How This Recipe Came About
The detailed beginnings of country-fried or chicken-fried steak are murky, but its presumed the method has its roots in of all things schnitzel. And this really does make so much sense when you stop to consider some facts.
Austrian and German immigrants to Texas hill country likely introduced their preparation methods for breaded cutlets of beef such as Wiener schnitzel and the rest is as they say history.
The Virginia Housewife, published in 1838 by Mary Randolph, has a recipe for veal cutlets that is one of the earliest recipes for a food like chicken-fried steak. This time period correlates with the dish popularizing in the American south, specifically Texas and Alabama, in the couple of decades following the publication.
You may recall me referencing The Virginia Housewife within my post forShaker Chicken Pudding. The Virginia Housewife has been used historically to date and trace the origins of so many American food dishes, its unassuming pages rife with detail.
Difference Between Salisbury Steak And Hamburger Steak
- Hamburger Steak is made with simple ingredients that resemble how you would make a hamburger.
- Salisbury Steak often includes an egg thats used as a binder, along with breadcrumbs, milk, and other ingredients. Basically an individually-sized meatloaf.
This Salisbury Steak recipe is basically a combination of my recipes for Baked Meatballs, Cracker Barrel Meatloaf, and Hamburger Steak ,Brown Gravy, and Mushroom Gravy all rolled into one.
Cracker Barrel Country Fried Steak
Cracker Barrel Country Fried Steak is one of the most popular items on the menu. Homemade country fried steak is delicious comfort food, especially when served with gravy.
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What Makes The Cracker Barrel Country Fried Steak So Good
Simple, inexpensive, and hearty, Cracker Barrel Country Fried Steak is the ultimate hunger buster. Its a signature dish on the restaurants menu. This recipe combines everyones favorite part of fried chicken, the thick, crispy coating, with a tender, perfectly pan-fried steak.
Pour on creamy sawmill gravy, add a side or two, and you can recreate the Country Fried Steak Cracker Barrel Old Country Store customers have been raving about for years!
How To Bread The Steak
The best way to bread the steak for this copycat Cracker Barrel country fried steak recipe is by using the wet-hand / dry-hand breading method.
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Review Of Cracker Barrel
I just want to say that I’ve never had a hamburger steak at Cracker Barrel that tasted as great as this one. I was like eating a steak! I came back to Chattanooga and ordered the hamburger steak and it was nothing like this one. It tasted like greasy hamburger meat compared to the one I had at this Henderson, NC location.
49 – 53 of 105 reviews
All the staff is friendly and has a general merchandise store attached. We has a Supper and a breakfast while visiting here.
We chose to eat at Cracker Barrell as meals at Cracker Barrell are consistent whichever one you choose to eat at. Their meals are tasty and along with good service. We did experience one incident that we were at a loss of trying to understand. Our waitress gave us our meal ticket and when we went to pay it the cashier told us that was not what we had and proceeded to tell us what we had. I never looked at the ticket other than the final amount. The cashier ran another ticket for what we had eaten and we paid and left. Not real sure how she was able to determine that the ticket I presented was not ours. She said the amount on each ticket was the same amount. But ??????
Did You Make This Recipe
Tag @frugalcouponliving on Instagram and hashtag it #frugalcouponliving
and I would love to see how this worked out for you. Share your final Copycat Cracker Barrel Hamburger Steak Recipe. Leave a comment and/or add a photo here on Pinterest!
Save this recipe for later. Print your recipe and add it to your recipe box or recipe binder! This is my favorite Recipe Binder I get tired of printing the same recipe over and over. A binder keeps me organized and gives me a place to store my recipes.
The southern food doesnt end here. Also visit our Copycat Chick-Fil-A Recipes. Eat more chicken! to save for later.
For more comfort food, enjoy these Copycat Panera Recipes. Soups, sandwiches, breads, salads and more. to save for later.
Follow all Recipes on Frugal Coupon Living.
Originally posted September 24, 2013, updated July 2021.
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How To Reheat Smothered Hamburger Patties
Keep the hamburger steaks moist by warming them on the stovetop:
Help Your Hamburger Steaks Cook Evenly With This Technique
The reason we shape them into doughnut shapes is that it helps the hamburger meat to cook more evenly and as they cook and shrink up that hole gets filled up anyway.
