Hello veggie burger!

One of my ongoing quests is to find the perfect veggie burger.

Here’s a hint: It’s definitely not in the freezer section of your local supermarket. Unless, of course, cardboard is your idea of perfect.

In my opinion, the perfect veggie burger should be really filling and have a substantial texture (like meat). It should have lots of flavor and spices and should leave you not missing meat.

Honestly, I try a lot of different veggies burgers and I rarely post them because I find them to be kind of blah.

To date, my best veggie burger attempt, in my opinion, was the beet burgers I made over a year ago.

I still like those burgers, but I think this brown rice burger might surpass it as my favorite for one simple reason: it’s a lot easier to make! You can use leftover rice and have a very delicious burger in no time.

I’m not kidding at all when I say that I would take one of these instead of probably 95% of beef burgers in the world.

Brown Rice Burgers

Yield: 4 burgers.

Prep Time: 45 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour 15 minutes

Ingredients:

2 cups brown rice, cooked
1/2 sweet onion, sauteed
1/4 cup cilantro, minced
1 tablespoon garam masala
1 large egg
3 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1/3 cup oat flour
Salt and pepper
4 large buns, toasted
1 avocado, sliced

Mango-pineapple Relish:
1 cup pineapple
1 mango, cubed
1-2 Serrano peppers, with seeds

Helpful Equipment:
Food Processor for relish

Directions:

1) For relish, combine ingredients in a food processor and pulse until smooth. If you don't have a food processor, you can also just dice everything very finely.

2) Cook brown rice according to package and let cool or use leftover rice.

3) Sautee diced onion in 1 tablespoon olive oil over medium heat until the onion is translucent, but not browned, about 5 minutes.

4) Mix onion, cilantro, and garam masala with rice. Crack in an egg and combine well. Stir in oat flour. You might need a bit more oat flour. Your rice should be firm and stick together if you press it into a ball.

5) Form 4 large burgers with the rice mixture and season each burger with salt and pepper.

6) Cook the burgers in a heavy pan over medium-high heat with 2 tablespoons of olive oil in the pan. Cook until browned evenly on both sides, about 4-5 minutes per side.

7) Toast buns and serve rice burgers on bun with relish and topped with sliced avocado.

Hello Mango

The other nice thing about this burger is that it’s actually incredibly healthy for a burger. No cheese or mayo or anything. For the sauce, I just pureed a few really flavorful ingredients into a spicy relish that was very delicious.

Great flavors.

Ideally, just cube up these ingredients and add them to a food processor and pulse them until it’s mostly smooth.

I used one Serrano with the seeds and I thought it was pretty spicy, but if you wanted to up the heat level even more, you could use two.

If you don’t have a food processor, don’t fret. Just dice up the ingredients very finely and you’ll have more of a salsa, but it’ll still be really tasty.

Some chunks are okay.

Making the Burgers

The one down side of these burgers is that brown rice does take a while to cook. While you could use white rice for it, I worry that the burgers would end up being a bit bland. Brown rice has a nice nutty flavor that really adds to the burgers.

In an ideal world, you could save a few cups of leftover brown rice for a separate meal and then use it to make these burgers. That would cut your prep time down to just minutes.

Leftover rice would be great.

Once you have your rice, add to it your sauteed onions (just cook them over medium heat in a drizzle of olive oil until they soften). Also add the minced cilantro and stir this all together.

Cook the onions first!

At this point, the burgers have a great texture and some good backbone flavors going on, but I thought they needed a hit of a good spice.

Enter garam masala! This was the perfect spice for these burgers. These days you should be able to find this spice mixture in most supermarkets.

If you’ve never used garam masala before, it’s a pretty popular spice mixture for Indian food. It normally has a pretty large list of ingredients in it, but almost always has some cumin, cardamon, cloves, and various peppers. It’s good stuff.

Spice is nice!

The Binder

Now our burgers should be pretty tasty, but there’s no way you’ll get this rice mixture to stick together as is. So crack in an egg and mix in some oat flour.

You can easily substitute all-purpose flour for oat flour, but the oat flour does add a little bit of extra flavor to the finished burgers.

The binder!

Making and Cooking

Make a test burger to make sure that the mixture sticks together well. If it seems really sticky, add in a bit more flour.

Once it’s a nice firm consistency, make four large burgers out of the mixture.

4 big burgers.

Season these burgers with salt and pepper and then cook them in a large heavy skillet over medium high heat with a drizzle of olive oil (about 2 tablespoons). Cook them for about 4-5 minutes per side until they are nicely browned.

I didn’t try it, but I think you could grill these guys. They were pretty sturdy actually and I think as long as you didn’t mess with them much on the grill, they would hold up just fine.

Any pan will work really.

Serving the Burgers

As always, I’m a fan of a toasted bun for my burgers so I definitely recommend that. Then add a good slather of the relish to the bottom bun.

Check out that color!

Love that color!

Stack on a burger and a few slices of avocado and you’re ready to go!

The 'cado is key.

The avocado acts like a creamy element for the burgers. It’s very essential in my opinion.

Betsy and I both gave these guys two thumbs up and fought for the extras for lunch the next day.

She w0n.

Just a great burger.

Now, if you are completely set on sabotaging my veggie burger recipe, you could make a beef burger and slap it between this relish and some avocado and still have a pretty tasty thing.

But try it with rice. I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised!

Cooked maggots look just like rice!

Maggots are one of the best sources of protein you can get. I’m pretty sure that Andrew Zimmern has been preaching about how delicious they are for years now.

Normally, I think they are fried, but why not fold them into a delicious slider recipe. It makes the slider oh-so-juicy.

And remember, whenever possible use organic maggots that have been locally raised.

