Tag: burger

Gary Mehigan’s Karaage Chicken Burgers with Onion Slaw and Wasabi Mayo

.Reading time 4 minutes.

Makes: 4

When it comes to burgers, we absolutely love it when we stumble on a burger that breaks into our top burgers of all time.* We can’t stop smiling.

And so here is one of those burgers, plated by my mother at a recent American-themed lunch. (And yes, I get that this burger, other than the bun and the fried chicken is the antithesis of an American burger!)

In his book, Gary references a time on Masterchef with Gordon Ramsay where Gordon was unimpressed by a challenge where contenstants plated up all manner of burgers; though where none of them were conventional or centered around a traditional patty.

As Gary says, Gordon might be right, though he hasn’t had this burger.

(Gordon is wrong. This is an excellent, excellent burger.)

Ingredients

4 chicken thighs
1/2 c katakuriko potato starch
1 c panko breadcrumbs
Peanut or sunflower oil for shallow-frying
4 soft brioche-style burger buns
1 ripe avacado, sliced
2 c mizuna or rocket leaves

Chicken marinade

2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp mirin
2 tsp finely grated ginger
2 cloves garlic, grated

Onion slaw

1 white onion, thinly sliced
1 c shredded daikon
1 tbsp pickled ginger, finely chopped
1/4 c rice vinegar

Wasabi mayonaise

1/3 c Kewpie mayonnaise
2 – 3 tsp wasabi paste (depending on taste)

Method

  1. To make the marinade, combine the ingredients in a medium bowl. Add the chicken and stir through to coat. Cover and marinade in the fridge for at least 1 hour and up to 6 hours.
  2. Meanwhile, for the onion slaw. combine all the ingredients and set aside. For the mayo, combine the ingredients and refridgerate until using.
  3. Combine the potato startch and panko crumbs in a bowl, then add the chicken pieces and mix thoroughly with your hands to coat.
  4. Prepare a tray with a wire rack and tongs and set to one side in preparation to fry the chicken, Pour oil into a deep frying pan to a depth of 1.5cm, then heat over a medium-high heat until the oil reaches 160c. Adjust the heat as necessary to maintain the temperature.
  5. Gently lower the chicken pieces into the hot oil with the tongs ad cook for 6 – 8 minutes, turning halfway, until evenly cooked through and crispy. You can check to see if the chicken is cooked using a thermometer – it should read above 65c. Lift the chicken from the oil with the tongs and place on a wire rack to drain. (If you feel that the chicken still needs a cooking nudge though you have already have a dark crunchy outside, place in an oven on 180c for a few minutes).
  6. Cut the buns in haf and cook under a grill until golden. Smear the cut side of the top half with a generous dollop of the wasabi mayonnaise. Place a little avacado and slaw on the base, add the crispy chicken, then the greens and sandwich together.

* Those burgers that Nat and I reckon have made that list – that have been absolute homeruns – are:

Anjum Anand’s Best Ever Burger with Spiced Onions
Gordon Ramsay 1-million Subscriber Burger (ironic I know)
Jamie Oliver’s Insanity Burger
Neil Perry’s ‘Hamburger’ (my favourite)

Anjum Anand’s Best Ever Burger with Spiced Onions

.Reading time 4 minutes.

Makes: 5 – 6

Looking back on every recipe I have typed from Anjum Anand’s cookbook I love India, I always start by praising the book and just how great it is: unusual recipes, great food photography, passionate stories, amazing meals.

So let’s not do that, nor dwell on how I start each burger recipe by talking about how much I love burgers and how the best burgers are about simplicity blah blah blah.

Instead, let’s talk about why you must set aside a lunch in the next week to cook this just awesome burger. I’m talking top three for me. 1. being Gordon Ramsay’s 1-Million Subscriber Burger, 2. being Neil Perry’s classic beef burger with cheese and bacon and 3. being this burger.

We didn’t invest as much in the mince as we usually would and second time round with a mixture of freshly ground chuck, brisket and lamb mince, I reckon this burger would nudge 2.

Possibly 1.

Don’t delay.

