Juicy Burgers, A Midwestern Loose Meat Sandwich Recipe
These classic Midwestern Loose Meat Sandwiches are simmered in a savory sauce made with spices, beef consomme and Worcestershire sauce. They are cheap, quick and easy. A delicious sandwich with the charm of small town Americana!
Where I live in the Midwest, loose meat sandwiches are a cult classic. Speckled around Missouri you’ll find tiny little locally owned burger joints with such loyal followers that they go back generations. If you’ve never gotten to enjoy a loose meat sandwich ordered standing outside at the pickup window on a nice Spring day, then most of us around here would say you’re missing out! 
Today’s recipe is a copycat version of our favorite loose meat sandwich, the beef burger, from our favorite little burger joint, the Burger Bar & DariMaid in Carrollton, Missouri. My husband’s family calls these burgers “Juicy Burgers” and they all love them so much that his Grandma uses her connections to get the mix and make them for all 30 plus of us several times a year. 
I’ve been working on this copycat recipe for quite a while and after lots of trial and error I am excited to share with you what my husband deems, the closest juicy burger copycat. Most loose meat sandwiches are in fact pretty loose, I’ve found that the meat just crumbles out of the bun and makes a mess. These loose meat burgers simmer in a sauce that helps them stick together better. 
I hope that you’ll enjoy this easy skillet dinner as much as we do. I love mine piled high with pickles and chopped onions and smothered in ketchup!
You might also enjoy these quick and easy weeknight dinners:
- Easiest Instant Pot Beef and Noodles Ever
- Cajun Sausage Alfredo
- Italian Sloppy Joes
- Hamburger Macaroni Soup
- Chili Dog Pizza
Juicy Burgers, A Midwestern Loose Meat Sandwich Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 lbs ground beef
- 1 tablespoon minced dried onion
- 1 teaspoon onion powder
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon mustard powder
- 1 teaspoon paprika
- 3 Tablespoons all purpose flour
- 1 10.5oz can beef consomme
- 2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
Instructions
- In a large skillet, brown the ground beef with the minced onion, onion powder, garlic powder, salt, mustard, and paprika.
- Add the flour to the ground beef and stir it in until it's completely dissolved.
- Add the consomme and Worcestershire sauce to the ground beef and bring to a simmer.
- Serve on hamburger or hotdog buns with pickles and chopped onions, if desired.
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In my family ( four generations of Michiganians) we call these Sloppy Joes. I have never heard them called loose meat sandwiches. No matter what you call it they are always a great food for a crowd. Just put the finished food in a crock pot and eat when ever. We started putting them on hard taco shells, Fritos, or Doritos and adding cheese they are delicious that way.
This is the recipe I have been searching for quite a while now! As a young child in the early 1950s in Southern California, there were many burger places throughout the area serving traditional old fashioned pre-fast food type burgers that were not all the same. It wasn’t unusual to find a stand that sold burgers made with loose ground beef instead of patties – although the fixings were the same: ketchup, mustard, pickles, onions, and usually there’s be Iceberg lettuce, but often it would be shredded and piled up – I liked those – but the rest was the same burger add-ons – they’d be put on a hamburger bun – I really loved those types of burgers because they had more flavor than the patty type, and also weren’t as dry. But in Southern California, after a time they disappeared, for the most part, after 1960s you didn’t find them much anymore. So I figured they probably had come through some regional style brought into SoCal from some other U.S. area. And looking for it online today I find it is a Midwestern tradition! That is so fun to discover, and I can’t wait to try this recipe! I’m sure it’s going to be perfect, because the ingredients sound right – we have similar recipes, but they would have a Mexican flavor, which I love of course, but this is the burger recipe I’ve been looking for!
I hope that it is exactly what you are looking for and serves you up a big helping of nostalgia, Iris!
OMG…. Very good and close to what I grew up with in Norborne
Do you drain the grease after you cook the ground beef?
Virginia,
You do not drain the grease off the ground beef for this recipe. You add the flour and seasonings to the ground beef with the fat almost like you’re making a gravy. These loose meat sandwiches have more of a substantial sauciness to them than other loose meat sandwiches I’ve had. We actually really like this, because it helps them to hold together a bit more and keeps the meat from falling out of the bun so easily.
Amy
Hello
I made these this evening and oh yeah, they are good! By the way the, coleman’s worked just fine. Thanks for sharing these!
Glad you enjoyed them, Jesse! Thanks for sharing your results.
I’m doing these Saturday and would like to ask which mustard powder? Something like Coleman’s?
Thanks I want to get it right.
I think that the brand I have at home is McCormick’s but yes, Coleman’s ground mustard should work great.
Have not made them yet but so happy to see this recipe……I now live in AZ and you will never find them here. We never missed the Made-Rites in Iowa City before the big home football game Saturday afternoons. Tomorrow evening Made-Rites and kidney bean salad…..another childhood memory. Thank you
Hi Leslie!
I hope you will enjoy them. Each restaurant that has a maid rite sandwich does them a little differently and this recipe makes them like my favorite restaurant. I hope that it will bring you a little slice of nostalgia.
Amy D.
As an Iowa native Maid Rites we’re a definite favorite. After living in several states I have learned that the taste of beef is vastly different depending on corn or grass fed beef !