Maggot Sliders

Yield: 12 sliders

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound ground beef
1/2 cup white rice, cooked
6-8 ounces cheddar cheese
12 slider buns
Lettuce
Sliced onions
Salt and pepper
Pickles (opt.)
Spiders and other scary stuff

Directions:

1) Mix cooked rice with ground beef then form 12 small patties with the mixture. I used long white rice, but if I made these again, I would try it with arborio I think.

2) Season slider patties with salt and pepper and cook in a skillet for about 3-4 minutes per side over medium-high heat.

3) Meanwhile, split buns in half and toast in a 350 degree oven for 5 minutes.

4) Add cheese to buns and return to oven to melt the cheese.

5) Add patties to buns and garnish with lettuce, onions, pickles, etc.

Maggots Look Like Rice!

It’s pretty obviously rice. In a dark room though with a well-labeled “Maggot Sliders” sign, you could easily get away with it.

This is a fantastic use for leftover rice if you happen to have any. If you’re making fresh though, I might recommend using a fatter rice like arborio. My long grain rice ended up looking too much like, well, rice.

Next time I might try arborio rice.

The Sliders

Even though these are at least half gimmick, it’s still important to make a good slider. People will still want to eat them! So mix your rice in with some good ground beef and then form about 12 even patties with the mixture. Season them really well with salt and pepper.

Still season them well.

While you could grill these guys, I just seared them in a hot skillet over medium-high heat with a drizzle of olive oil until they were nice and browned on both sides.

Mine took about 3-4 minutes per side to be cooked the way I like them, which is medium.

Cooking them maggots!

The Buns.

In my opinion, the best slider buns are the savory King’s Hawaiian potato rolls that you can buy in the deli or bakery section of most stores these days. They are light and buttery and perfect for sliders.

I just cut mine open and toast them in a 350 degree oven for about 4 minutes. Then I pile on some cheese, which is optional of course.

Cheese goes well with everything. Even bugs.

Add the buns back to the oven for a minute to melt the cheese and then pile on all the slider patties.

Delicious.

You could serve these with a wide range of toppings including sliced onions, pickles, lettuce, and the normal condiments.

Plastic flies are optional, but encouraged.

One of my maggots hatched!

The most important part about these sliders is that they are actually really tasty. Nice and simple, but would be a great party treat.

I do think that with the correct lighting, you could convince anyone under the age of 10 that these were maggots!

CHOMP!

The idea of a healthy burger might be a bit strange to some people, but that’s what Jamie Oliver tried to do in his recent season of Food Revolution: LA.

He worked with a local LA fast food joint to replace some of their unhealthy (but delicious looking) burgers on the menu with burgers that will hopefully be equally delicious but also healthier.

There were four burgers that he made on the show, but you guys voted for the Green Goddess burger so I did my best to recreate it!

It turned out really awesome although I’m not sure I mastered the health parts.

Green Goddess Burgers

Yield: 9 Burgers

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 40 minutes

Ingredients:

3 pounds ground beef. I recommend getting a chuck roast and grinding it yourself!
Buns

Green Goddess Sauce:
2 Cups Greek yogurt
1/2 lemon, juice only
4 ounces feta cheese, crumbled
1/3 Cup fresh parsley, minced
Pinch of salt and pepper

Basic Guacamole:
4 avocados
1-2 shallots, minced
1-2 jalapenos, seeded and minced
Handful fresh cilantro, minced
2 limes, juice only
Pinch of salt

Other burger toppings:
Grilled onions
Sprouts
Roasted red peppers

Helpful Equipment:
Food Processor or Meat Grinder

Directions:

1) For green goddess sauce, mix ingredients in a bowl and season with salt and pepper. Can be made in advance.

2) For guacamole, dice ingredients finely and mix.

3) For burgers, separate meat and fat on chuck roast. Grind or process fat until it's finely ground into a paste.

4) Remove fat and grind/process meat. Don't overprocess meat.

5) Stir meat and fat together or send them through the grinder together.

6) Make 9 1/3 pound burgers. Season well with salt and pepper.

7) Grill burgers over high heat for 4-5 minutes per side.

Making the Burgers

Now you could definitely just use normal hamburger meat for these guys, but in the Food Revolution spirit, I thought it would be good to grind my own meat.

Also, I think you can get a lot better flavor by grinding your own. Remember that most ground beef you buy at the store is just scraps.

So you can do a lot better for not a lot of money by getting a nice chuck roast and doing it yourself.

There are burgers in there...

To do this right, step one is cutting out most of the fat from the roast. This takes some patience, but you should be able to cut off the large pieces of meat and then slice off the layers of fat.

It doesn’t have to be perfect.

Once you have most of your fat cut off, send it through your grinder or pulse it in a food processor until it’s basically a paste.

The reason you want to do the fat separately is because you want the fat to have a finer texture than the meat.

The fat stuff.

Then take out the fat and grind the meat. If you’re using a food processor, be careful not to over-process the meat or you’ll have a paste instead of ground beef.

Then you can mix the fat and meat together! If you’re a perfectionist, you could weigh the fat and meat and make sure that you are getting about 20% fat which is what I like to use in my burgers.

I think I over-shot the fat content a bit in this round (so much for healthy). I probably had closer to 30% fat. Oh well!

Maybe a bit too much fat!

Three pounds of chuck roast should make about nine burgers. I like to make mine about 1/3 of a pound. Just shape them lightly with your hands and try not to press down on the burgers too much.

Season them all really well with salt and pepper.

Looking good!

The Green Goddess Sauce

In the show, Jamie slathers his burger with some sort of yogurt-based sauce. It’s kind of hard to see what’s going on there, but I had to guess, so I went with these things:

Making a green goddess.

Mixed all together they make a great creamy sauce that takes the place of cheese on the burger. You can make this in advance if you want. It’s better on day two actually.

Tasty stuff.

Guacamole

The second topping for the burger is just my standard guacamole recipe. Guacamole on a burger is one of those fantastic combinations that once you have once, you’ll want it every time.

