The first time I had pineapple on a burger was at a Margaritaville in Grand Cayman in 2007. I even wrote about it. I think that was probably the last time I had pineapple on a burger. Until today.
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My friends and I love cheese. But... it's pretty calorie-dense and not very filling. In other words, if I'm trying to lose weight through healthy eating, cheese is going to be one of the first things to go. Same story for bacon. I love crispy bacon on a burger. But cheese and bacon...is it Mardi Gras?
So let's build this thing from the ground up.
A burger starts with beef. The pineapple adds juiciness and sweetness. So you need something smoky and sharp to balance it out. BBQ sauce is smoky and red onion has a nice bite. Since this is an Aloha burger, a Hawaiian bun seemed appropriate.
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I got my cast-iron pan preheating at medium for a solid ten minutes. Meanwhile I cut a nice slice of onion and start making my sauces. I actually made three sauces for this, only one is super essential. All three shared a common ingredient: Kikkoman Teriyaki sauce. I took a long look at the soy sauce aisle and decided that this is soy sauce+. It's a very thin, not sweet sauce. It's only 15 cals/tablespoon. It's basically soy sauce with a little extra flavor. Perfect for what I'm looking for.
The essential sauce it a bit of no sugar added bbq sauce mixed with a drizzle of teriyaki. Still wanted a smoky bbq sauce but something that would compliment the pineapple.
The second sauce was some of the pineapple juice mixed with teriyaki. I used this to baste the onion while cooking, though I could have just drizzled the straight teriyaki.
The third sauce was a teriyaki mayo for under the burger. You couldn't see it or really taste the teriyaki part so that was just for fun.
Meanwhile, also got my electric griddle going and my bun toasting.
Back to the beef. Formed a patty, salt and pepper both sides, into the hot cast-iron. Red onion goes in. Once the burger is ready to flip, add the pineapple ring to the pan. Gave that a sprinkle of teriyaki as well. It seems like I'm adding it to everything, but just a little. Once I was done, the bottle looked essentially unused. I also gave the burger a slight glaze with the pineapple/teriyaki sauce.
It all comes together at once and pretty quickly. Teriyaki mayo on the bottom bun, then beef, then onion, pineapple and bbq sauce.
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For burgers everyone recommends 80% lean so it's plenty juicy. For this I went to 85% to save a few calories and the whole thing was very juicy. (Hard not to be with a freaking pineapple ring on top.)
It's hard to estimate the cals in the beef. I think it was a 5-6 ounce patty some sites are telling me that 85/15 meat is 60 cals/ounce. I'll say 400 for the beef. The bun was 160. The pineapple 30. The red onion and sugar free sauces maybe another 30 together. So right around 600 for this.
Pineapple instead of a slice of cheese saves you 80 calories, so if you wanted a bbq cheeseburger you could do one for around 700 and be fine. But this was great and it's fun to say aloha burger anyways.
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