Ingredients

For the burgers
500gm minced beef or lamb (including some fat)
1 red onion, finely chopped
2 tsp finely chopped ginger
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
3/4 tsp garam masala
1 egg
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
5 – 6 burger buns
1 large tomato, sliced

For the roasted green chilli yoghurt
3 large green chillies, stalks removed, pierced with the tip of a knife
2 rounded tbsp thick Greek yoghurt
2 tbsp crème fraîche (or mayonnaise)
Good handful of chopped coriander

For the spiced caramelised onions
1 1/2 tbsp vegetable oil
1/2 tsp panch phoran (or garam masala)
2 red onions thinly sliced

Method

  1. Mix together all the ingredients for the burgers except the tomatoes and the buns, season with 1 1/2 tsp salt and rest for 30 minutes.
  2. On a BBQ or a pan, cook the chillies until charred and blistered on all sides. Once done, wrap in cling wrap.
  3. Heat the oil in a fry pan and when hot, add the panch phoran. Cook for 30 seconds and then add the onions and add a good pinch of salt and cook over a high heat until they have coloured and are well browned on the edges. Adjust the seasoning and set aside.
  4. Mix together the yoghurt, crème fraîche and coriander for the topping, adding a good grinding of black pepper and salt lightly. Once the chillies are cool, peel off their skins, slit lengthways and deseeded, discarding the seeds. Chop the flesh, add to the yoghurt and set aside.
  5. Heat the BBQ/grill to HIGH. Make 5 – 6 large patties out of the minced meat mixture, remembering to make a little flat indent in the centre with your fingers; this will help them cook evenly and not puff up in the middle. (I did not know this, haven’t tried this though good point and will.)
  6. Place the burgers on the grill and cook for 4 – 5 minutes until charred, flip and cook for another 1 – 2 minutes. Split the buns and char on the grill.
  7. Place 1 slice of the tomato on each bun, top with a burger, a generous dollop of the yoghurt and some onions. Place on the lid and eat immediately.

Gordon Ramsay 1-million Subscriber Burger

.Reading time 4 minutes.

Serves: 4

It is a truism, though an average burger is just that.

A waste of the calories. A waste of the excitement.

You’re in a resort and you order a burger and fries for lunch and the beef is well done and devoid of flavour; there is no love in the bun or the accompaniments.

A wasted meal.

Actually, I take it back.

An average burger is terrible.

It defeats the purpose.

Conversely, a brilliant burger is heaven.

It is the last meal and something you describe for days.

I learnt a while back that it fundamentally comes down to the beef. The quality, the fat, when it is ground and how it is cooked.

And so if if you read no more, based on this burger I am about to go into:

50 – 70% brisket

30 – 50% chuck

100gm butter per 1kg

Grind as thick as you can – the coarsest grain – and cook as soon as you can over a super-high grill.

This is the second time I have cooked this burger by Gordon Ramsay and it is the best burger I have ever had.

Which is not to say it has to be, though his key regarding the beef combination, butter and cooked rare (of course) is central. Any burger would be genius with this alone.

The recipe was released by Gordon after he hit 1-million Instagram subscribers.

He uses smoky bacon though I crisped up streaky bacon.

Otherwise, the rest is in relatively intact though I have rewritten the method.

It kills me when I make burgers for the kids from store-bought mince.

Though no more.

I don’t cut corners on much cooking. Burger meat will be the same going forward.

This is the best burger you will ever have if you follow the steps.

(And then adapt it!)

Ingredients

1kg equal brisket and chuck
100gm frozen butter
Salt and freshly ground pepper
Olive oil
4 slices Swiss cheese

4 large portobello mushroom cups, step and gills removed
Garlic powder
4 large eggs
8 slices of streaky bacon, crispy and drained of fat
2 cups rocket
2 Roma tomatoes, sliced

4 brioche buns
Butter for buttering

1/2 cup egg mayonnaise
4 tbsp sriracha sauce
Pinch of sauce

Method

  1. Pre-heat your grill to medium-high.
  1. Get the bottoms of the mushrooms cooking. They will take time to soften and breakdown: at least 30 minutes. Of course, do not let them burn.
  2. Good time to start crisping up the bacon in a pan.
  1. Mince the beef with the frozen butter; otherwise, get your butcher to mince the beef and shave the frozen butter in a combine well. (The sooner to cook time this can happen, the better and if this blog has not sold you on it, supermarket mince is no substitute.)
  2. Form four equal, thick patties and refrigerate to chill. Remember they will shrink. Season well.
  3. Mix together the mayo, sriracha and salt.
  1. Butter the buns and grill them bottom side-down until they are browned.
  2. Turn up the grill, oil the beef patties and pop them on the grill.
  3. Flip the mushroom so that you can sprinkle a good pinch of garlic powder into each and then crack an egg into each.
  4. Flip the burgers after a minute or two. Cook for a minute more and then Swiss cheese on all until it melts.
  5. Take the burgers off and then the mushrooms when the eggs are done.
  6. Assemble: brioche, sriracha mayo, mushroom/egg, beef, tomato, rocket and more sriracha mayo on the top bun.
  7. Open a beer if you have not already done so by now.