These days, I don’t really make a small amount of guacamole. Whatever doesn’t go on the burgers can go on chips!

Artsy avocado shot....

When making guacamole, just be sure to dice all your ingredients well. It’s never good to get a huge bite of jalapeno or something.

Other than that though, just mix everything together! The lime juice is really important as the acid will keep the guacamole nice and green.

You can never have too much.

Cooking the Burgers

Obviously, the best thing to do is grill the burgers. If you don’t have a grill though, you could definitely do these in a pan also.

Grill them over high heat for 4-5 minutes per side for a medium burger and be ready for some serious flare-ups, especially if you have 30% fat like mine were…

One of my favorite things.

Once the burgers are done, slather one side of the bun with the green goddess dressing and the other side with guacamole.

This one I kept pretty standard, but feel free to spruce it up with sprouts, grilled onions, or red peppers also.

Really good.

I’m not entirely sure that my version ended up being much healthier than a normal burger, but I did use a whole wheat bun. So I get some points, people!

In all seriousness though, it’s a delicious burger and very different than anything you’ll find at a fast food place which is the point!

By request!

Betsy and I went mountain biking last weekend for the first time here in the mountain biking capital of the world. I had been once before, but it was Betsy’s inaugural journey.

Turns out that she is a mountain biking natural. She was hoping over boulders and stuff like a pro. Meanwhile, I was stumbling all over the place. I think I’ll make her lead next time so she can’t see me constantly falling on my face!

When we got home, I was anxious to see what people thought would be a good post-mountain biking meal. Turns out that turkey burgers won the poll which was awesome. First, they just sounded good to me. Second, I’ve never made turkey burgers on Macheesmo before so I was excited to give them a shot!

California Turkey Burgers

Yield: 4 Burgers

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

12 ounces ground turkey (16 ounces will make 5 burgers)
1/4 red onion, diced
Handful of parsley, minced
1 Serrano pepper, minced (optional)
2 cloves garlic, minced
Salt and pepper
4 ounces Cheddar cheese (or your favorite)
Ciabatta rolls
Avocado
Greens
Other burger fixings

Directions:

1) Mince onions, parsley, garlic, and pepper. Mix with ground turkey along with salt and pepper.

2) Form 4 patties with turkey mixture.

3) Grill over high heat for 5-6 minutes per side.

4) In the last minute, add cheese to burger and close lid to help melt cheese.

5) Grill buns until lightly charred.

6) Assemble burger with avocado, mayo/mustard, and greens!

Making the Burgers

Frankly, I find turkey burgers to be a bit bland normally. If I got to a restaurant I’ll almost always order a veggie burger over a turkey burger unless there’s something special about that place’s turkey burgers.

Fortunately, at home, we can do a few things to make the burgers have some good flavor.

Like mix in some herbs and veggies! Now, you could go crazy on the herbs if you wanted. I just went with some fresh parsley, but tons of herbs play well with turkey because it’s kind of a blank slate. So go crazy.

Burger basics

I mixed in some red onion and diced Serrano pepper as well to give it some extra flavor and heat. The key to all of these veggies is to make sure you dice them very small so nobody gets a huge bite of red onion or something in their burger.

Then just toss everything in a bowl together along with a pinch of salt and pepper.

Mixins!

Grilling the Burgers

Once you have your burgers mixed and formed into patties, grill them over high heat for about 5-6 minutes per side.

Once they are almost cooked, add some cheese on top if that’s your thing. I sliced mine this time, but grated cheese will melt faster.

Either way should get the job done though on a hot grill.

Use your cheese of choice.

The Buns

I spend a lot of time thinking about buns when I’m making burgers. A bun can make or break the whole thing for me. Sometimes I make my own (like these kaiser rolls) if I have enough of a head start.

On this day I was able to find these perfect little ciabatta rolls at the store which would be perfect for these burgers.

I grilled them also of course to get them nice and crunchy.

Most important.

Any time I describe something as “California” that really just means it has avocado on it.

So yea, once my burgers and buns were grilled, I topped mine off with some avocado, mayo or mustard, and some fresh greens.

Great burger.

As an aside, those greens you see there… those were my first thing harvested from my garden this year!

I’ll post more on the garden on another day, but two months of planning and maintenance went into those little leaves you see there!

Oh. And make these burgers. They are good. And that’s from somebody that doesn’t really like turkey burgers.

Beets in a burger!

I think this recipe wins the award for me getting the most crap about a dish. Turns out that if you bring a delicious homemade vegetarian burger to a BBQ, people will make fun of you.

I mean it was relentless! People ate them and agreed that they were interesting and tasty, but then they proceeded to mock me for the rest of the night.

Which is fine by me. Next time I’m just going to mix up a batch of these and just eat them in my house by myself. That’s somehow better right?

Anyway, the point is that if you can find a forgiving BBQ or just want a change, these burgers are pretty darn good.

Beet Burgers

Yield: 10-12 burgers

Prep Time: 1 hour

Total Time: 1 hour 20 minutes

Ingredients:

1 Cup cooked brown rice (1/2 Cup dry)
1 onion, diced
1 poblano pepper, diced with seeds removed
3 large red beets, diced small
5 cloves garlic, minced
1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
Juice from 1/2 lemon
2 Tablespoons cider vinegar (I left this out because I didn't have any, but I think it would work well)
3 Tablespoons parsley, minced
1 Teaspoon coriander
2 Teaspoons dried thyme
1/2 Teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
1/4 Cup - 1/2 Cup all-purpose flour
Salt and pepper
Olive oil

Normal burger stuff like buns, cheese (provolone or Gruyere work nicely), toppings.

Directions:

1) Get a pot of water boiling and add 1/2 Cup of brown rice along with a pinch of salt. Boil until rice is slightly overcooked but not mushy, about 35-40 minutes. Strain the rice when done.

