Meykers Burger Press Honest Review: Does the Non-Stick Coating Last and Are 150 Papers Enough?

I want to be straight with you before you read another glowing five-star blurb about this thing. I have pressed a lot of burger patties with the Meykers, and I think it is a genuinely solid little tool for the right person. But I have also messed up a batch or two figuring out its quirks, I have stood at the grill with no patty papers left at the worst possible moment, and I have watched the non-stick surface lose a little of its slickness over about eight months of regular use. None of that makes the Meykers a bad buy. It does mean you deserve a straight answer on what works, what does not, and whether this press is the right one for your cookouts specifically.

This is the honest side of the story. If you want the long-term use write-up covering how the press performs week after week across a full summer, that is the other review. This one is about the catches, the limitations, and the use cases where you should probably look at something else.

The Papers: What Nobody Tells You About 150

The marketing leads with "150 patty papers included," and that sounds like a lot until you actually start cooking. My family of five runs a burger night roughly twice a month from May through September. We press four to six patties a session. At that pace, 150 papers lasted me about a year. Sounds fine, right? Except here is the problem I did not see coming: I would press three, use two papers on the last one because it stuck the first time, then toss three papers that got a little meat residue on them from handling. Before long I was burning through papers faster than my burger pace suggested.

If you press eight to ten patties every weekend for a bigger crew, the papers are gone in a few months, not a year. And replacement papers are not hard to find on Amazon, cheap packs of 200 and 500 exist, but the Meykers is sized for its own papers specifically. The diameter is a hair under four inches, which matches most generic round patty paper packs, but not all. I bought one generic pack early on and the papers were slightly too small, which defeated the whole purpose. Check the diameter before you reorder.

The bigger issue is what happens if you run out mid-cookout. I did this exactly once. I figured I could just spray the press with cooking spray and skip the paper. The patty stuck, tore in half when I tried to peel it off, and I ended up with a mangled mess that fell apart on the grate. The non-stick coating works fine in normal conditions, but without a paper barrier it is not slick enough to release a raw, fatty ground beef patty cleanly. Buy extra papers when you first order. It will save you a cookout.

I ran out of papers mid-cookout and tried cooking spray as a substitute. The patty tore in half and the whole batch fell apart on the grate. Buy the extra papers before you need them.

The Over-Pressing Problem: Thinner Is Not Always Better

The Meykers does not have a thickness stop. You press as hard as you want, and the handle gives you a mechanical advantage that is easy to overuse. When I first got the press I was honestly pretty aggressive with it, thinking a flat, uniform patty was the goal. What I actually made was a quarter-inch-thin beef disc that cooked through in about ninety seconds and had the texture of a cardboard coaster by the time it hit the bun. It was not a burger. It was a tragedy.

The ideal press with this tool is firm but not full-body-weight firm. You want about three-quarters of an inch of thickness in the finished patty. That requires some restraint, especially at first, because the whole point of a press is to compress, and your instinct is to really lean into it. A few bad batches will teach you the right pressure faster than I can describe it in words. The fix is to use about 5 to 6 ounces of meat per patty and press until the edges just reach the rim of the mold, then stop. Do not chase more compression than that.

The single fixed diameter of roughly four inches is the other constraint here. You get one size: standard American burger patty. That is perfect for a sesame bun. But if you want a thicker, smaller pub-style patty, or if you prefer a bigger 5.5-inch smash-style patty for a brioche bun, the Meykers cannot help you. The size is fixed and there is no adjustment. That is a real limitation for cooks who like variety.

How the Non-Stick Surface Actually Holds Up

After about eight months of use, my Meykers press has a noticeably different surface feel than it did out of the box. Not ruined. Not unusable. But the pressing face has a faint ghosting of brown staining that scrubbing does not fully remove, and the slickness is maybe 70 to 75 percent of what it was new. It still works perfectly fine with a patty paper. The question is what caused the degradation, and the honest answer is heat. I made the mistake of leaving the press near the grill for a few minutes while I was getting things ready, and the radiant heat from the grill lid warped the surface slightly and accelerated the staining.

The Meykers is a kitchen and prep-area tool, not a grill-side tool. It is made from BPA-free plastic with a food-safe coating, and it is fine for its intended use at room temperature with raw meat. Put it near active heat, even indirect heat, and you are shortening its life. Keep it on the counter or the prep table well away from the grill. That is not a criticism of the design exactly, because no one should be pressing patties next to an open flame, but it is something a first-time buyer might not think about.

