German Frikadellen (Hamburg-Style Meat Patties)
Germany's pan-fried meat patties, made with half beef and half pork, a stale roll soaked in milk, sweated onion and parsley, then fried slowly to a deep brown crust and served with mustard.
A Frikadelle is a flat, pan-fried patty of ground meat, usually a mix of beef and pork bound with egg, onion and a stale roll soaked in water or milk; German Wikipedia says the word has been in German since the end of the 17th century and probably comes from the French fricandeau, a larded, fried slice of veal. The name changes across the country: Bulette in Berlin, where German Wikipedia credits the Huguenots with the word, Fleischpflanzerl in Bavaria, Fleischküchle in the southwest. It is eaten on a plate with potatoes or as a snack in a roll with mustard.
How it became the American hamburger is DISPUTED. English Wikipedia says the Hamburg steak was popular in New York port restaurants by the late 19th century and was eaten raw or lightly cooked. Its hamburger article adds a theory, which it calls unproven, that passengers on the Hamburg America Line ate it on board, and says nobody knows which story explains the name. Hamburg's own warm sandwich, the Rundstück warm, is a slice of hot roast pork or beef in a roll with gravy, offered to Hamburg diners by 1869, and German Wikipedia lists it as one theory of the hamburger's ancestor. The Japan Hamburg Association's chairman, interviewed by the Government of Japan's Highlighting Japan magazine (April 2026), puts it simply: in Hamburg, the dish that gave rise to hambagu is generally known as the Frikadelle, a small, well-spiced patty typically served without sauce.
🇩🇪 The original
Germany's pan-fried meat patties, made with half beef and half pork, a stale roll soaked in milk, sweated onion and parsley, then fried slowly to a deep brown crust and served with mustard.
🇺🇸 The American version
America put the patty in a soft bun, made it all beef, grilled it outside and stacked it with American cheese, lettuce, tomato, pickles, ketchup and mustard. See the The Classic Backyard Grilled Cheeseburger recipe.
Why it works the kitchen science
A soaked roll
The bread holds on to the meat's juices as it cooks, so a patty cooked all the way through still tastes moist and tender.
Sweated onion
Stiftung Warentest's test kitchen cooks the onion and parsley until glassy first, which draws out their flavor and avoids the sharp, bitter taste raw onion can give a meat mixture.
Step by step
- Step 1
Tear the stale roll into pieces, put it in a small bowl and pour the milk over it. Let it soak 10 minutes, pressing it down once or twice.
- Step 2
Meanwhile, heat 1 tbsp oil in a 12-inch skillet over medium heat. Add the onion and parsley and cook, stirring, 4 to 5 minutes, until the onion is soft and glassy but not browned. Scrape into a large bowl and let cool 5 minutes. Wipe out the skillet.
- Step 3
Squeeze the roll firmly to remove most of the milk (discard the milk) and crumble it into the bowl with the onion. Add the beef, pork, egg, mustard, salt, pepper and marjoram.
- Step 4
Knead with your hands 1 to 2 minutes, until evenly mixed. With wet hands, shape 4 patties about 3/4 inch thick and 4 inches across, each about 6 oz (175 g), with a flat bottom.
- Step 5
Heat 1 tbsp oil in the skillet over medium heat for 2 minutes (the pan should be around 300°F). Add the patties and fry 12 to 14 minutes in all, turning them about every 3 minutes, until both sides are deep brown and the center reads 160°F.
- Step 6
Rest the patties on a plate 2 minutes. Serve each in a split crusty roll with a good spoonful of mustard, or on a plate with boiled potatoes and mustard.
German Frikadellen (Hamburg-Style Meat Patties)
Serves 4 · 4 large patties · 45 min total
Patties
- 1 stale kaiser or crusty roll (about 2 oz)
- 1/2 cup whole milk
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil, plus 1 tbsp for frying
- 1 medium onion, diced small (about 1/4 inch)
- 3 tbsp chopped flat-leaf parsley
- 8 oz ground beef (80% lean)
- 8 oz ground pork
- 1 large egg
- 1 tsp medium-hot German mustard or yellow mustard
- 1 tsp kosher salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 1/2 tsp dried marjoram
To serve
- 4 crusty rolls, split
- About 4 tbsp medium-hot German mustard
Method
- Tear the stale roll into pieces, put it in a small bowl and pour the milk over it. Let it soak 10 minutes, pressing it down once or twice.
- Meanwhile, heat 1 tbsp oil in a 12-inch skillet over medium heat. Add the onion and parsley and cook, stirring, 4 to 5 minutes, until the onion is soft and glassy but not browned. Scrape into a large bowl and let cool 5 minutes. Wipe out the skillet.
- Squeeze the roll firmly to remove most of the milk (discard the milk) and crumble it into the bowl with the onion. Add the beef, pork, egg, mustard, salt, pepper and marjoram.
- Knead with your hands 1 to 2 minutes, until evenly mixed. With wet hands, shape 4 patties about 3/4 inch thick and 4 inches across, each about 6 oz (175 g), with a flat bottom.
- Heat 1 tbsp oil in the skillet over medium heat for 2 minutes (the pan should be around 300°F). Add the patties and fry 12 to 14 minutes in all, turning them about every 3 minutes, until both sides are deep brown and the center reads 160°F.
- Rest the patties on a plate 2 minutes. Serve each in a split crusty roll with a good spoonful of mustard, or on a plate with boiled potatoes and mustard.
Adapted from Stiftung Warentest, "Buletten im Speckmantel" (Gut essen mit der Stiftung Warentest, December 29, 2018), a recipe developed for the German consumer-testing foundation's readers by Professor Guido Ritter of the Food Lab at Münster University of Applied Sciences. We follow its method: sweat the onion and parsley in oil before they go into the meat, shape four 175 g patties and fry them over medium heat (about 150°C, which we round to 300°F) for 6 minutes a side, turning about three times. We leave out its bacon wrap and its veal, and use the classic proportions of the German Wikibooks cookbook instead: mixed beef and pork, a stale roll soaked in milk and squeezed out, onion and egg. The mustard and marjoram in the mix are seasonings German Wikipedia lists as common; the amounts are ours, as is the 160°F check. test.de. Ingredient list follows the source; the method is in our own words.
Tips
- Stiftung Warentest's original wraps each patty in three thin slices of bacon, held with a toothpick, and serves it with coleslaw.
- German Wikibooks suggests a few spoonfuls of dry breadcrumbs if the mixture feels too soft to shape.
- Cold Frikadellen are a classic picnic and lunchbox food; slice them into a roll with mustard and pickles.
- For a quick pan gravy, the German Wikibooks recipe pours off some fat, deglazes with water or broth and thickens with a little flour.
The rules people argue about
What the sources agree on, what they don't, and what is just a good story.
- The Frikadelle is the original hamburger. Disputed: Wikipedia calls the Hamburg steak the hamburger's origin and the Frikadelle its German equivalent, but it also says no one knows how the name traveled, and German Wikipedia offers the Rundstück warm as one theory among several.
- Hamburg America Line passengers spread it. Folklore: Wikipedia calls the ship theory unproven.
- The Rundstück warm was invented by Heinrich Heckel in 1901. Disputed: German Wikipedia gives a 1901 story and a 1904 newspaper version, and notes that Hamburg diners were offered warm roast in rolls by 1869.
- Bulette comes from the Huguenots. Documented as German Wikipedia's account: the word arrived with French Huguenots in Berlin.
- Soak the roll, don't use breadcrumbs. Folklore: both appear in German sources; Wikibooks soaks a roll, Stiftung Warentest allows breadcrumbs.
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