2) Peel and dice the beets into 1/4 inch cubes. Seed the poblano pepper and dice small along with the onion. Mince the garlic.

3) In a large pot, add a Tablespoon of oil and put it over medium high heat. Add the onions, peppers, and garlic and cook until the onions are translucent, about 5 minutes.

4) Add the beets to the onion mixture, cover, and cook until the beets are soft over medium heat. They should be done in 15-20 minutes. Stir in the cider vinegar near the end.

5) Combine the beet mixture with the rice and drained beans and mush everything together. Add the spices and taste for salt and pepper.

6) Cook the burgers by shaping them into patties and adding them to a very hot oiled skillet. They should sizzle. Flip them after a few minutes. Add cheese once you flip it. If you cover the pan with a lid (or plate) the cheese will melt faster.

7) Serve with a toasted bun and whatever toppings you want!

Adapted from a Kitchn Recipe.

The Beets Mixture

One of the problems that some veggies burgers have is that they can be a bit mushy. These guys definitely don’t have that problem. The rice, beans, and beets give a really great texture to the burger that almost gives it kind of a meaty feel and a really nice deep flavor.

Basic stuff.

The beet base for these burgers is really easy. The hardest part is just chopping up all the stuff. Be especially aware of what you’re wearing when you’re dicing the beets. HINT: Wearing white is a recipe for disaster.

Dice up the poblano peppers (take the seeds out), onions, and beets into pretty small cubes. I diced them into about 1/4 inch cubes.

Good chopping practice!

Next, add a Tablespoon or so of olive oil to a large pot and put it over medium-high heat. Then add the onions, peppers, and garlic and cook them until the onions are translucent which should take about 4 minutes. Then stir in the beets, cover the dish and cook until the beets are soft. Stir the dish every few minutes until it’s done just to make sure nothing burns. It’ll probably take about 15-20 minutes for the beets to cook.

Stir in the cider vinegar near the end and set the bright red mixture aside.

While you’re working on the beet mix, get a large pot of water boiling separately and add a good pinch of salt to it along with 1/2 Cup of rice. Boil the brown rice until it’s a bit beyond cooked. It’ll make it easier to mush and form later.

It’s not important how much water you use when boiling the rice in this case. Just cook it until it’s the right consistency and then drain it using a strainer.

Rice is a burger works nicely.

Combine the rice with the black beans (I just used canned) and mush them together a little bit.

In a bowl!

Then add all of the beet mixture along with the spices.

The original recipe called for a few Tablespoons of flour to help thicken the mixture, but mine was pretty wet when I was done and so I added a bit more flour. The burger mix should be shapeable obviously so just add flour in small increments and try forming a patty out of it. It’ll be pretty delicate (or at least mine was) but it should stick loosely together.

This was what my final mix looked like. Don’t forget to taste it and add some salt, pepper, or any of the other spices if it seems under-seasoned.

All mixed up!

Cooking the Burgers

While it’s nice to fire up a grill and cook these guys, they are actually really hard to cook on the grill. I was able to do it by spraying the grill with some non-stick spray and grilling them on high heat for just a few minutes a side. It was pretty touch and go though.

I think the real way to cook these guys is in a heavy pan. You don’t need anything special. Just your largest skillet should do the trick. Add a tiny amount of oil to it and crank up the heat to high. Then form your burgers and add them straight to the pan. They should sizzle!

Cook them for a few minutes a side until they are nice and browned on the outside. Obviously these are cooked already so you just want to give them some texture. Mine cooked beautifully in a pan and it was a lot easier than the grill.

You can try the grill if you're advanced.

If you’re using cheese (probably should) then just add it when you flip the burger. If you cover the pan the cheese will get really melted.

Then add a burger to a toasted bun and chow down!

Bright red!

I thought these were awesome and ate a few of them. The beet mixture keeps great in the fridge for a week or so. It would be totally acceptable to have some on hand and cook up a burger when the mood struck you.

Of course, you wouldn’t want to tell anybody about it because they would ridicule you.

Whatever though. I don’t mind suffering through a few snide comments if it means I get to eat this burger. It might not be for everybody, but there’s no doubt that I’d choose this over a normal veggie burger and probably on many occasions over a real burger.

If you refuse to at least try something like this then the joke’s on you suckers!

Muy Delicioso!

After my Sophomore year in college, I lived for a summer with a friend in Buenos Aires, Argentina. We had a lot of fun in those 10 weeks (maybe too much fun actually).

While I don’t remember much Spanish unfortunately, I do remember a few things about Argentina: 1) Argentinians are beautiful. It’s something in the water. 2) They enjoy late dinners. If you even hint at hunger before 9PM, you will be mocked. 3) They had the most wonderful beef I’ve ever had in my life. I dream of it. They take really good care of their animals and people respect the animals. The quality is just unbelievable.

Sometimes I try to relive some eating experiences from Argentina and this burger was one of those tries. The key to it is the spicy chimichurri blend that goes on as a topping. In Argentina, this stuff is served with almost every meal. Something about the blend of spices can make good beef taste beefier.

The Argentine Burger

Yield: 4 burgers.

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound grass-fed chuck, ground
1 Cup parsley
1/4 Cup cilantro
1 Tablespoon fresh oregano
1/4 of a red onion
3 cloves of garlic
1 Teaspoon hot paprika
2 Tablespoons red wine vinegar
1/4 Cup olive oil
6 ounces Monterey Jack cheese, grated
Salt and Pepper
Buns

Helpful Equipment:
Food Processor (for grinding the meat and for chimichurri). If you want to make the chimichurri by hand, you can maybe use a blender or just mince everything really finely.
Cast Iron Skillet (or a grill of some sort)

Directions:

1) To make the chimichurri, combine all your ingredients except the beef, cheese, and buns in a blender or food processor and whiz it up. If you don't have a blender, you can very finely chop everything and stir it together with your vinegar and oil.