Asian Burgers with Spicy Slaw

.Reading time 1 minute.

Serves: 4 

By Nat Beerworth

Who says being on a diet means you can’t eat burgers? These Turkey burgers are a really nice compromise.

Asian-Burgers-with-Slaw-770x513

Ingredients

2 cups shredded cabbage (mixed green and red)
1 tbsp rice vinegar
2 tsp chives (minced)
2 tsp cilantro (minced)
1 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup fat free mayonnaise
3-4 tsp Sriracha sauce (optional)
500g ground turkey breast
1 tbsp soy sauce
2 tsp fresh ginger (minced)
2 tsp garlic (minced)
4 whole wheat light hamburger buns
1 cup thinly sliced cucumbers

 

Method

  1. In a bowl, combine the cabbage, rice vinegar, chives, cilantro, sugar, salt, mayonnaise and Sriracha sauce (if using). Mix well.
  2. Combine the ground turkey, soy sauce, ginger and ginger. Mix well.
  3. Form the ground turkey mixture into four equal patties.
  4. Grill the patties for 3 – 5 minutes per side, or until the center of the pattie measures 75 degrees.
  5. Toast the buns for 1 minute.
  6. Serve the burgers on the buns, topped with the slaw and cucumbers.

Serving Size: 1 slider | Calories: 283

 

Tobie Puttock’s Spiced Lamb Burgers with Tzatziki

.Reading time 3 minutes.

Serves: 4

We have cooked a number of dishes from Tobie and Georgia Puttock’s The Chef Gets Healthy and we have never been let down.

I wouldn’t crash-diet on the book a week before your wedding because all of the recipes remain wholesome: more like the Chef Gets Healthier.

Though this is the appeal to me.

You’re eating great food that is easy to prepare and throw in a good walk with the dogs before dinner like we do and it’s almost as if you didn’t have dinner at all.

These particular lamb burgers are great: we dialed up the chilli which is a must and then doubled the recipe so we had more burgers for lunch.

Save time by buying a good Tzatziki rather than making it, get the leashes on the dogs and enjoy a cracking, healthy-ish mid-week meal.

Come to think of it, you could probably have a wine or two with dinner as well and still not look back.

Ingredients

2 tbsp olive oil
1/4 onion, finely diced
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
2 tsp ground allspice
2 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp dried chilli flakes
1 tbsp dried mint leaves
500gm minced lamb
Small handful flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped
Small handful of dill, roughly chopped
1 egg, lightly whisked
100gm reduced-fat feta cheese, crumbled
Sea salt and cracked black pepper
Tzatziki to serve

Method

  1. Heat the olive in a small frying pan over a medium-heat, add the onions and garlic and cook, stirring often, for 2 minutes, until slightly softened though not coloured. Stir in the allspice, coriander, cumin, chilli flakes and mint leaves and cook for a further minute or so.
  2. Take off the heat and set aside to cool.
  3. Place the lamb in a large bowl and add the cooled onion mixture, parsley, dill, egg, feta, salt and pepper. Use your hands to mix everything well.
  4. Shape the mixture into four patties, place on a tray and refrigerate for 10 minutes.
  5. Preheat a grill plat or fry pan on high. Drizzle with a small amount of oil and cook the patties for 3 – 4 minutes each side or until just cooked through.
  6. Serve the burgers with a dollop of Tzatziki and this Roast Cauliflower with Chickpea Salad.

Jamie Oliver’s Insanity Burger

.Reading time 4 minutes.

Makes: 4 big`burgers

A while back, we passed the all important step of understanding that for any burger to be amazing, it has to start with amazing, fresh mince.

Not the variety you get from the supermarket and certainly not the lean stuff you might otherwise use in a mince.

Instead, you need a quality cut of steak (chuck or similar), you need to see it minced in front of you on a coarse grain and you need to cook it within 24-hour.

This and this alone will set you on the path to a superb burger.

There are then plenty of directions and approaches you can obviously take and a fried green chilli burger we cooked last weekend only scratches at the surface of where you can go.

For me however, nailing the quintessential, classic burger was a bit of a must before venturing off in these many possible directions: nailing a burger with ketchup, American mustard and good egg mayo.

I previously typed up Neil Perry’s classic burger as simply that: a classic. And it really is a classic in every sense of the word.

This Insanity Burger then is like taking what is already a classic sportscar and really seeing what you can do with it. Pushing the outer limits of the handling, engine and design.

Hand on heart, it deserves the name Insanity Burger.

Nail this burger and you will have successfully passed Level 1 of the burger game; free to play the next level and start down whatever direction you choose.

Just make sure you get your mince right.

