The internet is full of fabulous facts about everything from current events to the history basket weaving. Because of this, as we research for our daily content on food trucks, food carts and street food, we stumble upon some items of knowledge that we just did not know. We have decided when these fun facts pop up, that we would share them with our readers in our section titled “Did You Know?”

For today’s Did You Know fun food facts we will look at Hamburgers.

The Facts: We have Genghis Khan and his conquering hordes of horsemen to thank for the simple hamburger. While his nomadic troops were riding to battle, they would keep scraps of lamb or mutton, formed into patties, under their saddles to tenderize the meat. When they stopped to make camp, the horsemen would cook the patties over open flames or eat them raw. The dish was taken to Russia, where it became “steak tartare.”

• From Russia, the dish made its way to Germany, where pork or beef was used in the patties. Then the burger found its way to America via the crew and immigrant passengers of the German Hamburg-Amerika shipping line. On board, the passengers ate a dish of ground meat that was spiced and stretched out with onions and breadcrumbs.
• Some say December 21 is National Hamburger Day. Others say National Hamburger Day is July 28. The burger also gets a whole month of celebration in May. We say why not have multiple days to celebrate this meat filled sandwich?
• The average American consumes about 30 pounds of hamburgers a year.
• More than seven of every ten burgers (73% or 9.6 billion) consumed in the U.S. were prepared and purchased out of the home.
• The Hamburger Hall of Fame is located in Seymour, Wis.
• The first restaurant chain to serve the burger was White Castle in Wichita, Kansas
• Hamburger (ground beef patty) is the most popular food for the grill, followed by steak and chicken.