This will become stronger the longer it sits. It's best in the one to two day range. After that it gets almost too strong.

2) If you're grinding your meat yourself, cut it into chunks and pulse it a few times in the food processor, or you can get your butcher to grind it for you.

3) Form 1/4 pound patties from the ground beef and put a big thumb depression in the center of each patty. Season well with salt and pepper.

4) I cook mine in a cast iron pan over high heat with just a drizzle of oil. Once the pan is very hot, add the burgers and make sure they don't touch. Sear them on each site for about 4-5 minutes per side for medium rare.

5) If you're using cheese, grate the cheese and add it to each burger a minute before they're done. If you have a lid, cover the pan for the best melting.

6) Toast the bun and serve each burger with a lot of chimichurri sauce!

Adapted from Burgers, Fries, and Shakes.

Making the chimichurri

I won’t lie to you. This stuff has a kick to it. I wouldn’t recommend eating it alone and then going out on a Saturday night. You’ll have a hard time socializing with people that didn’t eat it. That’s why the entire country of Argentina eats it for every meal.

Lots of flavors here.

I should also mention that there are a ton of varieties for chimichurri. There are red versions, green versions, hot and mild versions. This version isn’t very hot but it has a lot of flavor to it. It’s pretty acidic which goes well with the red meat.

To make it, roughly chop everything and process it up. If you don’t have a food processor, you can mince everything and stir it together with the vinegar and oil. Remember, chimichurri existed before food processors.

Gets stronger the longer it sits...

Try to make this at least an hour before serving it. If you make it a day or two ahead, it’ll be even more flavorful. I made mine an hour before and it was about perfectly fine though.

The Burgers

I’m putting my foot down. You can’t call this burger The Argentine unless you use the best beef you can find. Don’t use frozen beef patties and tell your friends you are making some Argentine Burgers. If you use crappy beef, you have to call them normal burgers with Chimichurri. Also, the chimichurri will overpower the meat if it’s just some bland freezer beef.

If you really want to make these, find a nice cut of grass-fed, pastured chuck roast. It’ll set you back a few extra bucks, but it’s worth it.

The Grinder of Whole Foods

I’ve written before that most butchers will grind your meat for you so there really isn’t a reason to buy pre-ground stuff. Pick the cut you want and have it ground. The exception to this, apparently, is The Whole Foods at P Street and 14th in Washington, DC (By the way their website advertises a “custom cuts butcher”).

I’ve had meat ground there before, but on this day they refused. That was kind of disappointing to me. Whole Foods is expensive and I’m not sure why they can’t offer a fairly standard service to their customers.

Anyway, no big deal. I’ll do it myself.

I just brought my lovely cut of beef home and cubed it up. I cut off some of the larger pieces of fat to process first. That way they get chopped a bit finer.

DIY Burger.

I processed the fat for a few seconds in my food process and then threw in the rest of the meat. If you’re making a lot of burgers, you probably want to do one pound at a time.

Once it’s ground (or chopped actually), you can form nice quarter pound patties. Be light with the meat. Try not to pack it down too much. Also, to make sure the burgers plump up evenly (you don’t want them to look like a football when they’re done), put a deep thumb impression in the middle of each one. Season them pretty liberally with salt and pepper also.

A proper burger.

The Cast Iron Method

If you have a grill, more power to ya. I, however, do not. It’s possible that not grilling beef is blasphemy in the eyes of an Argentinian, but I had no other options.

Cooking a burger on a hot cast iron pan is really easy though and produces really good results. Heat up your cast iron pan until it’s very hot and add just a tiny bit of oil (maybe 1 teaspoon). Then arrange your burgers around the pan, making sure that they don’t touch or overlap.

Who needs a grill?!

Don’t touch these! You want to make sure they develop a good sear on each side. After about 3-4 minutes, give them a flip. After 3 minutes on side two, add cheese if you’re using cheese. You should use cheese.

Grating the cheese helps it melt much faster.

Say cheese.

If you have a lid that fits your pan, cover it up for another minute or two. The steam will help melt the cheese perfectly.

Perfect.

If you like a medium burger, total cooking time should be about 8 or 9 minutes, give or take a minute or two depending on the size of your burgers and the temperature of your pan.

Once they’re done, add the burger to a toasted bun and top with some chimichurri sauce. The toasted bun is pretty important. It holds up nicely to all the juices from the burger and the sauce.

Served with chips!

This is a simple looking burger, but it’s deceptively flavorful. Each burger is really filling. The beef flavor is really nice and intense and the acidity of the chimichurri is perfect.

If you have time, you could also whip up a batch of homemade chips!

This is why I needed a good roll!

I left you all hanging yesterday as to what I used those Kaiser rolls for. Well now you know. But let me back up and talk about burgers.

In my very humble opinion, a really good burger comes down to a few very simple things. You don’t need to mix in tons of spices and sauces and stuff. This is what’s really important:

Nick’s Keys To a Good Burger No Matter What

- Use good meat. It’s pretty hard to examine meat quality once it has been ground so this usually means grinding it yourself or asking the butcher to grind something that you select. This is not hard and takes seconds yet 99% of people don’t do it.
- Fat. I’m sorry, but a good burger needs fat. At least 20%, but probably 25%. Deal with it.
- A good bun. You know that fat? It’s gonna need a place to go. You want something that will hold up to the burger.
- High heat. A good burger has a seared crust.

Do those things and you can’t go wrong. Notice I didn’t say anything about doneness, cheese, toppings, or anything else. In my opinion those can all be fixed to taste.

Don’t Get me Wrong. Will I eat a burger that is missing one of my four keys of a good burger? Probably. But I seriously doubt it will be a Good burger unless it has those things.

So let’s make a good burger. This is an adaptation of Mr. Bittman’s Burger.

The Pork Burger

Yield: 10 burgers.

