Learn how to whip up Chef John's Cheeseburger Garbage Bread effortlessly with this step-by-step video guide. Watch him create a mouthwatering, cheesy delight using simple ingredients. Perfect for a satisfying homemade meal, this recipe puts a tasty spin on classic comfort food.
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00:00 Hello, this is Chef John from FoodWishes.com with Cheeseburger Garbage Bread.
00:09 That's right, we used to call these things Stromboli, but apparently that didn't sound
00:13 appetizing enough, so they changed the name to Garbage Bread.
00:18 But no matter what you call this, it is absolutely perfect for when you're having a party, and
00:22 also when you're not having a party.
00:25 And to get started, we will add some sliced up bacon to a cold, dry pan, and then we'll
00:29 set our heat to medium, and we will cook it until that fat renders out and our bacon gets
00:34 nice and crispy.
00:36 And a great visual clue to look for is when those pieces of bacon start to look foamy.
00:40 All right, can you see all those little bubbles on the surface of the meat?
00:44 That means just about all the fat has rendered out, and we're probably close to being done.
00:49 And once we do decide our bacon's cooked long enough, we will pull that off the heat and
00:53 pour it on a paper towel lined plate, and we will let that drain and set it aside until
00:58 we need it later.
01:00 But do not wipe out the pan, since we're going to put that back on medium high heat, and
01:04 we'll transfer in our diced onions, along with a nice big pinch of salt, and we will
01:09 cook those, stirring in that little bit of bacon fat, for about three or four minutes,
01:14 or until those onions soften up and start to take on a little bit of color.
01:18 And I'm using red, but you use any color onion you want.
01:22 And then what we'll do once our onions are looking a little something like this, is stop
01:26 and add one pound of ground beef.
01:29 And once that's in there, we'll take the edge of our spatula, or in my case, spoon-ula,
01:33 and we'll break that meat up into small crumbles, but not too tiny.
01:38 We do want to preserve a little bit of burgery texture.
01:40 And besides breaking the meat up, we're also letting it brown a little bit, which is going
01:45 to help improve the flavor and the appearance.
01:48 And while that's happening, we can go ahead and season this up with some kosher salt,
01:53 some freshly ground black pepper, as well as two or three shakes of cayenne, and then
01:58 we will finish up with a few dashes of Worcestershire sauce, and we'll stir that in.
02:04 And since salt always draws out moisture, don't be surprised after adding that stuff,
02:08 that this mixture gets a little bit juicy looking.
02:10 Right, that's totally normal, and nothing to worry about, since all we need to do is
02:15 continue to cook this until that moisture evaporates and our pan dries out.
02:20 And once that happens, and our meat mixture looks like this, we will turn off the heat,
02:25 and we will transfer our cooked bacon back in, followed by some classic cheeseburger
02:29 ingredients, which would be a spoon of Dijon mustard, plus a generous squirt of ketchup,
02:36 and then last but not least, half our cheddar cheese, which we've grated up ourselves.
02:41 And with the heat off, we'll go ahead and stir everything together.
02:44 And I'm using sharp cheddar here, because that's what I like on my cheeseburgers, but
02:48 if you like a different cheese on yours, put whatever you want.
02:51 I mean, you are after all the chef Johnny Cash, of this edible trash.
02:56 Okay, Swiss, American, Monterey Jack would all be fine choices.
03:01 And that's it, once everything's been mixed in, we will let that cool down to room temp
03:04 before we use it.
03:06 Or if we're making it ahead, we can pop it in the fridge until we need it, although this
03:10 is a little harder to work with cold, and you'll have to crumble it up.
03:14 But either way, once our filling's done, we'll move on to rolling out some pizza dough, which
03:19 we'll do on a floured surface, and after pressing that out a little bit with our hands, we'll
03:23 switch to a rolling pin, and we'll attempt to roll this out into a rectangle, or anything
03:28 close to the shape of a rectangle, that's about 10 by 15 inches.
03:33 And yes, this works perfectly with ready-to-use pizza dough from the store, or if you want
03:37 to make it from scratch, we have about 10 different videos for different versions, and
03:42 the good news is, no matter which one you choose, it will work perfectly for this.
03:45 Oh, and don't forget our rolling out pizza dough tip.
03:49 If it's too elastic, and it keeps shrinking back when you roll it, just let it rest for
03:52 a few minutes in between rollings, and eventually it will relax, and you should be able to roll
03:57 it out nice and thin.
03:59 And as usual, once we get close to the size we want, we will stop rolling, and we will
04:04 do the final shaping and stretching with our hands.
04:07 And of course I could have got this into a perfect rectangle shape, but I wanted to demo
04:12 that even if it's not perfect, it's going to work perfectly for this.
04:16 And then once our pizza dough has been rectangled, we'll go ahead and transfer on our cooled
04:20 filling, but we don't want to go all the way to the edge, so we'll leave about an inch
04:24 to an inch and a half on both ends, and the side closest to us, and for the edge furthest
04:29 away from us, we'll want to leave at least a few inches uncovered.
04:34 And once we have that transferred on as evenly as possible, we will sprinkle over any of
04:38 our other optional cheeseburger ingredients, which for me was some chopped up dill pickles,
04:43 followed by a scattering of green onions, and then once that's on we'll finish up with
04:47 the other half of our cheese.
