Cheeseburger Fries with Homemade Burger Sauce
Need an easy weeknight takeout-esque meal for when you want to eat out but you don’t want to eat out? Cheeseburger fries are just the thing for those times! They are easy to put together, feel like an indulgent meal but are so much more wholesome than fast food.
I’m forever looking for ways to make easy, low-effort meals that my husband and toddler will love and not get bored being served the same things over and over. And um, me too?
We’ve drastically reduced the amount of eating out that we do, so on Fridays (when we always used to eat out) sometimes I like to make something that feels like takeout and sometimes pizza gets old. Just kidding, it never gets old but sometimes you want something different, ya know? So I made these and we all loved them so much I knew I needed to make them in to an official recipe. Let’s make them!
Ingredient notes
We’re just going to need the usual cheeseburger suspects, guys. Ground beef with some simple seasoning (garlic powder, onion powder, salt and pepper). Then have a field day with the toppings.
For the toppings, I went with cheddar cheese, tomatoes, pickled onions, extra pickles on the side and my very own homemade burger sauce recipe.
Honestly, I know this is a cheeseburger fry recipe and cheeseburgers typically have lettuce but I just don’t want lettuce on my cheeseburger fries, okay? If you want to add it you definitely can!
Burger sauce notes
This can’t really be much easier. You’re basically just mixing up every condiment and cupboard seasoning you have and calling it a day. I’m exaggerating, but only a little.
You’ll need mayo, mustard, ketchup, pickles, pickle juice, onion powder, garlic powder, paprika, salt and pepper.
Cooking notes
I made my own oven fries, but you can certainly use you’re favorite frozen french fries for extra ease.
My tips for making the best oven fries:
- dry the potatoes as much as possible before baking
- use parchment paper to absorb excess moisture
- give them space on the baking sheet so they don’t steam and can get a little crisper
Are they going to be as crispy as fast food fries or frozen french fries? No, probably not but they will still be tasty + wholesome.
As far as everything else goes, we are really just browning some ground beef with simple seasonings then topping our fries with it and some shredded cheddar. And of course some fun burger toppings.
So fun + easy!
Storage, time-saving tips and whatnot
These are best eaten fresh but we had leftovers and ended up eating all of them and they were still good. I like doing individual assembly rather than throwing everything on top of the fries on the baking sheet so I can save the ingredients separately and reassemble them to eat again the next day.
However, if you are serving a bigger crowd, you could definitely just scoot the fries together after baking and top with all the ground beef and cheesy goodness and serve kinda like nachos.
Want to save more time and simplify this recipe more?
- Use your favorite frozen french fries instead so you can skip washing and scrubbing potatoes (actually one of my least favorite kitchen tasks by far lol).
- Sub in your favorite store-bought burger sauce. My favorites are Trader Joe’s Magnifisauce or Kinder’s.
Cheeseburger Fry Recipe
Need an easy weeknight takeout-esque meal for when you want to eat out but you don’t want to eat out? Cheeseburger fries are just the thing for those times! They are easy to put together, feel like an indulgent meal but are so much more wholesome than fast food.
- Prep Time: 20
- Cook Time: 40
- Total Time: 1 hour
- Yield: 4–6 servings 1x
- Category: easy dinners
- Diet: Gluten Free
Ingredients
fries
- 2 lbs yukon gold potatoes, washed + scrubbed & cut into 1/2 inch sticks
- olive oil or avocado oil
- 1 lb ground beef
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- salt and pepper
suggested toppings
- cheddar cheese
- tomatoes
- pickles
- pickled onions
burger sauce
- 1/2 cup mayonnaise
- 2 tbsp ketchup
- 1 tbsp mustard
- 1 tsp garlic powder
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1/2 tsp paprika
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
- 2 tbsp diced pickle
- 1 tbsp pickle juice
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400F.
- Place sliced potatoes on two baking sheets lined with parchment paper. Drizzle with oil to coat evenly and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Arrange in an even layer, keeping the potatoes spaced apart to avoid steaming. Bake for about 40 minutes, until golden. You may want to rotate the racks and/or give the fries a flip halfway through baking for more golden edges but its not 100% necessary.
- Heat a large skillet over medium heat with a drizzle of oil. Add the ground beef and break up with a wooden spoon or spatula. Add 1 tsp salt, 1/4 tsp black pepper, 1 tsp onion powder, 1/2 tsp garlic powder and cook until no longer pink. Remove from heat and set aside until ready to assemble the fries.
- While the fries finish cooking, prepare toppings: chop tomato, make the burger sauce, etc.
- Serve oven fries topped with ground beef, cheese and other desired toppings.
- Please see the notes section for information about melting the cheese and serving options.
Notes
I wanted to give more of an explanation here regarding getting your cheese melted just right. The thing is, if you cook the beef while baking the fries, it will cool down and probably won’t be hot enough to melt the cheese (a problem for me, and maybe you too?) so here’s what I did. I had little individual cardboard fast-foody containers I got from smart and final that I could pop back in the oven for a minute on a baking sheet to melt the cheese.
If you don’t have oven-safe individual dishes, you can always microwave or you can add the beef and cheese to the fries on the baking sheet and pop the whole baking sheet back in the oven to melt the cheese and warm up the beef a bit. It only takes a couple minutes.
If you try this recipe, please leave a star rating below and let me know how it went. I’d love to hear from you!
You can also find me on Pinterest!
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