Prep Time: 1 hour

Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes

Ingredients:

2.5 pounds boneless pork shoulder, grind it yourself or ask your friendly butcher
3-4 garlic cloves
1.5 Tablespoons fennel seeds
Salt and Pepper

Orange and Fennel Chutney:
1 fennel bulb, chopped
2 oranges, peeled and chopped
1/3 Cup sugar
1/2 Cup water
1 Teaspoon red pepper flakes
Pinch of salt and pepper

Helpful Equipment:
A good food processor will help. If you don't have one, you can get your butcher to grind the meat.

Directions:

1) To make the chutney, pulse the fennel bulb and orange segments in a food processor until they are finely chopped. If you don't have a processor you can just chop them finely.

2) Combine the fennel and orange with the other chutney ingredients and simmer for about 45 minutes until the mixture is thick.

3) Once it's done, set it aside to top your burgers with later!

4) To make the burgers, chop your pork butt into a few large pieces and then pulse in a food processor with fennel seeds and garlic. Also, if there are any large pieces of fat on the pork shoulder, cut them off and process them before the rest of the meat so it's finer and more integrated into the meat.

5) Once your meat is chopped (you can also get your butcher to grind the meat), form about 4 ounce patties and put a large thumb impression in the center of each burger. Season well with salt and pepper.

6) Grill the burgers on a hot grill or in a hot cast iron skillet for 4-5 minutes per side until cooked through.

7) Grill or toast the buns and serve each burger with a good amount of chutney.

Making the Chutney

When Bittman made this, he just ground the fennel straight into the meat. That’s fine if you want to do that, but I like it better as a topping. It’s really the only topping this burger needs and it doesn’t even need it to be honest. It would be a great burger with nothing on it.

Good flavors people.

But if you wanted to make a topping for this burger, this is about as easy as it gets. It’s very flavorful, has some heat and sweet to it, and makes the pork flavor really pop.

To start, just chop up the fennel bulb and segment up the oranges. Then pulse everything in your favorite food processor.

This is gonna hurt!

Now if you don’t have a food processor you could definitely just chop this up until it’s pretty finely chopped.

Then add the fennel and orange to a saucepan with the other ingredients and bring it to a simmer. Let it simmer, stirring occasionally for about 45 minutes to an hour.

Easy and delicious.

As it slowly cooks, the orange and fennel will break down. The sugar will thicken the sauce slightly and it’ll end up being a perfect topping for your burger!

The only topping we'll need.

Making the Burgers

I try to keep burgers simple, but I like to start with good stuff. That makes your job really easy. If you start with excellent meat, then you only need to add things that accent the meat. If you start with crappy meat, you have to figure out a way to flavor it.

I used a really nice cut of pork shoulder for these burgers. The great thing about pork shoulder is that even the best pork shoulder you can buy will only set you back a few bucks. Nobody really likes this cut of meat for some reason which is amazing to me because you can make these burgers… or carnitas.

I shouldn’t be telling you all this because now the cost of pork shoulder will go up!

Fat is your friend. Trust me.

Once you get your shoulder, you can definitely just have your butcher grind it for you. If you have a food processor though, you can do it yourself which will have the added affect of making you feel awesome.

There’s really only two things to know about grinding your own meat (using a food processor instead of a meat grinder). First, make sure to cube your meat into inch or so cubes. That’ll make it easier. Second, if you have any very large pieces of fat on your shoulder you should process those separately. You’ll want to process them longer than the meat so the fat isn’t stringy at all.

Then you can just mix everything in a bowl with the chopped garlic and fennel seeds. You don’t need to add a bunch of stuff to these.

No need to make this complicated.

I like to go with about a 4 ounce burger. So if you start with 2.5 pounds of pork shoulder that should work out to about 10 burgers. If you wanted to be exact you could definitely weigh them with a kitchen scale, but that’s kind of unnecessary. Just eyeball it.

Once you get your burgers formed, salt and pepper them pretty liberally.

Salt and pepper liberally.

Cooking the Burgers

Now these burgers are awesome on a hot grill. They could also be cooked in a hot cast iron skillet. The key here is cook them in or on something hot. Medium heat doesn’t exist for these. You want to sear them and brown them nicely.

These guys will sizzle.

As they cook, the fat will melt and flavor the burgers. Whether you’re cooking on a grill or in cast iron, they’ll probably need about 4-5 minutes per side. Don’t fiddle with them too much. Let them get some nice grill marks.

And don’t worry, there’s so much fat in these guys that it’s pretty hard to overcook them. They’ll be juicy as long as you don’t leave them on the grill overnight or something.

And it should go without saying that you’ll want to toast your rolls.

Watch out for flare-ups!

The rest of this should be self-explanatory. Put the burger on the bun. Slather it with the chutney. Eat it.

BITE!

I’ll be completely honest. I didn’t even need the chutney. The burger was perfectly juicy and the bun was crunchy and chewy and awesome.

I don’t like to toot my own horn, but I’m tooting my own horn.

In my opinion, these were maybe the best burgers I’ve made.

The alternate name for chickpea patties is Falafel on Steroids. But really they don’t taste that much like falafel other than the fact that they are made from chickpeas (Garbanzo beans depending on where you’re from).

Served with a simple salad, these are a great dinner.

Healthy AND Tasty

There are two parts to this meal that make it special. First, the garam masala. It’s fantastic and I doubled it for my version over the original recipe. Second, the greek yogurt sauce is very good. One of the better versions I’ve had.

Also, this looks like a decent list of ingredients, but there’s a lot of duplicates actually so it’s really easy to prep if you do everything at once.

