Burgers/Hamburgers:
A hamburger (or simply burger) is an American sandwich that consists of a cooked patty of ground meat that is fried, steamed, grilled, broiled, barbequed, seared or deep fried and is generally served with various garnish or condiments like ketchup, mustard, mayonaise, lettuce, tomato, onion, relish and cheese toppings, placed inside a sliced bun, often baked specially for this purpose, or pieces of bread or toast. The meat patty is beef, unless otherwise noted.

Methods of serving hamburgers vary considerably in different countries. Many countries use a bun. Thickness in meat patties range depending on the restaurant. Some places serve hamburger patties that can weigh two pounds, and sometimes much more.

Cheeseburgers:
A cheeseburger is a hamburger with cheese in addition to the meat. In 1924, Lionel Sternberger grilled the first cheeseburger in Pasadena, California.

Veggie Burgers:
A veggie burger, garden burger, or tofu burger uses a meat analogue, a meat substitute such as tofu, TVP, seitan (wheat gluten), quorn or an assortment of vegetables, ground up and mashed into patties. In the last several years Chili's and several frozen food distributors have created a burger made up of black beans that is supposed to taste like smokey beef. Throughout the years veggie burgers have become more popular among fastfood restaurants, appealing to vegetarians.

These burgers are usually lower in saturated fat or calories than traditional hamburgers. Many contain phytoestrogen (soy).

Burgers Around the World:

North America Burgers:
Can be divided into two main types: fast food hamburgers and individually-prepared ones made in homes and sit down restaurants. The latter are traditionally prepared "with everything" (or "all the way," "deluxe," "the works," "through the garden," or in some regions "dressed"), which includes lettuce, tomato, onion, and often sliced pickles (or pickle relish). Cheese (usually processed cheese slices but often cheddar, Swiss, or blue, either melted on the meat patty or crumbled on top), is generally an option. Condiments are usually added to the hamburger, but they may be offered separately ("on the side"), with the two most common condiments being mustard and tomato ketchup. However, mayonnaise, other salad dressings, and barbecue sauce are also popular. Traditional "Texas" hamburgers and cheeseburgers usually eschew other liquid condiments besides mustard. Other popular toppings include bacon, avocado or guacamole, sliced mushrooms, cheese sauce and/or chili (usually without beans). Heinz 57 sauce is popular among burger enthusiasts. Somewhat less common additions/ingredients include fried egg, scrambled egg, feta cheese,blue cheese, salsa and other kinds of chile peppers, anchovies, slices of ham, pastrami or teriyaki-seasoned beef, tartar sauce, french fries or potato chips.

Standard toppings on hamburgers can vary by geographical region, particularly at restaurants that are not national or regional franchises. In the Upper Midwest, particularly Wisconsin, burgers are often made with a buttered bun, butter as one of the ingredients of the patty or with a pat of butter on top of the burger patty. This is called a "Butter Burger." In portions of the Carolinas, for instance, a Carolina-style hamburger "with everything" may be served with cheese, chili, onions, mustard, and cole slaw and national chain Wendy's sells a "Carolina Classic" burger with these toppings in these areas. In Hawaii hamburgers are often topped with teriyaki sauce, derived from the Japanese-American culture, and locally grown pineapple. Waffle House claims on its menus and website to offer 70,778,880 different ways of serving a hamburger. In portions of the Midwest and east coast, a hamburger served with lettuce, tomato, and onion is referred to as a "California burger." This usage is sufficiently widespread to appear on the menus of fast-food restaurants, most notably in locations of the Dairy Queen franchise.

A hamburger with two patties is a "double decker" or simply a "double," of which the Big Boy claims to be the first commercially sold, while a hamburger with three patties is a "triple," with the Wendy's restaurant chain being among the first to offer this as a regular product. Doubles and triples are often combined with cheese and occasionally with bacon as well, yielding a "double cheeseburger" or a "triple bacon cheeseburger," or alternatively, a "bacon double/triple cheeseburger." A hamburger with one patty, bacon, and cheese is a "bacon cheeseburger" or a "Banquet Burger"; hamburgers with bacon but no cheese are often called "bacon-burger"s. The Hardee's restaurant chain gained extensive publicity within the United States following its introduction of the Monster Thickburger, with two meat patties, three slices of cheese, six strips of bacon, 1,420 calories and 107 grams of fat. Other restaurants, such as In-N-Out, offer multiple patties and cheese on a burger (for example, 4 X 4 which is 4 meat patties and 4 slices of cheese). One could order as many meat patties as desired. The largest ordered was a 100X100 at the cost of about $400 for a special occasion.

