First things first, unless you are fortunate enough to have access to ground bacon somewhere, we have to grind the bacon. If you don't have a meat grinder, that's ok! With a knife, roughly chop the bacon. Then spread it out on a baking sheet and place in the freezer for about 20 minutes. Once the bacon has gotten somewhat frozen (you just want it to be hard enough to make cutting easier), place it in a food processor and pulse until it is ground, but not mush. I've tried this in a blender too, and it did not work as well as the food processor. Feel free to try this with whatever you have though. With a blender, you might just have to stop and stir it more.

Now that you have ground bacon, mix that ground bacon into your ground beef. Take time to really work them together.

Form the meat mixture into balls. You want them to be larger than golf balls, but not quite as big as baseballs.

Heat a griddle or a skillet, preferably cast iron to medium high heat. Place the meat ball onto the skillet and let it sizzle for a minute. Then, using two spatulas or a spatula and something else sturdy like a wooden spoon, flatten the meat ball and press down with the other spatula or sturdy item, such as a wooden spoon. Sprinkle about a teaspoon of the seasoning over the newly flattened meat patty.

Continue to press down and apply pressure to the burger. If this was an all beef burger, we wouldn't keep pressing, but since there is bacon in this patty, we want to have a thin enough patty to ensure that the bacon cooks through. After a few minutes and getting a good char, flip the patty and press again. There's no need to add more seasoning because this burger is thin. Cook until the other side has a good char as well. While this burger will cook fast, you want to be sure that it is cooked all the way through.

While the patty is finishing, take the bun and place each half down in the skillet or on the griddle and toast the bread. Use the grease from the burger to add flavor to the bun.

Here's the point where you can totally freestyle if you want, but we'll tell you how we like to top this burger.

Take your toasted bun and spread mustard on the bottom half. Arrange 3 dill pickle chips on top of that. Then add the patty. On top of the patty, place a slice of American cheese. If you want to add the cheese to the patty while it is still warm on the skillet, that's even better. Squeeze a little ketchup on top of the cheese patty and then sprinkle some of the diced red onions on top. Spread the mayonnaise on the top half of the bun and place it on top of the burger.

Now you have the HITC Ground Bacon and Beef Smashburger!