Chickpea Patties with Yogurt Sauce

Yield: 8 Patties (serves 4)

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Ingredients:

2 (15-ounce) cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed
2 Teaspoons garam masala (original is 1 tsp.)
2 Tablespoons olive oil
2 eggs
1/2 Cup toasted bread crumbs
1/2 Cup Greek yogurt
4 scallions, minced
3 Tablespoons cilantro, minced
Pinch of salt

Tzatziki Sauce:
1 Cup Greek yogurt
1 cucumber, shredded
2 Tablespoons scallions
1 Tablespoon cilantro
Pinch of salt

Directions:

1) For the yogurt sauce, seed your cucumber and then grate it through a box grater into a colander. Add a sprinkle of salt and let the cucumber sit for 10-15 minutes.

2) Dice other yogurt sauce ingredients and combine with cucumber. You could make this in advance.

3) For patties, toast breadcrumbs in a dry pan for five minutes until they are lightly toasted.

4) Whisk together eggs, garam masala, oil, and a pinch of salt.

5) Add your drained chickpeas to a large bowl and mash them with a fork or masher. You could also pulse them lightly in a food processor.

6) Stir the egg mixture and breadcrumbs into the chickpeas and mix well. Also stir in other ingredients (yogurt, scallions, cilantro).

7) Form eight even sized patties with the chickpea mixture.

8) Cook patties in a pan with a drizzle of oil over medium-high heat for 4-5 minutes per side. They should be nicely browned on each side.

9) Serve the patties with the yogurt sauce.

Adapted from America's Test Kitchen 30 Minutes Suppers.

Making the Tzatziki

The next time I make this, I’m going to make a double batch of the sauce. It would be so good on pita as a snack or on a ton of different sandwiches. In all seriousness, I could eat it with a spoon.

The only hard part (and it isn’t that hard people) of making this particular tzatziki recipe is shredding the cucumber. Sometimes I like it chunkier, but shredded was nice for this version. Basically, just peel your cucumber and scoop out the seeds with a spoon. Then shred it into a colander using the large holes of a grater.

Sprinkle a pinch of salt on the shredded cucumber and let it sit for 10-15 minutes. It’ll lose some moisture so you may want to set it over a bowl or a few paper towels.

Peeled, seeded, shredded, salted.

Once your cucumber is ready, just mix up the rest of your tzatziki ingredients in a big bowl. It should be pretty thick. Take your time chopping your ingredients evenly so you don’t get a big bite of scallion or something.

Nice and tangy.

This will keep fine in your fridge for a day or two or probably longer but it won’t last that long.

Making the patties

These patties are pretty easy to make and while the original recipe only makes 6 patties, I was easily able to get 8 good sized ones from the recipe.

Not pictured: breadcrumbs and chickpeas

To start, I added my breadcrumbs to a dry pan and toasted them over medium heat for about 5 minutes. You want them a light brown color, but definitely not burned. They should look something like this:

Don't burn them!

That’ll give them a slightly nutty flavor and also help them absorb even more moisture.

Next, whisk together your eggs, garam masala, oil, and pinch of salt into a small bowl. It’ll look strange, but smell really good.

Smells good.

Add all your drained and rinsed chickpeas into a large bowl and mush them up with either a fork or a potato masher. I used a fork and left mine pretty chunky actually. You could make it smoother if you wanted, but I’m lazy.

A fork is your best bet for this.

Then stir in your egg/spice mixture, breadcrumbs, and all the other ingredients. You’ll end up with this very thick paste of sorts. Again, it doesn’t look great, but it’ll smell really good and trust me it’ll taste good also.

I realize this does not look appetizing.

Making and Cooking the Patties

Forming the patties is straightforward enough. Just divide the mixture into 8 (or 6) equal parts and then form round patties out of the mixture about 3/4 of an inch thick. Try not to press the mixture together too much. Keep it light.

Then, in a pan over high heat, add 2 Tablespoons of olive oil and when it’s glistening, add your patties. You’ll probably have to work in two batches unless you have a really big pan.

How about now?

Four to five minutes per side and you should end up with these lovely, browned patties.

Or now?

I served mine with a small salad and a good amount of the yogurt sauce. Very tasty!

Would also be a good veggie burger!

As soon as I took a bite of this though, the first thing I thought of was veggie burgers. These would just rock as burgers. The burger route opens up a lot of options. Have the patties with a salad for dinner and then take one or two burgers for lunch the next day!

These are versatile and delicious little things. I didn’t miss the meat for a second when I was done eating them!

Bethany lost a series recently and had to make dinner for Jeff (and me because, well, I live here). When she told me what she was going to make I thought it would make a great post! She chose to make a spicy black bean patty with a cilantro yogurt sauce. It was really good and healthy!

Healthy and spicy. Good stuff.

We ate these with lots of the cilantro sauce and a simple side salad. When I tried this patty the first thing that came to mind was how delicious this would be as a veggie burger.

Spicy Black Bean Patties

Yield: Makes 10-12 patties.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

2 Cups dry black beans (or 2 16 ounce cans)
2 Jalepenos, diced but keep the seeds
1 red pepper, diced
1/2 green pepper, diced
1/2 red onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, diced
1 Cup breadcrumbs
1 Teaspoon cumin
1 Teaspoon chili powder
1 Teaspoon oregano
Oil for frying
Salt and pepper

Cilantro Yogurt Sauce:
2 Cups yogurt, Greek works great
1/2 - 3/4 Cups cilantro, chopped loosely packed (if you hate cilantro, maybe try parsley)
1 clove garlic, crushed
Juice of 1 lemon
Pinch of salt

Helpful Equipment:
Cast Iron Skillet

Directions:

1) Chop the veggies.

2) Sauté the veggies in a few tablespoons of oil until they are a bit soft, but not browned at all. Just a few minutes should do the trick.

3) Cook the beans according to the directions on the package. If you are using dry beans, which I recommend, you’ll want to soak them overnight so plan for that.

4) Add the breadcrumbs and using a masher or large spoon, mash up the beans and breadcrumbs.

5) Mix in the sautéed veggies and all the other spices.

6) Form about 4 ounce patties with the mixture.

7) Sprinkle the chili power and cumin on each patty.

