Why You Should Only Flip Your Burger Once, According To Bobby Flay

After a lifetime of the classic dish being his favorite comfort food, Bobby Flay has gotten the art of making a great burger down to a science. The New York chef knows every method that can improve or detract from a good burger — like the mistake of cooking them medium rare instead of medium. One of these seemingly minor yet very consequential factors is how often you flip your patty when cooking it on the grill. For Flay, the correct answer is just once, and he wasn't afraid to call out the many summertime grillmasters who insist on doing it any more than that.

He discussed the vitality of this small nuance during an appearance on "The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon," where he quizzed the host on his barbecuing abilities. When the topic of flipping burgers came up, Flay gave a short rundown of what happens if you over-flip your patties. "These guys who think they can grill — they don't cook all year long," Flay set the scene. "So they flip and turn, flip and turn, flip and turn, and that's how you get greyed, grilled food [...] you want the grill to do its job — get it nice and crusty, flip it once, and get it crusty on the other side."

Now, while we've advocated for only flipping burgers once on the grill in the past, Flay giving the audience this piece of advice adds yet another layer to the chef's hyper-specific methodology when making burgers. Beyond just not flipping patties several times, Flay also recommends not pressing burgers down as they cook, as doing so incorrectly will strip the patties of all their juiciness and flavor. Furthermore, the New Yorker believes that never using cheddar cheese for cheeseburgers and leaving a thumbprint in the patty before cooking it are vital yet often-forgotten steps towards maintaining a great taste and texture for your burger.

And beyond those simple tips that are great for burger-makers of all kinds, Flay also has his own small preferences that are slightly less traditional. While the tenured celebrity chef typically likes to keep his rendition of the classic dish simple, Bobby Flay is known for using crunchy ingredients like potato chips to upgrade his burgers — a relatively controversial method that he swears by wholeheartedly.