This French Onion Burger is the ultimate comfort food burger with caramelized onions and super melty fontina cheese.
This recipe was originally published in May 2016 and republished with new photos (recipe untouched) April 2021.
This post is sponsored by Pepperidge Farm in conjunction with Blog Meets Brand and I have been compensated for my participation. As ALWAYS, all opinions are my own. #PepperidgeFarm #FarmhouseHeartyBuns
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I feel I must warn you before I begin. This burger is not for the faint of heart. It's big, very big, super beefy and it's piled high with delicious caramelized onions and lots of melty fontina cheese. Oh, and it's awesome!
Because this burger packs in so much, you will want to have to choose a bun that can hold all this deliciousness. I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to try out the new Pepperidge Farm® Farmhouse Hearty Buns.I mean, the word hearty is right there in the name; seemed like a good fit. Boy, was I right. I love when I'm right. Good thing I'm right most of the time.
Now on to what I put in this beast of a burger.
Related: 6 Must-Try Burger Recipes by Parade.com
How To Make The Onions
Prep the onions first. I wanted them not only to be caramelized but to boast the flavors of a French Onion Soup. Slice the onions super thin. You can do this either by hand or with a mandolin. I heated up a pan with butter AND oil and added the onions in. After they went through their caramelization process, I added some black pepper, Worcestershire sauce and beef broth and let them cook down a bit more, just to get all that good flavor infused the onions.
Forming The Burger Patties
While all that flavor is being incorporated into the onions I formed my patties. I used plain old ground beef (85%), about 2 pounds. I seasoned it with the same seasonings I put into the onions; black pepper, Worcestershire and beef broth. You want to form these bad boys big. I was able to get 6 huge burgers out of this.
Make sure when you form your patties that you press your thumb in the center of the patty. Placing a divot there will help prevent the burger from losing it's perfect shape while cooking. If it's not shaped nice and flat on top, you'll have a hard time getting those toppings to stay put!
Cooking The Burger
Grill your burgers to your liking. I like mine a nice pink medium. It took about 12 minutes to get these big boys cooked. Be sure not to keep your flame up too high. After I got good grill marks and the meat released a bit from the grates, I flipped them over, reduced the heat and covered the grill. Once the burgers were looking good, I put my fontina cheese on top and closed the top again just until it was all beautiful and melty. Oh man, I love fontina cheese. It melts so perfectly. If you haven't tried fontina yet, this is a great reason to do so.
Check out this video I put together showing the easy steps in putting together this French Onion Burger!
Helpful Tools
A beefy, satisfying burger smothered in caramelized jammy onions as a nod to French Onion soup.
- 1 T olive oil
- 1 T butter
- 3 medium sized sweet onions sliced thinly
- 1 tsp worcestershire sauce
- 1 tsp salt
- ½ tsp black pepper
- ¼ C beef broth
- 2 lb ground beef 85%
- 1 T Worcestershire sauce
- 2 T beef broth
- ½ tsp black pepper
- 6 oz fontina cheese sliced
- 6 hearty hamburger buns
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Heat oil and butter in a saute pan over medium/high heat. Add onions once butter is melted. After 5 minutes, reduce heat to medium and give onions a stir. Continue to cook over medium heat, if onions seem to be leaning towards burning, turn down to medium/low. Stir occasionally but not too often. After about 1 minutes, season with salt, pepper and worcestershire sauce. Cook another 5-10 minutes until onions are soft and caramelized. Deglaze the pan with the beef broth and continue to cook until liquid is just about absorbed; approximately 5 more minutes. Set aside.
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While onions are caramelizing, in a large bowl combine beef, worcestershire sauce, beef broth and black pepper. Shape into patties. You should get about 6 BIG patties. Be sure to press your thumb in the center of each patty, creating a divot, which will result in a more evenly rounded patty after cooking.
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Heat grill to medium/high heat. Place burgers on preheated grill. Cook about 5-6 minutes until burger easily releases from grates. Flip over, reduce heat to medium to medium low, depending on how hot your grill cooks. Close cover and cook another 8-12 minutes or until desired doneness. Place cheese on each burger, close cover just until cheese melts, about 2 minutes.
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Place buns, cut side down on grill to toast - about 3 minutes.
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Create burger by placing cheeseburger on bun an top with caramelized onions.
Wow! What an amazing, rich, juicy and HUGE burger is this! The caramelized onion looks divine and the burger so mouth-watering, I can't even tell! I'm literally droolin over your amazing recipe!I love the beef broth and the worcestershire sauce in the onions and the burgers! These are really hearty!- Love, Anna
Thanks so much Anna! I really appreciate your comments, I hope you will try it!
I am totally drooling over here! Unfortunately I am allergic to onions, I wish I wasn't before I knew what was wrong with me I ate them all the time and they were probably my favorite thing to add to my burgers my sandwich to anything. This looks so good I'm going to live vicariously through you LOL.
Oh no! I'm so sorry to be tempting you with this then! We deal w/ a lot of food allergies in my house so I feel for you.
Oh goodness! We are having burgers otnight I may have to use this idea!
you will not be disappointed!
Anything with caramelized onion rules in my book! We love burgers and French onion soup so this is sure to be a hit in our house>
Thanks - I'm a huge fan of caramelized onions too!
I'm not a huge fan of onions but that looks AMAZING! I am the biggest burger freak so I'd love to try this, even if I'm not a huge onion fan!
I'm not a fan of raw onions on sandwiches or burgers but these onions are treated right!
You may not believe this but I was crying to use beef broth in my recipe too! Your burger looks so so good!
Thanks so much Patty. I do think the beef broth helped keep this big burger super juicy!
Oh my, grilled onions on hamburgers are my favorite! That photo totally made my mouth water!
Oh those onions look spectacular and the perfect topper for a juicy burger! YUM
Thanks Angela!
Great burger goodness here - drooling!
This look so darn delicious!!! I need a burger right now!!!
Those onions look amazing! You are making me very hungry. I am pinning this for later. Thank you for sharing. I'm glad I saw you over at #WednesdayRoundup. This is the first time I've been to your website.
Oh wow, how great to connect! Thanks so much for pinning my burger and for popping over. I'll be sure to pop on over and check out MommysApron. 🙂
Oh my, I may have had dinner but this luscious burger has me salivating right now!
Oh, this reminds me of a burger we have at one of our local restaurants. They are kind of stingy with the onions, so this is sure to be tastier!
Oh man, how dare they? lol. The onions are like the best part!
You've outdone yourself with this burger. Fontina is a great tasting melting cheese. Perfect with those onions!
Thanks KC. I loooooove Fontina and all it's melty goodness.
Love those caramelized onions! Pinned!
I love French onion soup, so this is my kind of burger, it looks divine! Great video too!
French Onion Burger?! Genius! Everyone loves sauteed onions, this looks so amazing.
It is a very unique concept of making French onions work in a burger. This looks very creative, Christine.
Thanks Rini, it was a hit!
Such a juicy looking burger. Love the idea of french onions in it!