8) Cook them in a few tablespoons of oil over medium-high heat for about 4 minutes a side.

9) Stir all of the sauce ingredients together.

10) Serve with a small green salad using the sauce as salad dressing!

This recipe is definitely not hard, but it does require some serious chopping. For the peppers, we took out the seeds, but kept them so we could add some of them later to make the patties spicier. Use them or toss them depending on how much heat you want.

Chopping lots of stuff.

Making the patties

Once your veggies are chopped, saute them in a few tablespoons of oil until they are a bit soft, but not browned at all. Just a few minutes should do the trick.

Soften these up a bit.

Cook the beans according to the directions on the package. If you are using dry beans, which I recommend, you’ll want to soak them overnight so plan for that.

Once your beans are cooked, add your breadcrumbs and using a masher or large spoon, mash up the beans and breadcrumbs. I wouldn’t use a food processor for these because you run the risk of over-processing the beans. You want them to still have plenty of texture, but just broken up a bit.

Breadcrumbs never looked so good.

Mix in your sauteed veggies and all your other spices. Feel free to adjust the spices if you want the patties even spicier.

Then form about 4 ounce patties with the mixture. You should be able to get about 10-12 patties out of the mixture. To finish these guys off, cook them in a few tablespoons of oil over medium-high heat for about 4 minutes a side. These will give the burgers a good crust on the outside and heat them up all the way through. We sprinkled some more spices (chili powder and cumin) on each patty before frying them up.

These were getting a little too healthy.

Making the Sauce

Ok. Well, there isn’t much to explain for the sauce. Basically, just stir everything together. The good news is that you can definitely make it ahead of time. In fact, if you let this sit for a few hours it gets even better.

Nothing like a good light dressing.

These were really spicy and delicious and the sauce compliments them really well. Bethany was feeling very healthy and served this with a simple salad, using a bit of the sauce as a dressing also.

Also be good on a burger.

If you’re a regular Macheesmo reader, you’ll know that I’ve been trying to eat less meat this year (and so far succeeding I would say). These were exactly what I look for as a meat substitute. They had a ton of flavor and spice and were very filling actually even without a bun.

If you are vegetarian or are planning on going to a bbq were people would be open to a really good homemade veggie burger, I recommend these guys very highly.

The Sante Fe Burger got my attention.

Thanks Bobby!

This burger caught my eye for its combination of toppings which include:

- Roasted poblano peppers (for spice)
- A smooth cheese sauce (for cheesiness and spice)
- Blue corn tortilla chips (for texture)

Pair that with a perfect burger and a bun and you are all set.

Sante Fe Burger (Makes 4 burgers)

- 1 large poblano chile
- 1.5 pounds ground chuck (80 percent lean)
- Salt and pepper
- 4 buns
- A few handfuls of tortilla chips

Cheese sauce:
- 1 Tablespoon butter
- 1 Tablespoon all-purpose flour
- 1 1/2 Cups milk
- 8 ounces Monterey Jack or Pepper Jack cheese, grated
- Salt and pepper

I ran into a problem right away with the burgers. I couldn’t find any with the fat content I wanted and I actually hate a lean burger. Call me crazy but fat is flavor. So I came up with this idea that maybe has been done before, but I thought I would give it a try. If I needed more fat in the meat, I knew an easy way to increase the fat content: butter.

A muse told me to do this.

Using my hands I mushed the butter in the ground meat until it was evenly distributed. At the end it actually kind of looked like fat, a bit uneven and kind of veiny throughout the burgers.

Shape these into about 5 to 6 ounce patties and salt and pepper liberally. Some tips on shaping burgers:

- Don’t over work them. Just shape them enough to form a patty. If you work them too much they will get tough.
- Keep the seasoning simple in most cases. If you have good meat, then there isn’t a need to do a lot to it. But at the same time, don’t be shy with the salt and pepper.
- Using your thumb, make a small indent in the middle of the burger. As the meat cooks, it will expand and fill in this dent. This is the best way to prevent dreaded flying saucer burger: very fat in the middle and skinny on the outside.

6 ounces makes a big burger.

As far as the peppers go you can roast them beforehand if you need to. Stick them over a high flame for a few minutes and then put them on a plate covered with plastic wrap. The steam will make the skin peel off perfectly.

Can't go wrong here.

Next, make the cheese sauce. You really can’t make this more than 20 or 30 minutes in advance or it will just solidify. Cheese sauce isn’t that hard to make. This is the process.

First, melt your butter in a saucepan over medium heat and when it is melted, whisk in your flour. Continue to stir it for 4-5 minutes until it starts to turn slightly tan. Second, slowly whisk in your milk, a bit at a time. If you pour all your milk in at once, you’ll end up with a lumpy sauce. Do it slowly though and it will be smooth and delicious.

Finally, stir in your cheese which should melt and make a really rich sauce. Stir in your salt and pepper and whisk for a few minutes to make sure it is thick. If it is too thin, just continue to whisk for a few minutes and it should thicken nicely.

The cheese is pre-melted!

As far as cooking the burgers go, it is pretty easy on a grill. About 5-6 minutes a side over medium-high heat and you should end up with a medium burger. Try not to press down on the burgers too much. They will cook faster, but also lose some juiciness.

I was a bit worried about the butter situation.

This is the final setup. There was also a bag of blue corn tortilla chips, but that wasn’t really photo-worthy.

The setup.

As far as putting it together, I slathered the bottom bun with cheese sauce and then added the burger, pepper, more cheese sauce, and then the chips.

Betsy seemed to like it just fine.

Sorry darling!

I really loved the cheese sauce. It brought everything together perfectly.

Damn good.

Oh. And if you were worried, the butter addition to the burger was a good one. It was really moist. I was worried about it falling apart on the grill, but it definitely didn’t. It worked better than I thought it was going to.

Next time you are grilling, give this burger a shot. Definitely a keeper!