A patty melt is a sandwich consisting of a hamburger patty, sautéed onions and cheese between two slices of rye bread. The sandwich is then grilled so that the cheese melts thoroughly.

To decrease cooking and serving time, fast food hamburgers have thinner patties than their fancier counterparts. The Carl's Jr. restaurant chain acknowledged this with the introduction of the "Six Dollar Burger," featuring a patty the same size as those served by sit-down restaurants for a lower price. Hamburgers also tend to be described by their combined uncooked weight, with a single uncooked burger a nominal four ounces (a "quarter pounder" [113.5 grams]); so, instead of a "double hamburger" one might encounter a "half pounder" (i.e. eight ounces [227 grams]; burger weights are always specified in pounds).

Fast-food hamburgers are usually dressed with a variety of condiments, and in order to get a fast-food hamburger without one of these standard condiments a special order may be required.

Another variety of hamburger is the "slider", which is a very small hamburger patty served in an equally small bun. This is the kind of hamburger popularized by White Castle. Another purveyor of the slider is Krystal.

In Alberta, Canada a kubie burger is a hamburger made with a pressed Ukrainian sausage (kubasa).

United Kingdom:
Hamburgers in the UK are very similar to their U.S. cousins, and the high-street is dominated by the same big two chains as in the U.S.—McDonald's and Burger King. The menus offered to both countries are virtually identical, although portion sizes tend to be smaller in the UK.

An original and indigenous rival to the big two U.S. giants was the quintessentially British fast-food chain Wimpy, originally known as Wimpy Bar, which served its burgers or cheeseburgers with British-style chips, served on a plate accompanied by flatware and delivered to the customer's table. Wimpy began to die out in the late 1980's, disappearing from most UK high-streets. However, it persists in some town centers and particularly at motorway service stations, resembling much more the U.S. style system of counter-service.

Hamburgers are also available from mobile kiosks, particularly at outdoor events such as football matches. Burgers from this type of outlet are usually served without any form of salad - only fried onions and a choice of tomato ketchup or brown sauce.

Chip shops, particularly in the West Midlands, North-East and Scotland, serve battered hamburgers (along with many other battered food items). This is where the burger patty, by itself, is deep-fat-fried in batter and served with chips, but no bun.

Hamburgers and veggie burgers, usually of a better quality, served with chips and salad, are now standard pub grub menu items. Indeed, many pubs specialize in "gourmet" burgers. These are usually high quality minced steak patties, topped with items such as blue cheese, brie, avocado et cetera. Another variant is the curry burger, which seasons the meat with curry to provide a spicier alternative.

Many British pubs are also notable for their extreme fondness for burger patties made from more exotic meats - common examples include venison burgers (sometimes nicknamed Bambi Burgers), bison burgers, ostrich burgers and in some Australian themed pubs even kangaroo burgers can be purchased. All of these hamburgers are served in a similar way to the traditional hamburger but may come with a different condiment, redcurrant sauce, mint sauce and plum sauce being common examples.

In the early 21st century "premium" hamburger chain and independent restaurants have arisen, selling burgers produced from meat stated to be of high quality and often organic, usually served to eat on the premises rather than to take away. Chains include Gourmet Burger Kitchen, Ultimate Burger, and Hamburger Union.

In recent years Rustlers has sold pre-cooked hamburgers re-heatable in a microwave oven in the United Kingdom.

