The Plastic Food Takeout Item That Perfectly Shapes Burger Patties

It seems incredibly wasteful to discard takeout containers, especially since 14 million tons of plastic end up in the oceans every year. Luckily, there are many ways they can be reused in the kitchen for our everyday cooking needs. And it turns out, the lids are ideal for shaping burger patties.

The lid trick is different from an actual burger press, which is a flat circular weight that you use to press the burger to uniformity while on the grill. Unlike a burger press, a plastic takeout lid cannot handle the heat of a grill. To try this, simply roll your burger meat into a 4-ounce ball and place the lid on top, and use your hands to press down on the burger. If you really want to be a stickler for complete uniformity, you can use a heavy circular item like a water bottle to evenly distribute the meat around.

Most people season and shape burger patties by hand, but that can be extremely tedious. On top of the labor intensity, working with raw meat with your hands can lead to worse-tasting burger. The body heat from your hands is already enough to melt the fat in the burger patty. Hand-molding them is time consuming, and working with burgers too much can cause all the natural beef fat in your hands, compromising the juiciness. This trick, and adding salt while the burger patties are just about done, will ensure you get an evenly cooked, juicy bite.

Experts warn against reusing takeout containers for long-term food storage or to heat up food. Unlike Ziploc baggies, which you can use up to 10 times, the longer containers are used, the more likely it is that chemicals from the container will seep into your food. Using takeout containers to transport food once or twice seems less harmful as long as you keep things at room temperature or cold.

Takeout containers might be a great way to transport food to friends or to make care packages for unhoused people; that way, you can share food without worrying about getting your Tupperware back. Speaking of getting Tupperware back, it's a great option to pack food for picnics or on hikes since you don't have to worry about it breaking or getting lost. Just be sure to properly disinfect them by soaking the containers with warm soapy water and then spraying them with isopropyl alcohol before air-drying.

Fortunately, there are also a ton of creative ways to reuse your plastic containers. For one, you can drill some holes in the bottom of your plastic takeout containers and use them to make a little garden. Takeout containers also make great on-the-go dishes for pets, so keeping one in your bag or in your car will certainly come in handy. You can also take the containers grocery shopping with you and use them to buy and store bulk foods.