Beet On The Bread

I have to admit, I was a bit reluctant to try this recipe. I'm not a big fan of beets. But wow! This was hands down one of the better homemade burgers I ever tasted. Earthy beets, smokey paprika, honey mustard vinaigrette dressing and blue cheese. All very robust flavours, but they work beatifully together. The original recipe is by Louisa Shafia, and I tweaked it a little bit to fit my own taste.

Ingredients

- 1 onion 
- olive oil
- 2 medium red beets (grated)
- 2 cloves of garlic
- handful of walnuts
- handful of golden raisins
- teaspoon of smoked paprika 
- 100 gr canned lentils (drained and rinsed)
- sea salt
- pepper
- 100 gr cooked brown rice (at room temperature)
- blue cheese
- apple cider vinegar
- alfalfa sprouts
- 1 raw egg
- Dijon mustard
- honey
- hamburger bun

Preparation

Slice the onion into fine cubes. In a pan, sauté the onion in the oil over low heat for 20 minutes, until it starts to darken and caramelize. Turn down the heat slightly and add the beets along with the garlic, walnuts, raisins, smoked paprika, salt and black pepper and cook for 10 minutes, stirring often. At the end turn up the heat add a splash of apple cider vinegar and let it cook out. 

While this is cooking you start making the honey-mustard vinaigrette. Take a spoon of honey, about the same amount of mustard. Add a splash of vinegar and about a spoon of olive oil . Whisk and add pepper and salt.

Transfer the contents of the pan to a food processor and pulse several times until chunky. In a large bowl, combine the onion mixture with the lentils. Now add the rice and egg to the food processor, and pulse to form a coarse puree. Add the rice mixture to the onion-lentil mixture and mix well with your hands. 
Now start making the burgers. First roll the mixture into a ball ( take about a handful of the mixture). Heat a pan over medium-high heat and add oil to coat the bottom. Place the burgers in the pan and cook undisturbed for 5 minutes. Gently flip the burgers and turn down the heat to low. Add a slice of blue cheese on the burger so it can start to melt. Cover with a lid  until the burgers have a firm, brown crust. 
Now put the burger between your favourite kind of bun, drizzle some of the hony-mustard dressing and finish with alfalfa sprouts.

Beet On The Bread

Music

1 2 3 4... The Ramones with Beat on the Brat. These guys don't need an introduction.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d9EhPunI6xg

The Hemburger ( For Whom the Bun Tolls )

Hey everyone! Last week while strolling the internet, probably lurking where I shouldn't been lurking, I came across several sites that posted something about a burger recipe by literary legend Ernest Hemingway. Apparently, in 2014 Ernest Hemingway’s hamburger recipe resurfaced at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum in Boston. This recipe makes for a super manly,ultra- flavour packed burger comparable with the super macho- man Hemingway was. It has hints of mediterranean cuisine combined with more exotic flavours. This makes sense if you see where the man lived over the years : America, Paris, Spain, Cuba, Key West and the Caribbean. He is known for his very clean use of language, a very spare and tight prose. This inspired me to create a a very clean robust burger, nothing added that wasn't necessary. I present to you the Ron Swanson of burgers : The Hemburger ( For Whom the Bun Tolls ).

The original recipeIngredients

- 3 garlic cloves
- 2 eggs
- olive oil
- lemon
- 130 gr lentils (canned)
- 265 gr black beans (canned)
- dried sage
- selery salt
- onion powder
- 1 big spoon of marmite
- red wine
- panko or breadcrumbs (+- 80 grams)
- smoked paprika
- 1 big spoon of piccalilli
- 2 spoons of capers
- onion
- 2 spring onions

Preparation ( aïoli)

Roughly cut up 2 garlic cloves. Put them in a mortar and pestle, together with a pinch of coarse sea salt ( this helps the grinding). Now grind the garlic until you have a smooth paste. Add the yoke of 1 egg and mix it with the garlic paste. Now comes the hard part. Slowly add olive oil, and by slowly I mean really slowly, drop by drop. You're making a emulsion and if you add the oil to quickly the emulsion might curdle. While adding the oil you need to whisk continuously. Keep adding oil until you have the consistency of mayo. Add a little lemon juice, remember to keep whisking. Flavour with salt and pepper.

