It all started a few months ago, as the good weather approached and Supergirl's mum wanted to get the BBQ going. Our local supermarket sells good value rissoles which we have used before but in reality they aren't the greatest, and the most recent batches seemed VERY salty. So it was put to me to come up with a homemade burger.
Now I have had a crack a few times in the past and always with only a sliver of success. I have always had trouble finding a mixture that didn't fall apart on the hotplate.
Anyway, with the internet at my beck and call, I went searching for a good solid base to build on.
After a few trials and tweaks I came up with something I am happy with and so is everyone else!
Ingredients.
1kg Beef Mince
(also known as ground beef in other parts of the world)
1 med-large brown onion
(have used 2 smaller ones but 1 medium is about right)
1 egg
(I have used 2 before and was happy with the results)
1 cup bread crumbs
(you can choose whether you use fresh or packet. I have used both and again
I'm happy with the results of both)
1 large pinch of Nutmeg.
1/2 cup finely grated Parmesan Cheese.
1-2 tsp of Dried Chili Flakes - go with your own taste. Hot or mild, it's up to you.
1 tsp Dijon Mustard. I tend to use a heaped teaspoon.
Method.
Start by finely dicing the onion. And when I say finely dice - FINELY DICE. I personally hate big chunks of onion in my burgers. Hate it. Of course you could use one of the many settings on your food processor, but that takes all the fun out of it. Get your knife skills happening.
Then you basically just mix all of the ingredients together in a large bowl. Give it a good, thorough going over. Yes you have to get your hands in there, so if you are one of those people who hates getting itty bitty bits of food under your fingernails, get someone else to do it.
At the next stage, I tend to be a bit OCD.
It's time to make the burgers. Any one can do this. Just evenly divide the mixture and flatten into patties. Now with this mixture I can get a dozen evenly sized patties. But they tend to be small. Now the original recipe I based this on, said to divide into four. Can you believe it? FOUR. That's huge. Lately I have been doing 10 for this batch. And as for the OCD bit - that comes from the fact I weigh the total mixture and then divide by the number of burgers I want, and make sure each patty is within 1-2 grams. Yep. 1-2 grams. I like them all to be even.
Once you have made your burgers, you need to put them in the refrigerator for at least a 1/2 hour. Normally when I make these, I make them in the afternoon and leave them until the evening. They work fine this way.
Come cooking time, I get the BBQ fired up and get the hotplate up to temperature. While I cook the burgers I also throw some bacon on as well, along with some eggs.
Supergirl's Mum gets the rest ready. Great, fresh hamburger buns or lovely fresh rolls from our favorite bakery. Lettuce (various sorts with some actual taste and texture for Supergirl's mum and I, iceberg for the children), huge slices of tomato, our favorite tasty cheese, beetroot if it's in the fridge, red onion. The grown ups love to use a fruit chutney as a condiment, where the children have tomato or bbq sauce. As you can see from the picture, we sometimes serve this with some oven fries and lately some garlic aioli has featured on the plate.
Hope you all try these some time. They get the stamp of approval in our house from everyone even Supergirl, and she is a fussy eater!
