Loco Moco (White Rice With Hamburger Patties and Fried Eggs)

Name: Loco Moco (White Rice With Hamburger Patties and Fried Eggs)
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 12 min
Total time: 27 min
Yield: 4
Ingredients: 1 pound (453 g) ground beef, (80% lean/20% fat); 2 tablespoons (12 g) panko breadcrumbs; 1 tablespoon (15 ml) Worcestershire sauce; 1 teaspoon garlic powder; 2 teaspoons (10 ml) canola oil; 1/4 teaspoon Diamond Crystal kosher salt; for table salt use half as much by volume; 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper; 1/2 medium yellow onion (4 ounces; 113 g), thinly sliced; 2 cups (480 ml) store-bought low-sodium beef stock or 2 teaspoons jarred beef stock base dissolved in 2 cups tap water; 2 tablespoons (14 g) cornstarch; 2 tablespoons (30 ml) soy sauce; 2 tablespoons (30 ml) tomato ketchup; 1 teaspoon (5 ml) Worcestershire sauce; 1/2 teaspoon sugar; 1/4 teaspoonDiamond Crystal kosher salt; for table salt use half as much by volume; 1 recipe warm cooked white rice for serving; 4 crispy fried eggs for serving

A plate of loco moco, a dish comprising rice, a hamburger patty, gravy, and a fried egg, served on a green patterned tablecloth — Serious Eats / Loco Moco

In This Recipe

Origins of Loco Moco
How to Make Great Loco Moco at Home

Why It Works

Adding panko breadcrumbs to the ground beef mixture helps bind the ingredients together, so the thin patties hold their shape once cooked.
Cornstarch thickens the gravy and creates an appealing glossy sheen.
Making the gravy with boxed beef stock enhances the dish's signature savory flavor.

Loco moco is as comforting as comfort food gets. The beloved Hawaiian dish consists of a stacked tower of a ground beef patty served atop a pile of white rice, smothered with onion gravy, and topped with a crispy fried egg. I mean, aren’t you almost full from reading that description alone?!

People in Hawaii enjoy this hearty meal for breakfast, lunch, dinner, or any time in between. And while some restaurants and home cooks may make variations of the dish with Spam, fish, or seafood in place of the hamburger patty, the name loco moco only applies to the version with hamburger patties. When the protein changes, the name is also changed—Spam loco, shrimp loco, and so on.

Four plates of food each with a fried egg on top, served on a marble countertop — Serious Eats / Loco Moco

Origins of Loco Moco

According to Rachel Lauden’s book The Food of Paradise: Exploring Hawaii’s Culinary Heritage, the dish was reportedly created at the Lincoln Grill restaurant in Hilo, Hawaii, in 1949 by its proprietors, Richard Inouye and his wife, Nancy. Local teenagers were clamoring for something substantial but different than typical American sandwiches.

Reportedly, these teenagers also chose the name: Loco was the nickname of the first boy to try it (loco means crazy in Spanish and Hawaiian pidgin) and moco was added to the name by the teens because it rhymed and sounded fun. It was love at first bite for just about everyone who tried it, and the dish caught on in popularity in the Hawaiian Islands over the years as a satisfying, filling, easy to prepare meal.

How to Make Great Loco Moco at Home

In the recipe below, my Birmingham, Alabama-based test kitchen colleague Renu Dhar shares a version of this popular Hawaiian staple that delivers the classic and comforting home-cooked flavor to be expected in loco moco. Her loco moco ground beef mixture includes Worcestershire sauce and garlic powder for a savory punch, as well as panko breadcrumbs to help bind the delicate meat mixture together. The mixture is shaped into thin patties that are briefly seared until just browned and set aside before you build the umami-rich gravy in the remaining rendered beef fat left in the skillet.

Pan with meat patties and gravy, spoon stirring liquid — Serious Eats / Loco Moco

The secret to the most savory loco moco gravy possible? Store-bought boxed beef stock. Yes you heard me right. Now, we at Serious Eats usually have a rule against using store-bought beef stock or broth because its flavor is usually inferior to homemade stock, but Renu wants you to hear her out: In her research she found that the boxed stock flavor is a critical component in loco moco's unique flavor profile. "It's the Islands thing to do," she says. Loco moco gravy shouldn’t taste like a from-scratch beef stock. It's meant to taste over-the-top savory, so the added MSG, hydrolyzed proteins, and onion powder often added to enhance boxed beef stocks and broths actually boost the flavor of this gravy.

The gravy ingredients are briefly simmered until thickened and glossy before the seared patties are added back to the skillet to finish cooking in the gravy. At this point, it’s time to load up that plate and stack everything sky high. Start with a mound of rice, which will anchor the hamburger patty and fried egg in place. Once you've topped the rice with the beef patty and then a fried egg, finish the dish with an overly generous ladle of the gravy. It should cling to and glide over the egg and beef patty before dribbling down and soaking into the rice. The result is a glossy, gloriously delicious plate of beautiful brown food. Truly comfort food at its best.

This recipe was developed by Renu Dhar; the headnote was written by Leah Colins.