Japanese Hamburg Steak (Hambagu) (2024)

Japanese Hamburg Steak is moist, juicy and served with a sweet tangy ketchup-based sauce. It is perfect for dinner, lunch box and also child-friendly.

What is Japanese Hamburg Steak?

I like Japanese food as much as I like Vietnamese food. One of my favorite Japanese dishes to cook at home is hamburg steak/hamburger steak (hambagu).

It is a patty of ground meat which is tender and juicy, served with a tangy ketchup-based sauce. I read that this dish became popular in Japan in the 1960s. My guess is it was inspired by Western hamburgers.

This hamburg steak goes very well with white rice and steamed/boiled vegetables (or a refreshing green salad with sesame dressing). The sweet and tangy sauce balances the meatiness of the patty, and it is incredibly easy to make. I sometimes make Japanese hamburger steak for dinner and then have the leftover for lunch the next day.

Recipe Notes

So my recipe is based on the hamburg steak recipe in the Japanese Soul Cooking cookbook. It is a great recipe, but I modified it to suit my taste better.

I reduced the amount of liquid because the patties were too moist for me. I used quite a bit of garlic although Japanese cooking doesn’t use it very much. To us Vietnamese, if there’s beef, there should be a lot of garlic too :).

I also added more herbs and seasonings to make it more flavorful. Lastly, I tweaked the amount of ingredients for the sauce because it was sweeter than what I like.

Ingredients

The main ingredients for the hamburger patty are:

• ground beef and pork: using a mixture of beef and pork results in flavorful and juicy hamburger.
• garlic and onions: The onions add sweetness and texture to the patty.
• eggs, panko breadcrumbs and milk: the milk and panko help keep the hamburg steak tender and juicy. Please use Japanese panko breadcrumbs for best results. You can find it at Asian grocery stores. You can use either dairy milk or non-dairy milk (I have made this recipe with almond milk before).
• seasonings: salt, pepper and soy sauce.

For the sauce, you will need: sake, ketchup and worcestershire sauce. If you don’t have sake, either white wine or red wine will work.

How to Cook Japanese Hamburg Steak

1️⃣ The first step to make this hamburger steak is to sauté the onions until translucent to let them develop sweetness. After that, all ingredients for the patty are mixed together for a couple of minutes until they are sticky and well combined.

You can form the patties as big or as small as you want. For 1 pound of ground meat, I like to form 8 patties. Too big and too thick, they will take longer to cook.

2️⃣ Fry the hamburger over medium heat. This may take 8-12 minutes depending on the size of the patties. If they are browned but not quite cooked through yet, you can cover the pan to help the inside cook thoroughly.

3️⃣ After pan-frying the patties, we’ll deglaze the frying pan with wine and then mix in other ingredients to make the sauce. Sounds easy right :)? All the detailed cooking steps are in the recipe card below.

This recipe first appeared on Delightful Plate in July 2018. It has been updated with more information and unit conversion.

How to Serve

You can serve this hamburg steak with rice and steamed vegetables, or any of the dishes below:

Related Recipes

Another easy recipe with Japanese flavors you may like is this Oyster Donburi (Rice Bowl).If you are looking for more ideas for cooking ground meat, here are some dishes I like:

I’d love to hear what you think about the dish, so please feel free to leave a comment. New recipes are added every week so let’s connect on Facebook, Pinterest and Instagram for the latest updates.