Wendyl Wants to Know: 'Grey' patties ok, but home-made is better

Leader BBQ Burger Beef Patties - $5.99 per 510g. Photo / Wendyl Nissen

Burger fillers taste fine despite additives — and dogs love them.

As summer creeps over the horizon thoughts begin to turn to barbecues and burgers.

I found these beef patties in my supermarket freezer and was at first struck by their colour, which was a murky grey.

You get 10 patties in this packet for just under $6 so this represents value for money, but what are you really buying?

Ingredients (in order of greatest quantity first)

• Beef (71 per cent) — This means that 71 per cent of the beef patty is actually meat so that is good. The packaging says this produce is "100% NZ made" so I'm going to assume the beef is New Zealand beef.

• Water

• Onions

• Seasoning [salt, spices, milk powder, emulsifier (451), flavours, flavour enhancer (635)] — This provides the flavour of these patties. The emulsifier is diphosphates (451), which is salts of phosphoric acid. The flavours will be artificial as it is not stated otherwise and the flavour enhancer is disodium 5'-ribonucleotide (635), a chemical that can be a problem for gout sufferers.

• Breadcrumbs [wheat four, yeast, wheat gluten, maize starch, canola oil, soy flour, emulsifiers (471,481), acidity regulator (263)] — These ingredients will make up most of the rest of the patty. They are standard ingredients for breadcrumbs with emulsifiers mono and diglycerides of fatty acids (471), which are primarily produced from hydrogenated soya bean oil and sodium lactylate (481), a sodium salt. The acidity regulator is calcium acetate (263).

• Soy protein — This is a common filler for meat products like these.

• Colour (150c) — You would think some meat would not require colouring, but here it is. This is caramel III which is a dark brown colour made by heating sugars with ammonia.

My recommendation

These didn't taste too bad, and my dogs certainly lapped them up, but it really doesn't take long to make a few simple patties and do away with three emulsifiers, one acidity regulator, artificial flavour and colour. You'll pay about $6 for 500g of mince so the cost is about the same and you're eating all real food ingredients with this very simple recipe:

• In a bowl mix 500g beef mince, 1 egg, 1 finely chopped onion, salt and pepper.
• Shape into thin patties and fry for about four minutes each side.
• For extra flavour add 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce and 1 tsp tomato sauce.

Highlights

• 71 per cent meat.
• Uses artificial flavour and colour.
• Uses breadcrumbs and soy protein as a filler.

Do you have a food product you would like to see featured in this column? Email wendylwantstoknow@gmail.com with suggestions. Unfortunately, Wendyl cannot correspond with readers.

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