Photo: White CastleCheese Slider
The Original Slider with a slice of American cheese, and the one most sacks are actually full of. In the onion steam the cheese goes so soft it merges with the meat and the bun until the three become one warm, squishy layer. That texture is the entire appeal, and it is exactly what people who love White Castle miss when they move away.
The story
White Castle opened in Wichita in 1921 and spent its first thirty years grilling patties the ordinary way. The change that defined it came in 1954, when the kitchen started punching five holes in each patty and cooking it on a bed of onions without flipping it at all: steam rises through the holes and cooks the burger from both sides at once, which is why the meat is soft rather than seared and why the onion goes all the way through. Cheese was the obvious addition, and it settles into the holes.
What’s inside
Make it at home
There is no copycat of the Cheese Slider yet. Until there is, these recipes on the site come closest to it, judged by what goes into the bun.
- Shares beef and cheese
TOP 2McDonald's Quarter Pounder with Cheese (Copycat) - Shares beef and cheese
Baby You Can Chive My Car - Shares beef and cheese
Homemade Smash Burgers - Shares beef, cooked onions and cheese
Fat Mimolette Bacon & Fried Onion Burger
The Cheese Slider on YouTube
Everyone who has cooked, copied or taste-tested it on camera.
Similar burgers at other chains
Built around the same things as the Cheese Slider.- The Counter · beef, cooked onions and cheese
Juicy Lucy - PNY · beef, cooked onions and cheese
Jucy Lucy - Rekas Burgers · beef, cooked onions and cheese
SignatureMalmö Smash - Emmy Squared · beef, cooked onions and cheese
SignatureEmmy Burger
More from White Castle
About White Castle
White Castle is where fast food begins. Walter Anderson and Billy Ingram opened the first one in Wichita, Kansas, in 1921, selling small square burgers for a nickel from a building made to look like a castle, a deliberate signal that the kitchen was clean at a time when Americans did not trust ground beef. It was the first hamburger chain in the country, and the Ingram family still owns it.
Around 300 restaurants, mostly in the Midwest and around New York. Still family-owned.
Not affiliated with White Castle. Trademarks belong to their owners. The photo is credited under it and is used to illustrate this menu item; it comes down on request.