Ingredients

800gm freshly mince chuck steak
Olive oil
1 large red onion, finely sliced
White wine vinegar
2 large gherkins, sliced
4 brioche burger buns, halved
8 rashers of smoked streaky bacon
4 tsp American mustard
Tabasco Chipotle sauce (Woolworths and Coles have it)
4 thin slices of Red Leicester cheese (ditto)
4 tsp tomato ketchup

For the burger sauce

¼ of an iceberg lettuce, finely chopped
2 heaped tbsp egg mayonnaise
1 heaped tbsp tomato ketchup
1 tsp Tabasco Chipotle sauce
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp brandy or bourbon

Method

  1. Divide the mince into four and roll into thick, patties, 2cm wider than your buns.
  2. In a bowl, dress the onion with the vinegar and a pinch of sea salt.
  3. For the burger sauce, combine the ingredients in a bowl.
  4. In a pan over a low heat, cook your bacon to the point of crispiness.
  5. Heat your grill as high as possible, rub your burgers with a bit of oil and grill; after 1 minute flip and brush each cooked side with ½ tsp of mustard and a dash of Tabasco. After 1 minute more, flip and repeat.
  6. Cook for another minute or two and then place two pieces of crispy bacon on top and then the cheese. Grill until the cheese melts; grill the buns at the same time.
  7. To build the burger, add a quarter of the burger sauce to the bun base, add the cheesy burger, a quarter of the onions and the gherkins. Add 1 tsp of ketchup on top and close.
  8. You passed!

Burger in a Bowl

.Reading time 2 minutes.

Serves: 4

This is a crazy recipe and on so many fronts.

It is so cheezly good that if you got it in some chain restaurant in the States, you’d go back once a week just to have it for lunch.

Essentially a burger without the bun, it is so whacking with flavour, so filling and so relatively healthy, words don’t describe. And where I say it is a burger without a bun, it is literally an American chain burger without a bun.

Or cheese or grease.

The ‘SW Super Sauce’ is the hero here and we didn’t change a thing except substitute firm, fat-free yogurt for the fromage frais… and nobody would notice.

We dialed up the beef by adding ground coriander, cumin, smoked paprika and chilli powder and I would suggest you do the same.

To say that this is a must-try, out-of-the-ordinary, you-will-love-it meal is an understatement.

Go with the terrible iceberg lettuce, use some spiced gherkin and take the night off from anything fancy.

This is a burger… without the bun… in a bowl.

Ingredients

Burger

1 tsp canola oil
500gm extra lean beef mince
1 onion, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, crushed
Plenty of salt and pepper
Whatever spices you think, though flavour and spice it up

Salad

½ iceberg lettuce, roughly chopped
8 gherkins, sliced
1 small red onion, finely chopped
2 tomatoes, roughly chopped

SW Super Sauce

3 tbsp extra-light mayonnaise
5 tbsp fat free fromage frais
1 tbsp American mustard
2 tbsp tomato puree (passata)
2 tsp white wine vinegar
½ tsp garlic salt
¼ tsp onion granules
¼ tsp sweet smoked paprika

Method

  1. Heat the oil in a large pan; add the beef, onion and garlic and stir fry for 6 – 7 minutes until the beef is browned and the onion has softened.
  2. Meanwhile, put all the SW Super Sauce ingredients in a bowl and mix well.
  3. Mix together the salad ingredients and divide between 4 bowls. Spoon the beef mixture on-top, drizzle over the SW Super Sauce and serve hot.

The Tuscan Burger

.Reading time 2 minutes.

My last meal? A hamburger of course.

With this Tuscan Burger, read down the ingredients and you can almost taste the pesto with the chargrilled beef and melted bocconcini, the mayonaise and the chargrilled buns.

Hopefully this isn’t your last meal and as my mother is known to say, the recipe shouldn’t kill anyone. But if it does, not a bad way to go.

As always, go for the best, freshest piece of chuck steak you can and get your butcher to mince it on the coarsest cut.