Australia & New Zealand:
Fast food franchises sell American style fast food hamburgers in both Australia and New Zealand. The traditional Australasian hamburger almost always includes tomato, lettuce, grilled onion, beetroot (canned slices), and meat as minimum, and can optionally include cheese, a fried egg (usually with a hard yolk), bacon, and a grilled pineapple ring. The only condiments regularly used are tomato sauce, which is similar to ketchup but has less vinegar and more sugar, or BBQ sauce. Hamburgers in Australia and New Zealand tend to be less oily and fatty than their US counterparts, and are more likely to include a full salad if available. The McDonalds "McOz" Burger is partway between American and Australian style burgers, having beetroot and tomato in an otherwise typical American burger. Likewise McDonalds in New Zealand created a Kiwiburger which is similar to a Quarter Pounder, but features salad, beetroot and a fried egg. The Hungry Jack's (Burger King) "Aussie Burger" has tomato, lettuce, onion, cheese, bacon, beetroot, egg, ketchup and a meat patty. As with many issues between the two countries there is much debate over whether this burger (with beetroot being the defining factor) is, in fact, an Australian or a New Zealand creation, but the answer remains unclear.

Hamburger meat is almost always ground beef. Outside of fast food restaurants, "home made" style burgers, generally known in Australia as a 'Hamburger with the lot' (if they have "the lot" on them) are usually bought from fish and chip shops.

China:
In China, restaurants such as McDonald's and KFC have been proliferating all across the country. In many parts of China, small hamburger chains have opened up to capitalize on the popularity of hamburgers with children. Restaurants such as Peter Burger attempt to copy McDonald's.

In supermarkets and corner stores, customers can buy "hamburgers" (hanbao) off the bread shelf. These unrefrigerated so-called "hamburgers" are nothing more than ultra-sweet buns cut open with a thin slice of pork or ham placed inside without any condiments or vegetables. These hanbao are a half-westernised form of the traditional Cantonese "hamburgers" called "char siu Bao" (BBQ Pork Bun). The Chinese word for hamburger (hanbao) often refers to all sandwiches containing cooked meat, regardless of the meat's origin. This includes chicken burgers, as KFC is very popular in China.

Japan:
In Japan, hamburgers can be served in a bun, called hanbaga, or just the patties served without a bun, known as hanbagu or "hamburg", short for "hamburg steak".

Hamburg steaks (served without buns) are similar to what is known as Salisbury steaks in the USA. They are made from minced beef, pork or a blend of the two, mixed with minced onions, egg, breadcrumbs and spices. They are served with brown sauce (or demi-glace in restaurants) with vegetable or salad sides, or occasionally in Japanese curries. It is a popular item at home, and in casual, western style suburban restaurant chains known in Japan as "family restaurants". It became popular in the 1960's.

Hamburgers in buns, on the other hand, are predominantly the domain of fast food chains. As well as American chains such as McDonald's (nicknamed Makku) and Wendy's, Japan has a few home grown hamburger chain restaurants such as MOS Burger which serve what many consider to be excellent hamburgers. Local varieties of burgers served in Japan include teriyaki burgers, katsu burgers (containing tonkatsu) and burgers containing shrimp korokke. Some of the more unusual examples include the "Rice Burger", where the bun is made of rice, and the luxury 1000-yen (US $10) "Takumi Burger" (meaning "artisan taste"), featuring avocados, freshly-grated wasabi, and other rare seasonal ingredients. In terms of the actual patty, there are burgers made with the famous Kobe beef, butchered from cows that are fed with beer and massaged daily. McDonald's Japan also recently launched a McPork burger, made with U.S. pork. McDonald's has been gradually losing market share in Japan to these local hamburger chains, due in part to the preference of Japanese diners for fresh ingredients and more refined, "upscale" hamburger offerings.[citation needed]Burger King once retreated from Japan, but re-entered the market in Summer 2007 in a cooperation with the Japanese/Korean fast-food chain Lotteria.

Burgers in Other Countries:
Rice burgers, mentioned above, are also available in several East Asian countries such as Taiwan and South Korea. Lotteria is a big hamburger franchise in Japan owned by the South Korean Lotte group, with outlets also in China, South Korea, Vietnam, and Taiwan. In addition to selling beef hamburgers, they also have hamburgers made from squid, pork, tofu, and shrimp. Variations available in Korea include bulgogi burgers and kimchi burgers.

