Saturday, July 6, 2013

burgers galore

I'm sure everyone out there has been busy firing up & enjoying the BBQ over the past few weeks. I love it because my husband is pretty much a Grill Master, but he's now officially crowned the Burger King. For a couple years now he's been interested in making burgers from scratch with some success. But in the spring we stopped around Burger's Priest (cult burger joint in Toronto) for the first time and, as the name indicates, it was a religious experience. Burgers in the summer are the prefect reminder that as much as I enjoy several vegetarian meals a week, I'm most likely always destined to be a satisfied carnivore. We learned that Burger's Priest uses beef chuck with a high fat to meat ratio, which must account for the flavour as well as the soft melt-in-your-mouth quality these burgers possess. Inspired, Nuno's been experimenting with a combination of beef short-rib chuck and boneless shoulder for beef burgers with great results.

(left to right: beef chuck burgers, lamb burgers, turkey burgers)

And we are not limited to beef. Taking inspiration from these Greek Lamb Kebabs we loved this spring, Nuno purchased lamb and ground it along with a simple seasoning of ground coriander, salt & pepper. The toppings included lettuce, tomatoes, red onion and a dressing of plain yogurt, lemon juice, fresh mint & coriander.
 
I'm a huge turkey burger fan and Our Favourite Turkey Burger is probably my favourite burger to eat. I just love the addition of grueyere making these burgers perfect with just a simple topping of lettuce and tomato.

And my favourite side to any burger is potato salad. We purchased an assortment of colourful fingerling potatoes for the potato salad above. I don't really use a recipe for potato salad, just use whatever we have on hand that I think might work and taste-test till satisfied. This potato salad used light plain yogurt, mayonnaise, minced shallot, thinly sliced scallion, dijon, cider vinegar and salt & pepper.

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