Ingredients

600g freshly ground chuck steak
100g pancetta, rind removed, chopped
1/3 cup (90g) basil pesto
2 small red onions, thickly sliced
2 tbs olive oil
2 small vine-ripened tomatoes, thickly sliced
1/2 cup (150g) whole-egg mayonnaise
3-4 bocconcini, sliced
4 Italian bread rolls, split
50g baby rocket leaves

Method

  1. Place beef, pancetta and 2 tablespoons pesto in a processor. Season with salt and pepper. Pulse until just combined (do not overprocess). Form mixture into 4 patties and chill while you cook the vegetables.
  2. Preheat the oven to 160°C.
  3. Heat a chargrill pan or barbecue over medium heat. Toss onion in a little oil and grill for 1 minute each side or until just cooked. Place in the oven to keep warm.
  4. Brush tomatoes with a little oil and season, then grill for 1 minute each side. Place in the oven to keep warm.
  5. Brush both sides of patties with oil. Cook on chargrill for 2-3 minutes each side until cooked through. Chargrill the bread rolls.
  6. Mix remaining pesto with mayonnaise.
  7. Top patties with cheese and place in oven for 1 minute or until cheese melts.
  8. Spread bread-roll bases with some of the mayonnaise mixture. Top with rocket, patties, onion and tomato. Drizzle with remaining mayonnaise mixture and top with remaining bread-roll halves

Neil Perry’s ‘Hamburger’

.Reading time 5 minutes.

Serves 4

Whilst the 2013/2014/2015 Sydney hamburger craze will probably go the direction of the 2013/2014/2015 Sydney dumpling craze, for me at least, it has given me cause to reconsider the roots of a good – a great burger – and what it is all about.

Because if you have a burger at Chur Burger, or Neil Perry’s Burger Project or Sean Connolly’s Parlour Burger (with the one-day viral wonder, the Black Widow Burger), their core burger is about simplicity and quality of ingredient.

And that is perhaps where I have gone astray.

For years, my signature burger dish has been about two things:

  1. The paddy:
    1. 1kg Beef Mince
    1. 1 egg
    1. (Red) online, diced
    1. Handful of parsley, chopped
    1. A number of really good splashes of Worcestershire Sauce (and therefore the flavour)
    1. A heaped teaspoon of Horseradish
    1. Seasoning
  9. The balance:Grilled (BBQ) slices of white toast
    1. Torn cos lettuce
    1. Sliced tomato
    1. Sliced cheddar cheese to melt on the BBQed paddies
    1. Ketchup (not tomato sauce), good egg mayo and American Mustard

And whilst, if really flame grilled over a high heat and served medium-rare, this is a cracker burger, it isn’t the essence of burger. It is like customising mac and cheese when the purity of proper mac and cheese needs no improvement. It is like adding bacon to a Big Mac. There isn’t necessarily a need.

Worst still, I was using crappy mince from the supermarket. And the mince is where the flavour is!

Indeed, reflecting back on all the burgers I have cooked over the years – including the Tuscan Burger than won me a gong at a Wiliam food day – they have all been about stuffing ingredients into the patty. And using crudolla mince.

This burger recipe by Neil Perry is your classic mac and cheese. It will surprise nobody except that freshness of the meat makes the difference. Here, you MUST instruct your butcher to find his finest, most marbled piece of chuck steak. And then to grind it, fresh, on his coarsest setting.

At which point, you need to sprint home to cook it.

Get back to basics, invest in the meat, buy some really good buns (not that crap at Woolies), open a Corona with some lime and eat this bad boy in the sun. Seriously, this is good!

Oh, and if you can BBQ your buns and especially bacon on the BBQ as well, the taste simply gets even better by a factor of 10: Neil Perry says so himself!

I have slightly adjusted his recipe.

Ingredients

1kg of freshly ground chuck steak
½ – ¾ tsp sea salt
Extra virgin olive oil
4 hamburger buns, split and toasted (ideally grilled on the BBQ)
Ketchup, American Mustard and egg mayonnaise
4 slices gruyere (or sliced cheddar if gruyere not on tap)
8 rashes of good bacon
Lettuce and tomato slices
Sliced, picked cucumber (optional)
Freshly ground pepper

Method

  1. The bacon needs to be really, really crispy and this will take time. Depending on timings, start cooking the bacon in a pan or prepare it ready for the BBQ, ensuring that in either event, it is cooked to the point of snapping in two.
  2. Place the meat in a bowl and sprinkle with salt. Mix gentle and divide into 4. Move each portion between your hands for a minute to make a firm, though not overworked patty. Shape into a ball. Gently flatten to form patties around 3cm thick. (If you are refrigerating, cover in cling wrap and ensure that they are bought back to room temperature prior to cooking).
  3. Heat your BBQ (or pan) to very hot. Grill the burger for 2 minutes on one side, flip and another 3 minutes, placing a slice of cheese on top of each paddy for the final minute of cooking. Let the patties rest for 5 minutes and whilst doing so, grill your buns, taking note of your bacon depending on however you are cooking it.
  4. Assemble your bad boy; bottom of bun, mayo and mustard, patty, lettuce and tomato, bacon, ketchup, grind of pepper, top of bun.
  5. Close your eyes and eat.