Cheese was unknown on hamburgers down here before the US fast food outlets introduced them.
Before that the classic Aussie hamburger was a toasted and buttered bun, made with REAL BEEF, tomato, iceberg lettuce, beetroot and a dash of tomato sauce............YUM!!
Vinny, you mean Aussies didn't eat plain boiled or roasted beets? Fascinating. (I have met Jamaicans who have never heard of pickled beets.) And I've never heard of pickled beets as a hamburger condiment, before you mentioned it. Ain't travel enlightening?
fresh white bread, lashings of butter and sliced pickled beets and thin sliced onion...excellent sandwich.
#10--
I'n pretty sure that hamburgers were unknown in Australia until you learned about them from some American. Tomatoes are originally New World too.
So where do hamburgers come from? Why a flattened, round shaped meat patty would be unknown in Australia, or elsewhere in the world, before?
Where I was raised minced meat patties (under local name) where a popular everyday dish before anyone heard the word hamburger.
#14--
Eaten on a toasted bun with lettuce and tomato and ketchup? #10 is describing a hamburger, not a klopse, rissole, or polpetto. They got the idea from the US. And added pickled beet, which is a good idea.
The hamburger is supposed to come from Hamburg in Germany, and supposedly spread to the US by the sailors from there in the early 1900's.
And taken up and popularised and more widely spread by the US firstly in their own country, and then to other parts of the world, including US servicemen bringing it to Australia during the 2ndWW.
The "Hamburg Steak" became popular in the late 19th C. I found mention of a recipe in an 1899 Australian cookbook. (The earliest US recipe I found is 1844)
It's the "hamburger sandwich" that Vinny is talking about. There are all sorts of claims about its origin. According to Wikipedia, "all claims made by the potential inventors of the hamburger occurred between 1885 and 1904." Early ones were just sandwiches, but ketchup became the condiment of choice by the early 20th C. and the full lot of mustard, pickles tomato, lettuce etc. was in place by WWII.
Apparently the American-style hamburger really took off in Oz in the 1970s when McDonalds & other large chains expanded into that country.
What I can't get a good handle on is when beets became popular. I found mention that Americans stationed in Australia during WWII were surprised to get hamburgers with beets. One reference said that the Aussie style began in the 1930s.
(In 1969, Pan Am Airways produced a "complete guide to travel in the United States." They described hamburgers:Grilled or fried ground beef patty, nearly always served on an unbuttered bun. It needs catsup or a slice of onion before it has much personality.)
My late father, who ironically was to fight along side of the US Army on Bouganville, told me that when he was growing up the hamburger was unknown down here, and was only introduced to the larger population when scores of US servicemen hit our shores during WW11.
And #18, i did say in my earlier post this how the classic 'Aussie' hamburger is made, and i do not care if the Pan Am served thiers without butter on the bun or not, OK?........................And i do not know why you would mention it?