And now a word from the resident pain in the ass . . .

D, it seems, caught wind of how I represented -- or, in his opinion, misrepresented -- our conversation about what constitutes a burger. I have graciously agreed to post his amendment to my post, but only this one time (after all, those who want their say should start their own damn blogs, no?).

D's 2 cents:

On numerous occasions, Running Burro (RB) and myself have talked about
the concept of a list of criteria to accurately and consistently define foods [Incidently, this may be differently conceived as identifying foods.]. For example, to be appropriately labeled a sandwich, does the stacked concoction (sitting on a plate [or perhaps a cutting board]) need to include cheese among its multiple layers?
And what about the inclusion (or exclusion) of a condiment/spread?

Typically (in such discussions), I take the position [just for the 'sake of argument'] of assuming that checklists are apparent necessities, whereas RB is both more reluctant to invoke the checklist concept as well as more willing to permit a short checklist (i.e., I usually assume that such checklists [if they were to exist and be instructive] would need to include many items).

So, in order for something to be rightly called a burger, what should it include? As I recall, these were the only two items mentioned: (i)ground up* composition; and (ii) some specific percentage [or proportion] of the ground up product needs to be beef. We did not get into any specific details such as "What kind of beef?". Or "What numerical value should this percentage [or proportion] take?" - e.g.,
95%, 88%, etc.

*Footnote: I believe that many times (i.e., during our discussion) we were
talking of burger when we really meant to be saying something about
the patty part of the burger. Also, I should have added that the
patty itself needs to be of a form resembling a geometric shape (e.g.,
approximately circular or square depending upon various factors
including the desired outcome and whether the patty is formed 'by
hand' or by machine), but…I did not think of any of this at the time.

And now back to our regularly scheduled broadcast.