Hand washing is strongly preferred over the dishwasher. The coating holds up better if you rinse with warm water and a soft sponge right after use, before the meat residue dries. I ran it through the dishwasher twice and both times it came out with more staining and a slightly tackier surface than hand washing ever left. It is technically dishwasher-safe as advertised, but your press will last longer if you treat it gently.

Cleanup: Easier Than You Think, With One Exception

If you use a patty paper every single time, cleanup is genuinely about thirty seconds. Rinse, wipe, done. The wax paper catches the meat contact and the press itself barely gets dirty. This is probably the single best practical feature of the Meykers design: the tool stays cleaner than a press that makes direct contact with meat on every press.

The exception is fat. Ground beef with a higher fat ratio, anything 80/20 or fattier, sometimes pushes grease up through the sides of the paper and onto the press rim and handle. That fat sits in the handle joint if you do not catch it, and over time it leaves a sticky residue that is harder to clean than fresh grease. The fix is simple: use a slightly smaller ball of meat centered carefully on the paper so fat does not push out the sides, and wipe the handle down with a damp cloth after every session regardless of whether it looks dirty.

The Single-Size Limitation Is Real

I want to spend a moment on this because it is the thing most enthusiastic Meykers reviews gloss over entirely. This press makes one size of patty. Around four inches in diameter. If that is all you need, great. But if your household has a mix of people who want different sizes, or if you want to do sliders for a party alongside full-size burgers, you will need a separate tool. The Meykers does not slide, adjust, or transform. It is what it is.

For comparison, adjustable-weight and adjustable-diameter presses exist, including options from Cuisinart, that let you change thickness and diameter. If you want that flexibility, the Meykers is not your press. It trades versatility for simplicity and a very low price point. That trade is worth it for a lot of cooks. Just know what you are signing up for. My full breakdown of how the Meykers stacks up against the Cuisinart Adjustable Patty Maker is in the Meykers vs Cuisinart comparison if you want the head-to-head.

Who This Is For

The Meykers earns its place in your gear rotation if you cook burgers for a household of two to four people, you press them once a week or less during grilling season, and you are not particular about having thick steakhouse-style patties. It is also a genuinely good entry point for anyone who has never used a burger press and wants to understand whether a press fits their cooking style before spending more on an adjustable model. The price is low enough that trying it is low risk. If it becomes a habit, you can always graduate to something with more flexibility later.

It works especially well if you make patties ahead and freeze them, because the round wax papers double as freezer separators. You can press a whole batch on a Sunday afternoon, layer them with the papers still on, and freeze a stack that cooks from frozen on a weeknight with no sticking. That is genuinely useful and not something every burger press setup makes easy.

Who Should Skip It

Skip the Meykers if you cook for large groups regularly. If you are pressing ten or more patties every Saturday, you will blow through the 150 papers in a couple of months, and you will quickly find the fixed single size limits your menu. You will also want something with a thickness guide if you are serious about patty consistency, because the Meykers gives you no physical feedback on when to stop pressing.

Also skip it if you prefer thick, half-pound pub burgers. The press can technically hold six ounces of meat, but the resulting patty is fat enough to dome in the middle and split around the edges rather than forming cleanly. It is designed for standard quarter-pound patties at the American fast-food diameter. Forcing it beyond that design intent produces ugly patties that fall apart. If thick burgers are your thing, look at something with a deeper mold. And if the long-term performance picture matters to you, the long-term Meykers review covers a full summer of use in detail.

The Honest Verdict on This Press

Here is the version of this review I would give you if we were standing at my back fence after a Sunday cookout. The Meykers Burger Press is a good, honest tool that does exactly what it says it does for the cook it is designed for. It is not the last burger press you will ever need if you get serious about your patty game. But for most backyard weekend cooks who want consistent four-inch patties without fussing over hand-forming technique, it solves the problem cleanly and cheaply.

The catches are real but avoidable. Buy replacement papers before you run out. Keep it away from grill heat. Hand wash it. Do not press so hard you make beef crackers. Do all of that and the Meykers will serve you well for a couple of grilling seasons without complaint. Just go in clear-eyed about what it is and what it cannot do. That is all any honest review can ask.