Take each meat patty and dip each side in the flour. Toss with flour to coat. The flour acts as a binder but also gives a crispier version of the burger when done.
Add those patties to a large skillet that is on medium heat.
NOTE: You may want to add a tablespoon or two of oil to the skillet and let it heat beforehand if you have a really low-fat ground beef or if your nonstick skillet isnt quite as nonstick as it used to be.
Let those brown for a few minutes on each side.
Then add your sliced onion to the pan. Cook those until they start getting a bit soft and brown on the edges.
At this point, you can drain off and discard the grease if you like.
Now pour in your beef broth . Im only using about a cup here.
Cover and let cook for another ten minutes or so, until your ground beef patties are cooked completely through and no longer pink in the center.
When your hamburger steaks are done theyll look something like this picture above.
Now, I like to scoop out my hamburger steaks and then get my onions out with a slotted spoon to serve.
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How To Store Leftover Country Fried Steak
To refrigerate for up to three days, wrap each cooled steak separately with a paper towel and put them in a container or wrap them with foil to seal in the freshness.
To freeze for up to three months, lay the steaks on a baking sheet and put them in the freezer until frozen solid. Transfer to a freezer-safe container.
How To Make Country Fried Steak Like Cracker Barrel
To finish cooking this Cracker Barrel Country Fried Steak recipe:
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What Is Cracker Barrel Famous For
Chances are driving down the highway you have seen the famous orange and brown logo Cracker Barrel Old Country Store. This restaurant is one of the best places to find southern style recipes including biscuits, chicken and dumplings, hash brown casserole and Cracker Barrel Hamburger Steak.
In addition to their southern food dishes, they also have an amazing country store. Pick up their well-known wooden triangle peg game, old time candy, nostalgic toys & games, the Home Sweet Home Cookbook and even souvenirs for your road trip. Its a great pit stop for food, shopping, and even clean restrooms.
Home Style Hamburger Steak And Onion Gravy Recipe
Its nearly impossible to get a seat quickly at Cracker Barrel on Sundays. The reason is simple. Theres nothing quite like country cooking! If you want a meal that will stick to those bones and widen the hips, this is it! And one of their more famed menu items? Good, ole Hamburger Steak and Gravy! Its a dish that takes very little effort to make. But, has a taste that will linger. Its definitely a dish of nostalgia. Of course, I had to share my version with you.
Ive found that 80/20 ground round beef is the best for this recipe. The amount of fat makes the burgers extremely juicy. And my little additions add the flavor and moisture.
The gravy is the easy part. Yes. I mean it! I know many fear making gravy from scratch. But, rest assured, its a breeze! I like my gravy to sit on top of the rice. Theres nothing worse than thin gravy that seeps through the rice. The gravy is the superior! Never let rice swallow that goodness up!
My Home Style Hamburger Steak and Onion Gravy recipe is as delicious as it is simple to make. Perfect for those busy weeknights when you dont want fast food. Its a meal of substance!
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How To Reheat Country Fried Steak
The best way to reheat Cracker Barrel Chicken Fried Steak is in the air fryer.
To reheat in an oven:
Cracker Barrel Hamburger Steak Recipe
Let’s cook?
- Buffalo, and some more.
The traditional burger steak is a fusion of steak and burger patty, using the best of each dish. The breadcrumbs and eggs help to add fluffy creaminess, but just a smaller amount, not as much as in a hamburger patty.
Burger steak is still very much plain ground meat, deeply flavored with seasoning.
Lean meats are best to use, such as buffalo or high-quality beef like Angus. Both of them have a unique taste and a moist texture. The overall experience will be entirely different with quality ground meat.
Gravy is also a staple for this meal, so dont skip it! To keep calories under control, use a cooking spray instead of butter.
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What Is The Cracker Barrel Hamburger Steak
Although Cracker Barrel is famous for its meaty meals, a hamburger steak might sound confusing to some. After all, how is it different from the basic patty in a burger? The bad news is that there is no one commonly accepted explanation. But hamburger steaks are definitely a southern thing.
