% to the 1.5-burger crowd, and 15% to the 2-burger crowd.

Then, if you know your guests well enough, identify them. According to the chart below, ten people are single-burger people. Identify them. Roughly seven people are two-burger people. Identify them. Keep in mind that heavy sides and lots of pre-dinner snacks will turn more people into one-burger people. Make adjustments if it seems like you can or should. Finally, adjust the 1.5 number so that the total comes out to 50.

Guest Type	Estimated Consumption	Total Count
Light Eaters / Kids	1 Burger	10 (20%)
Average Eaters	1.5 Burgers	25 (50%)
Hearty Eaters	2 Burgers	15 (30%)
Total Recommended		50 Burgers

At a backyard BBQ, people tend to graze. Someone might have one burger immediately and then go back for a second “snack” burger 45 minutes later. Some people won’t. That’s how one-burger people turn into one-and-a-half-burger people.

If you have heavy sides (like potato salad, pasta salad, or baked beans), people will lean closer to the one-burger-per-person mark. If the burgers are the main event with just chips, definitely lean toward two per person.

Grilling

Plan to leave 30 minutes to light your charcoal and get it to the right state for grilling. Your grill has a method of increasing or decreasing the distance between the coals and the burgers. Mine has four settings; I set it to the second-to-closest one. I grill my burgers five minutes on one side, 3 on the other, in order to get them medium-well. If you want them more done, increase the timing of the second flip or increase the timing of both flips. Close the grill in between flips.  

When you close the grill on the first side of the first batch of burgers, note the grill temperature. It will drop over time, and as it does, your timing will have to increase in order to the successive batches of burgers to come out the same way. Either that, or you’ll have to periodically toss in more coals, maybe five to ten at a time.

You want fries with that?

Actually, no. I will have substantial sides, though: baked beans and pasta salad. I’ll also serve family-size bags of chips or salty snacks before dinner, watermelon with dinner, and I’ll have two large bags of ice around for beverages.

Overall BBQ Logistics

You’ll do yourself a big favor if you choose beverages (cocktails, iced tea, etc.), snacks, sides, and desserts that can be made at least a day in advance. Everything I listed in the previous paragraph fits that bill. If guests ask if they can bring something, say yes. Or consider asking all the guests to bring something. Even guests who can’t cook can bring something like beverages and salty snacks.

Expect guests to arrive 15 to 30 minutes late, and expect to serve dinner an hour after the time you listed on the invitation.

The “fifteen minutes late” rule isn’t fashionable. It’s a socially expected grace period. You are not a professional chef or caterer, and this is the way your guests cut you a bit of slack. Fifteen minutes late is actually on time. Thirty-one minutes late is fashionably late. But you have to come to grips with the fact that you’ve prioritized fashion over conviviality, since this pre-dinner time is for conversation. Way to make it all about you! Forty-five minutes late is problematic, because I’m about to announce that the food is ready, and now I have to stop and greet you.

Burgers for a Crowd

Credit for images on this page: Make It Like a Man! This content was not solicited by anyone, nor was it written in exchange for anything. Thank you, Kesor. Thank you, ⌘+C. Make It Like a Man! is ranked by Feedspot as #2 in the Top 30 Men’s Cooking Blogs. 

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