Is a Hamburger a Sandwich? The Argument, Settled

Is a hamburger a sandwich?

Is a hamburger a sandwich? In the United States, yes, and this one is a lot easier than the hot dog. A burger has bread on top and bread on the bottom with the filling in between, which is the basic shape everyone pictures when they hear the word sandwich.

The argument survives anyway, because "burger" has become its own menu category with its own culture. So one person is answering "does it fit the definition?" and the other is answering "do we call it that?" If you have already had the fight over whether a hot dog is a sandwich, you will recognize the setup. The difference is that this time the definition side has almost nothing working against it.

The case for yes: bun, filling, top and bottom

Dictionaries describe it that way. The American English entry in the Cambridge Dictionary says hamburger meat is usually eaten as a sandwich in a small, round roll. The burger was a sandwich from the start, too: American newspapers advertised "hamburger steak sandwiches" in the 1890s, the Chicago Daily Tribune described a five-cent hamburger steak sandwich in 1896, Louis' Lunch in New Haven calls itself the birthplace of the hamburger sandwich, and White Castle sold its small square burgers as hamburger sandwiches.

Government definitions agree. A USDA food safety official told NPR that, for the agency, a sandwich is a meat or poultry filling between two slices of bread, a bun or a biscuit. The same USDA labeling policy book lists hamburgers among sandwich-type products. New York's sales tax bulletin lists hamburgers on buns and rolls as taxable sandwiches, and California's tax rules refer to hot dog and hamburger sandwiches.

• Bread on top, bread on the bottom, filling in between.
• Called a hamburger sandwich since at least the 1890s.
• Treated as a sandwich by a USDA definition and by New York and California tax rules.

The verdict

What it sounds like

The case for no: a burger is its own category

The no side argues from everyday language. Menus usually list burgers and sandwiches in separate sections, and nobody walks up to a counter and orders "a beef sandwich" when they want a cheeseburger. If you invite people over for sandwiches and fire up the grill for burgers, your guests will notice. Usage shapes meaning, and in daily life burger is a word of its own.

Outside the United States the no side gets stronger. In Britain, Australia and New Zealand, sandwich usually means fillings between slices of bread from a loaf, so a burger in a bun is generally not called a sandwich. Even in US federal rules, hamburger is first of all the meat: the federal standard defines hamburger as chopped beef with no more than 30 percent fat, whether or not it is ever put in a bun.

Why it's easier than the hot dog

The hot dog debate is hard because a hot dog bun is one piece of bread, hinged on one side. The 2006 Massachusetts ruling often quoted in these fights described a sandwich using a dictionary definition of two thin pieces of bread with a filling between them. A burger bun is sliced into a top and a bottom, so it gives you two pieces of bread, and the classic objection simply does not apply. The same court also said tacos and burritos are not sandwiches, which is a much closer call, covered in is a taco a sandwich.

Even the tongue in cheek Cube Rule, which sorts foods by where the starch sits, files bread on the top and bottom under sandwich. Its one twist is the burger with an extra slice of bun in the middle, like a Big Mac, which it calls a cake because of the layers. That says less about burgers than about how much fun people have with this question, and it is a good reminder to check what the other person means by the word before you argue.

Where the line actually is

Most real arguments about burgers are about edge cases. Here is a practical sorting:

• Burger on a bun: a sandwich, and a burger.
• Patty melt on rye, or a burger on toast: a sandwich, no argument.
• Double-decker burger with a middle bun: still a sandwich in ordinary English, just a tall one.
• Lettuce-wrapped burger: not a sandwich, since there is no bread.
• Hamburger steak on a plate with gravy: not a sandwich, it is a hamburger in the meat sense.
• Chicken patty on a bun: American chains call it a chicken sandwich, which is the burger-is-a-sandwich logic in action.

The ruling

A hamburger is a sandwich. It fits the definition better than almost anything else that gets argued about, it has been called a hamburger sandwich for well over a century, and official definitions in the US include it. The no side is right that burger is its own everyday word, and right about British usage, but neither point makes it stop being a sandwich in American English.

Watch out for the move where someone keeps redrawing the line to exclude whatever you bring up: "a real sandwich uses sliced bread," then "a real sandwich is served cold." That is a no true Scotsman in a paper wrapper. For your own lunch debates, paste both sides into the argument judge.