04:49 And of course, jokes aside, the real reason this is called garbage bread, is that it's
04:53 usually made with stuff from the fridge that would otherwise end up in the garbage.
04:58 So when you're making one of these, make sure you peek in the fridge to see if there's anything
05:01 else you might want to use.
05:03 But regardless of what extras you end up putting on, once we're done with the filling, and
05:08 we've tidied things up, we'll take a little bit of water on the tips of our fingers, and
05:12 we will moisten that dough all the way along that far edge.
05:16 And once we've done that, we'll take the excess dough on the sides, and we'll fold that up
05:20 over, since we're going to make every effort to prevent our filling from coming out the
05:24 ends.
05:26 And that's it, we can now start rolling this up from the bottom, and as we do this, we're
05:30 concentrating on two things.
05:32 Okay, we want to roll this up tightly, without having to stretch the dough.
05:37 Otherwise it's going to get too thin, and basically dissolve.
05:41 And then the other thing, as we roll, we want to make sure that dough on the sides is staying
05:45 sealed, so like I said, we don't have any filling coming out.
05:49 And once we get close to where we're trying to get, it's always good to stop and stretch
05:52 that dough out with your fingers, so that we're able to get a nice secure seal.
05:57 And of course, we always want to end up with a seam on the bottom.
06:01 And then once that's been accomplished, we'll go ahead and clean off our surface, so we
06:05 don't get too much flour on the bottom of our pan.
06:08 And then we will very slowly and carefully transfer that onto the sheet pan, which as
06:13 you can see has been lined with parchment.
06:15 And once that's been successfully transferred on, we will double check those ends are nicely
06:19 sealed, plus any other fine tuning we think we need to do.
06:24 And then before this goes in the oven, we'll go ahead and brush it with some melted butter,
06:28 which is going to help this brown up beautifully.
06:31 Plus I don't know about you, but I do like my cheeseburgers served on a nice buttery
06:35 bun, so I think flavor-wise it works as well.
06:39 And then speaking of burger buns, I decided to finish up by sprinkling over some sesame
06:43 seeds, except I forgot one thing.
06:47 If you want to stick on sesame seeds, you really need to use an egg wash, and you can
06:51 see exactly why when we try to cut this, so stay tuned for that.
06:56 And either way, this is now ready to transfer into the center of a 375 degree oven for about
07:02 35 minutes, or until it's beautifully browned and it hopefully looks like this.
07:08 Oh yeah, you know what that doesn't look like?
07:12 Garbage.
07:13 And then pretty much as soon as this comes out, I like to transfer it onto a cooling
07:17 rack where we will let it sit and cool and set up for at least 20 minutes or so.
07:22 Alright, for me the ideal temperature to serve this would be just barely warm, or at room
07:27 temp, which is why it's so perfect for a party.
07:31 But once that has cooled down, we'll go ahead and grab a knife and slice in.
07:35 And because we used butter and not an egg wash, those sesame seeds are going to be flying
07:40 everywhere, which may or may not bother you.
07:43 And if they don't, great, because the butter is really good.
07:46 But if they do, go ahead and use an egg wash instead.
07:50 And if everything goes according to plan, we should be seeing a perfect spiral of filling.
07:54 And because we took our time and properly browned the meat, we have a very attractive
07:58 color and not some ugly pale gray.
08:02 And as you can see, if you've cooked it long enough, that bottom should be nicely
08:05 browned as well.
08:07 And then I would have no problem eating this as is, but we should probably upgrade with
08:11 some secret sauce, which is just mayo, mustard, and ketchup, with maybe some minced up dill
08:16 pickles and green onions stirred in.
08:18 And yes, I'll give you those ingredients in the written recipe.
08:22 And that, my friends, not surprisingly, tastes exactly like a bacon cheeseburger with all
08:26 the fixins, except there's no lettuce.
08:30 But that's okay.
08:31 Nobody at a party cares about lettuce.
08:34 And if they do, please ask them to leave.
08:37 And it's very hard to see because of all the cheese, but even though it was super thin,
08:41 our pizza dough is cooked.
08:43 And yes, you can definitely use more dough and make it thicker.
08:47 So this is a little more bready and a little less garbagey, but personally I thought this
08:51 had the perfect ratio and there is just barely enough pizza dough to hold this together.
08:57 And as I finish this one and slice a few more pieces, you're going to get a better look
09:01 at what I mentioned earlier, which was that even though that dough was thin, it still
09:05 cooked all the way through, which is why you really do want to make sure this spends enough
09:09 time in the oven.
09:10 All right, don't burn it, but I think the longer it stays in the oven, the better.
09:15 And for whatever reason you're not into cheeseburgers, this technique is going to work no matter
09:19 what kind of meat and cheese filling you use.
09:21 Okay, we could do Italian peppers and sausage.
09:23 We could do Buffalo chicken or a version based on a Reuben sandwich or a Philly cheesesteak.
09:30 But anyway, the point is this is a very, very versatile technique.
09:34 And no matter what you fill this with, I really do hope you give it a try soon.
09:40 So please follow the links below for the ingredient amounts, a printable written recipe and much
09:44 more info as usual.
09:45 And as always, enjoy!
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