Good Morning Burger from The Simpsons

The Good Morning Burger is a Simpsons breakfast burger that exists for exactly one TV commercial. In "Bart's Friend Falls in Love" (Season 3, Episode 23), Homer watches the ad in the same episode where Marge orders him a subliminal weight-loss tape, and the narrator walks through the build:

"We take 18 ounces of sizzling ground beef..."

"...and soak it in rich creamery butter."

"Then we top it off with bacon, ham, and a fried egg."

That's the whole spec. No cheese, no sauce, no salad. This recipe follows it, with the 18 ounces (about 510g) split across four burgers instead of one.

If you'd rather wear it than eat it, the Simpsons t-shirts are over here.

The butter

The ad says the beef is soaked in butter. Soaking raw patties in melted butter just gives you greasy, grey meat, so this version bastes instead. Sear one side, flip, drop butter into the pan and spoon it over the patty as it foams. You get the flavour the commercial promises and a crust you can actually bite through.

Cook the patties in the bacon fat first. It's already in the pan, and it seasons the beef before the butter goes in.

Bacon and ham

Two pork products on one burger is the point of the joke, so keep both. Use thin leg ham, warmed in the pan for a few seconds, so it sits flat under the egg. Thick ham steaks make the stack slide.

The egg

Fry it last so it goes on hot. A runny yolk does the job of a sauce, which is handy, because the original has none. If you want it set, fry it through. The burger still holds together.

Tips

Have everything hot before you assemble. Cold bacon goes chewy against a hot patty.

Don't press the patties while they cook. You'll squeeze the fat out, and the butter can't make up for it.

A soft, slightly sweet bun soaks up yolk better than a crusty roll.

Cooking for four in one pan? Fry the eggs inside greased egg rings so they come out the same size as the patties and don't run into each other.

The episode

"Bart's Friend Falls in Love" aired on 7 May 1992. Jay Kogen and Wallace Wolodarsky wrote it. The A-plot is Milhouse falling for the new girl, Samantha Stanky. The B-plot is Homer's diet, which goes the way you'd expect: the weight-loss tape turns out to be a vocabulary tape, and after two weeks he's put on 13 pounds. An ad for an 18-ounce butter-soaked burger is exactly what that household doesn't need.

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More breakfast: Moon Waffles from "Homer the Heretic", or a pink frosted donut. The full list is in the Simpsons recipes index.