Not surprisingly, the Philippines, with American influences going back to US domination of the islands at the beginning of the 20th Century, retains a strong bond with American trends. A wide range of major US fast-food franchises are well represented, together with local imitators, often amended to the local palate. The famous chain McDonalds (locally nicknamed "McDo"), which is immensely popular with Filipinos, have a range of burger and chicken dishes often accompanied by plain steamed rice and/or french fries. Most popular of all with locals, the Philippines boasts its own burger-chain called Jollibee - which offers credible burger meals and chicken, including a signature burger called "The Big Champ". It is perhaps ironic, but very encouraging, that Jollibee now has a number of outlets in the United States. Jollibee, as well as other rewith ground chicken and/or pork patties, and are served with coleslaw and generous amounts of a sauce made by mixing ketchup, mayonnaise and sour cream. In addition to tasting nothing like most Western burgers, the large amount of sauce makes it a very messy food to eat, and these hamburgers are generally served in special paper or plastic pouches to avoid spilling the sauce on oneself.

In India, burgers are usually made using a chicken or a vegetable patty, due to cultural taboos against eating beef. These taboos stem from the religious practices of Hindus and Muslims, respectively. Because of this, the majority of fast food chains and restaurants in India do not serve beef. Likewise, McDonalds restaurants in India do not serve beef, therefore the 'Big Mac' is replaced with the 'Maharaja Mac' which substitutes the beef patties with chicken.

Another version of the Indian vegetarian burger is the "Wada Pav" consisting deep-fried potato patty dipped in gramflour batter. It is usually served with mint chutney and fried green chili.

In Pakistan apart from American Fast food chains, burgers can be found on stalls near shopping areas. The most famous and inexpensive being 'Shami Burger' made from 'Shami Kebab'. It is a Kebab made by mixing lentil and Minced lamb meat. Onions, scrambled egg and ketchup are the most common toppings.

In Malaysia there are 300 Mc Donalds restaurants. The menu in Malaysia also includes eggs and fried chicken on top of the regular burgers. Burgers are also easily found at nearby mobile kiosks especially Ramly Burger.

In South Africa a mixture of hot mustard and mayonnaise is standard fare for a burger. Usually the mixture will be out, already mixed for partakers.

Cultural Associations of Burgers:
In the 1930's (and TV re-runs through the 1970's), the best-known association to the hamburger was Wimpy, a moocher in the cartoon Popeye who would "gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today." The character was the inspiration behind the name of the Wimpy hamburger chain.

In the movie Pulp Fiction, the two assassins played by John Travolta and Samuel L Jackson discuss with amusement the titles given to their beloved burgers in Europe. For instance they marvel that a quarter pounder is known as a "Royale with cheese". Samuel L Jackson's character gives a highly amusing speech to his soon-to-be victims (tucking into burgers before they are blown away) about the burger being a "cornerstone of any nutritious breakfast".

Another character associated with the hamburger is Jughead of Archie Comics. He would often beg his best friend Archie Andrews to buy him a hamburger and was constantly seen hanging out at Pop Tate's restaurant. At one point in the series, Jughead even entered a hamburger eating contest. After defeating his opponent, his only thoughts were to eat more hamburgers.

In 1984, Wendy's aired a series of TV advertisements for its hamburgers in which an elderly woman (played by Clara Peller) commented, "Where's the beef?" when examining competitors' burgers. The quip became a national catchphrase in the United States.

In the mid-1990's, some American fast food restaurants such as Hardee's and Burger King began intensely marketing eating "large hamburgers" (of one half pounds [681 grams] of beef or more) as a sign of masculinity. Using scantily clad women and images of construction workers eating hamburgers, they introduced the notion that eating large hamburgers is a sign of manliness.

The Adventures of Brisco County Jr., as part of its running gag of showing the "true" origins of many turn-of-the-century inventions, features a waitress who comes up with the idea of serving a ground beef patty between two slices of bread as it is easier to eat than steak. She calls them cow pies, much to the cowboy heroes' discomfort.

The Video Game and anime character Viewtiful Joe loves to eat cheeseburgers, which are his favorite food. Everytime he sees a Hamburger Stand or Restaurant he says "Cheeseburger, please!" Another game, the 1982 arcade game Burgertime features a chef trying to make hamburgers while being chased by hot-dogs, pickles and eggs.

Pop performer Jimmy Buffett wrote the song "Cheeseburger in Paradise" in 1978. He was inspired to write it after discovering, to his surprise, a restaurant in the British Virgin Islands serving American cheeseburgers.

Floridian band "The Monsters In The Morning" made a song about a hamburger and the contents called "Mr. Hamburger".