Why are Hamburgers called Ham.. when the're made of Beef?

Question

HAMburger... why?? it's made of BEEF!!!

Answer 1

This question was asked before. Let me find the answer, which I actually saved on my computer. I don't know who originally came up with that answer, but all credit goes to them.

'Q: Why is a hamburger called a hamburger when there's no ham?

A: There is no egg in eggplant nor ham in hamburger; neither apple nor pine in pineapple. English muffins weren't invented in England nor French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies while sweet-breads, which aren't sweet, are meat.
We take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig. And why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?

If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese? One index, 2 indices?

Doesn't it seem crazy that you can make amends but not one amend, that you can comb through the annals of history but not a single annal? If you have a bunch of odds and ends and get rid of all but one of them, what do you call it? If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat? If you wrote a letter, perhaps you bote your tongue?

Sometimes I think all the English speakers should be committed to an asylum for the verbally insane. In what other language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell? Park on driveways and drive on parkways?

How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and wise guy are opposites? How can overlook and oversee be opposites, while quite a lot and quite a few are alike? How can the weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell another.

Have you noticed that we talk about certain things only when they are absent?

Have you ever seen a horsefull carriage or a strapfull gown? Met a sung hero or experienced requited love? Have you ever run into someone who was combobulated, gruntled, ruly or peccable? And where are all those people who ARE spring chickens or who would ACTUALLY hurt a fly?

You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language in which your house can burn up as it burns down, in which you fill in a form by filling it out and in which an alarm clock goes off by going on.

English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race (which, of course, isn't a race at all). That is why, when the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible.

And why, when I wind up my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essay, I end it.'

Answer 2

In the late eighteenth century, the largest ports in Europe were in Germany. Sailors who had visited the ports of Hamburg, Germany and New York, brought this food and term "Hamburg Steak" into popular usage. To attract German sailors, eating stands along the New York city harbor offered "steak cooked in the Hamburg style."

In 1802, the Oxford English Dictionary defined Hamburg steak as salt beef. It had little resemblance to the hamburger we know today. It was a hard slab of salted minced beef, often slightly smoked, mixed with onions and breadcrumbs. The emphasis was more on durability than taste.

Immigrants to the United States from German-speaking countries brought with them some of their favorite foods. One of them was Hamburg Steak. The Germans simply flavored shredded low-grade beef with regional spices, and both cooked and raw it became a standard meal among the poorer classes. In the seaport town of Hamburg, it acquired the name Hamburg steak. Today, this hamburger patty is no longer called Hamburg Steak in Germany but rather "Frikadelle," "Frikandelle" or "Bulette," orginally Italian and French words.

According to Theodora Fitzgibbon in her book The Food of the Western World - An Encyclopedia of food from North American and Europe:

The originated on the German Hamburg-Amerika line boats, which brought emigrants to America in the 1850s. There was at that time a famous Hamburg beef which was salted and sometimes slightly smoked, and therefore ideal for keeping on a long sea voyage. As it was hard, it was minced and sometimes stretched with soaked breadcrumbs and chopped onion. It was popular with the Jewish emigrants, who continued to make Hamburg steaks, as the patties were then called, with fresh meat when they settled in the U.S.

Answer 3

Because they were invented at the beginning of the 20th. century by a german immigrant to the USA who was from HAMBURG Germany.
Presumably the people started off saying "let's go get one of the Hamburgers' sandwiches" ...and the name stuck. (hamburger also means person from Hamburg...it's not only just the word for the meat sandwich).

Answer 4

Or maybe hamburger was first made with a ham not with a beef.what do you think?It may also have a concern with the city of Hamburg, Germany

Answer 5

Because I believe a gentleman in Hamburg, Germany thought up the neat idea.

Answer 6

Supposedly it has to do with the city of Hamburg, Germany, not the meat content.

Language is funny. Flammable and inflammable mean the same thing, we park in driveways and drive on parkways. Relax and pass the catsup.

Answer 7

They are hammed up as in made up and not just beef they got onions in as well.

Answer 8

they originated in hamburg, germany hence hamburgers (total guess lololol)

Answer 9

would it sound as nice saying beefburger.