Preparation ( Burger )

Put the lentils, beans, 1 clove of garlic, a heaping teaspoon of dried sage, selery salt, onion powder, marmite, red wine, panko, raw egg and smoked paprika in a food processor and mix until you have a nice paste. If it's too wet add panko, if it's too dry add some wine or water.
When you you have the right consistency, add the piccalilli, the capers and the finely chopped spring onions. Taste and add seasoning if needed.
Now cool the mixture for about 20 minutes. In the meantime, heat up some oil in a frying pan, turn the heat very low and add coarsely chopped onion rings. Let them slowly cook until they're soft and brown. (be carefull not to burn them, if you let them cook long enough on low heat  they will caramelize). Set aside.
Now make burgers with the cooled down mixture. Heat a pan, high heat at first to get that crispy outside, lower the heat and let them cook for about a minute. Carefully turn the burger to the other side and repeat.

Assembling the burger

Cut open a bun ( your favourite one, I picked a whole grain bun), put on the burger, add a copious amount of the aïoli, then the caramelized onions. Enjoy!

The Hemburger ( For Whom the Bun Tolls )

Music

Some more manliness with the music of some old school Metallica. A song with the same name as the novel by Ernest Hemingway published in 1940. It tells the story of Robert Jordan, a young American in the International Brigades attached to a republican guerrilla unit during the Spanish Civil War. As a dynamiter, he is assigned to blow up a bridge during an attack on the city of Segovia. The novel is regarded as one of Hemingway's best works.

Get Him To The Greek

Summer is on it's last legs so I decided to prepare a burger with some mediterranean flair. Perfect to reminiscence over the long hot days and nights. A burger inspired by Greek cuisine. A burger stuffed with feta and olives, smokey grilled peppers, zesty tzatziki and fresh arugula.

Ingredients

- cucumber
- clove of garlic
- dill (fresh)
- Greek yogurt
- lemon
- spring onion
- 12 black olives
- thyme (fresh)
- oregano
- cumin
- 1 egg
- breadcrumbs or panco
- 1 spoon of Dijon mustard
- vegetarian minced meat (250 gr makes 3 big burgers)
- feta cheese
- grilled peppers
- olive oil
- pistachio nuts
- arugula ( you can use dandelion leaves if you find those )
- tomato
- salt 
- pepper
- hamburger buns

preparation (tzatziki)

Finely chop half of the cucumber and put the slices in a colander with a sprinkle of salt.
Leave them at least 15 minutes. Rinse under water and dry the cucumber in a unused kitchen towel.
Grate a clove of garlic and chop the fresh dill.
Mix cucumber with the Greek yogurt, dill, garlic and season with salt and pepper and add a little lemon juice.

preparation (burger)

Chop the spring onion. Deseed the olives and chop them into fine bits. Crumble the feta cheese. Mix the vegetarian mince with a raw egg, add the onions, olives, feta, mustard, breadcrumbs, some oregano, thyme, cumin and black pepper. No need to add salt because of the feta and olives. 
Mix with hands until all the ingredients are mixed together and you got a firm mass.
Now roll balls of the mixture and pat them into a burger shape. Add olive oil to a pan and cook the burgers until golden and crispy on the outside. Now lower the heat and leave for about a minute. Flip over the burger and repeat.

assembling the burger

Start off with one of the buns, add a little tzatziki. Now comes the burger. Add some more tzatziki, sprinkle some chopped pistachio's for extra crunch, add the grilled peppers, arugula, tomato and finish with the top bun. 

Get Him To The Greek

Music

Music by famous Greek prog-rockers Aphrodite's child. A band featuring members Vangelis and Demis Roussos. The song is from their third studio album 666, a musical adaptation of the biblical Book of Revelation. Enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbeOTy48EjE