Typically, burger steak patties are served on top of mashed potatoes and sautéed with onions or mushrooms rather than in a bun. They are seasoned with salt, pepper, and, in some cases, smoked paprika to give them a darker color and a smoky flavor.
Some cook them in the oven similarly to meatloaf, but Cracker Barrel hamburger steaks are cooked in an iron skillet.
Tips And Tricks To Improve This Recipe
The best tip for any recipe ever is to balance out the flavors sweet, sour, umami, salty, and some bitter elements. There are some tricks to doing this in every recipe.
You can add a twist to hamburger steaks by squeezing some lime juice into the mix and glazing the steak patties on rum or sherry. The taste will be unforgettable!
Freshly chopped herbs and freshly ground seasonings make a big difference in a good recipe.
Vinegar is an aromatic, tangy ingredient, and adding a few small drops can bring out earthy undertones in meat. However, avoid adding red wine vinegar to gravy because it will ruin the taste horribly.
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Panade = The Key To Juicy & Flavorful Meat
- A panade is a mixture of starch and liquid that is combined to form a paste. Its mixed in with meat for meatballs, meatloaf, or burgers to preserve the tender texture of the meat.
- When meat cooks, the proteins expand and contract and in doing so, moisture escapes. The starch in the panade turns to a gel when cooked and lubricates the fibers in the meat as it cooks.
How To Make It
See recipe card below this post for ingredient quantities and full instructions.
Optional: Sauté onions/garlic and let cool. This gives them a more subtle flavor/texture in the Salisbury Steak which is ideal, especially for picky eaters.
Make the panade: Combine egg, milk, mustard, ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, oregano, and salt/pepper. Add the breadcrumbs and cooled onions/garlic. Stir to combine, it will form a paste.
Gently combine the panade with the meat until just combined. Dont overmix or the meat will become tough.
Form into patties and sear 2 at a time in olive oil over medium-high heat, 1 minute per side. Remove and set aside. The middle will still be uncooked.
Make the Gravy: Saute onions for 5 minutes. Add mushrooms and cook for another 5 minutes. Add gravy ingredients except for the cornstarch/cold water.
Bring the gravy to a boil. Combine 3 TBS cornstarch + ¼ cup COLD water. Slowly whisk in the cornstarch mixture until desired level of thickness is obtained. Whisk continuously as you add it, you may not need to add it all. Decrease heat to medium.
Add the steaks back and cover. Cook over medium heat for 10-15 minutes. Spoon with mushroom gravy and serve with mashed potatoes or buttered noodles. Theyre done when the internal temperature is 160°
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Ingredients For This Recipe
This dish is fantastic since it uses things that you most likely already have in your cupboard. These plain ingredients will give you a very family-friendly, cheap, juicy, hearty meal that is easy to pair with any side dish. You can use up any leftover ground meat as well.
A Cracker Barrel hamburger steak is somewhere between a patty and a steak.
They are made from various meats, including chicken, turkey, beef, pork, and buffalo.
High-quality beef like Angus is used to make the real deal, a restaurant-quality hamburger steak.
Get some seasonings like pepper, salt, garlic, onion, coriander, nutmeg, and Worcestershire sauce, and mix them well with some eggs and a very small amount of breadcrumbs and the ground meat. Pan-sear the steak-patties in lots and lots of butter.
How Do You Make Hamburger Steak
The process is very simple. With only 10 minutes prep and 30 minutes to cook, you can create a juicy hamburger steak at home.
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
In a large bowl, combine the ground beef, eggs, breadcrumbs, Worcestershire sauce, black pepper, salt, garlic powder, and onion powder. Use your hands to work the ingredients into the meat, then separate the meat mixture into four equal mounds. Press each ball of meat into a thick patty.
Prepare the butter sauce by stirring together the butter, garlic, and soy sauce.
Heat a cast iron skillet over medium heat and brush with olive oil.
Place the patties on the skillet and brown each side, around two minutes per side.
Place one tablespoon of butter mixture on top of each patty and transfer the pan to the oven to bake for 20 minutes, until the patties are cooked through.
Viola enjoy!
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