Complete Cookout Shopping List
Most cookout lists are long because they hedge. This one is short because it assumes you would rather have four good things than twelve average ones. Print it, or do not, but the order of it matters.
Buy the beef first and let everything else follow from it. The number of people decides the beef, and the beef decides the bread.
The beef
- Two patties per adult at a cookout, one at a sit-down.
- Half a pound of boneless beef per adult if you are serving steak or a roast instead.
- Add twenty percent for an afternoon that runs long.
“You don't want a lean burger. You don't want some silly 90-10. You know, get a good 80-20, 75-25 blend.”
Gray Shipley
Buy on that ratio and do not let anyone talk you into a leaner patty for a grill. Lean is for a pan where you control the time.
The bread
One bun per patty plus four spare, because buns are the thing that gets squashed, dropped or toasted past saving. Buy them the day before at the latest.
The condiments, and this is where people overbuy
“I think, what don't I like, you know, I don't like just like low-grade store-bought condiments. I don't like putting, you know, seed or vegetable oil-based mayonnaise on it.”
Gray Shipley
Six bottles of indifferent sauce is worse than two good ones. If you are going to do one thing properly here, make the mayonnaise.
“If you're going to put mayonnaise on a burger, take the time to get an egg and some lemon juice and make the, you know, put some avocado oil in. Make the mayonnaise, it ain't hard.”
Gray Shipley
It takes five minutes, it costs very little, and it is the single most noticeable upgrade on the whole table.
The rest of the list
- Cheese. One slice per patty plus a few, sliced thin enough to melt in the time a burger needs.
- Lettuce, tomato, red onion. Sliced the morning of, not the day before.
- Pickles. More than you think. They disappear.
- Ice. Twice what you planned. This is the most reliably underbought item at any cookout.
- Foil and a tray. For holding cooked batches while the next one goes on.
- Paper towels. Everywhere, not in one place.
Quantities people get wrong
- Ice. Underbought at almost every cookout. Two bags more than you planned.
- Buns. Bought the same day they are needed, and never quite enough.
- Cheese. Overbought, then left in the sun. Buy what you need and keep it cold.
- Sauce. Overbought by a factor of three. Two good ones is the whole answer.
What to skip
Skip the third sauce, the novelty bun and anything that needs assembling to order while you are also cooking. A cookout has one cook and that cook should be able to stand still occasionally.
Dry-aged patties at 5.3 ounces, portioned already. Count heads, count patties, done.
View Product
One pound packs of dry-aged ground beef. Four quarter-pounders or three third-pounders to the pack.
View ProductSame portion, everyday pricing. This is the one to buy by the case when the number gets large.
View ProductWork the numbers with how much beef per person, run the day with the cookout plan, and if you want the toppings to do the work, set up a burger bar.
- Cook to a Safe Minimum Internal Temperature, FoodSafety.gov
Food-safety temperatures and storage times on this page are cited to the agencies above rather than to us.
Written at Shipley Farms in Vilas, North Carolina: a family cattle farm raising and dry-aging beef in the Appalachian Mountains, now in its fifth generation. No shortcuts since 1872.
Every quote on this page is Gray Shipley talking, the man who runs this farm. We sat down with him, turned on a recorder, and left his words alone.
Nobody knows this beef better than we do. On food safety we leave it to FoodSafety.gov, and we have linked their page above. Reviewed 3 October 2026.
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