I love trying out new burger recipes with different flairs.
Jay found this version in Men’s Health and it reminded me so much of our favorite Banh Mi sandwiches, but in burger form.
Spicy Asian Pork Burgers
What you’ll need:
½ English cucumber
½ cup rice wine vinegar {I like “seasoned” rice vinegar}
Salt to taste
1 lb ground pork
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbsp fresh ginger, minced
2 scallions, thinly sliced
2 Tbsp mayonnaise
1 Tbsp sriracha
4 sesame-seed buns, lightly toasted
¼ cup hoisin sauce
How to make it:
1. Make the pickles by combining the cucumber, vinegar, and a few pinches of salt in a bowl or jar. Set aside.
2. Preheat the grill over medium heat. Combine the pork, garlic, ginger, and scallions. Gently shape into patties, season with salt, and grill for about 5 minutes on each side.
3. Combine the mayonnaise and sriracha and spread on the bottom buns. Spread the top buns with hoisin and then sandwich the two halves around the burger with pickles. Makes 4 burgers.
They were delish, of course.
Spicy from the Sriracha mayo, sweet from the hoisin and crunchy & tangy from the pickled cucumbers!
I served them with sautéed zucchini and red onion in about a tablespoon of coconut oil ~ my new fave.
*****
Grab the ingredients and grill up some of these this weekend!
Fortunately Elliott’s soccer practice was cancelled for tonight so that means we can get in our jammies early, light some candles and be in for the night to watch some Monday Night Football.
Go Niners!
Buffalo chicken wings are synonymous with football, no?
For all my buffalo chicken recipes, I like to use this…
Now, there is the Original Frank’s RedHot Cayenne Pepper Sauce , and then there is the WINGS sauce {pictured above}….I have found that the wings sauce gives whatever buffalo chicken dish you’re making a more authentic buffalo flavor ~ and we don’t want to mess with that, right? Right.
I totally messed up the recipe, but they worked out just fine. I will tell you what I did and you can determine if you’d like to do what I did or follow the original recipe provided in the link above.
1/4 cup light sour cream {I used plain greek yogurt}
1/4 cup reduced fat blue cheese crumbles
1/4 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1/2 cup diced celery
1 package ground chicken {approx 1.25 lbs.}
1/4 cup hot pepper/wing sauce
2 tablespoons bread crumbs {more if your meat mixture is too sticky}
1/2 teaspoon celery salt
1 pinch cayenne pepper, or to taste
4 buns or rolls, split & lightly toasted
For garnish: lettuce, tomato and/or red onion
{I spread a little bit of bottled Ranch dressing on the bun and used up some leftover chopped tomato on top}
Directions
Preheat your pan or grill on medium-high heat, and lightly oil the grate.
Mix the ground chicken, sour cream/yogurt, blue cheese crumbles, chopped celery, worcestershire sauce, 1/4 cup hot sauce, bread crumbs, celery salt, and cayenne pepper together in a mixing bowl until evenly blended. Form into four 3/4-inch-thick patties.
Cook the chicken burgers on the preheated grill 6 to 7 minutes until well marked, flip and cook for another 5-6 minutes. An instant-read thermometer inserted into the center should read at least 165 degrees F (74 degrees C).
Note: ground chicken has a very different texture than ground beef or ground turkey. Once you mix all the ingredients into the meat, it may seem very wet. If this is the case, you can add a little more bread crumbs to bring it together more or you can go ahead and separate into four patties and once they cook up, they will firm up obviously. The original recipe didn’t call for adding the blue cheese into the meat. I like to add things to the burger before cooking it and that is why I chose to add the chopped celery into the meat. You could certainly leave out the celery if you are not a fan. A little grated carrot would also be fun to throw into the meat for added color and crunch. Again, you can refer to the link above to see an alternate way to prepare these.
To roast the spaghetti squash, just cut in half lengthwise, scoop out the seeds, sprinkle with a little olive oil, salt & pepper and place flesh side {cut side} down onto a foil lined baking sheet and roast at 400* for 50 minutes.
I loved this meal. We’ll be having the leftovers tomorrow night before everyone comes into town for Thanksgiving and the real meals begin!
I’m trying to be healthy and nothing healthy looks good!
Until I get my Cooking Light, I remembered I got a Taste of Home featuring healthy recipe options…so I checked it out and found some garbanzo bean burgers!
Now you may not get excited about this, but I LOVE me some garbanzos ~ have been known to eat a whole can plain {rinsed first, of course!} Also found a new recipe for hummus which I’ll be trying soon, too.
1 can [15 oz.] garbanzo beans, rinsed and drained
3 Tbsp. water
1 tsp. lemon juice
1 cup dry bread crumbs
1 egg
1 tsp. Italian seasoning
1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1/2 tsp. onion powder
Dash crushed red pepper flakes
2 tsp. canola oil
6 whole wheat hamburger buns, split and toasted
1. Place the beans, water and lemon juice in a food processor; cover and process until blended. Transfer to a large bowl. Add the bread crumbs, egg and seasonings and mix well. Shape into six patties.
2. In a large skillet, cook patties in oil in batches for 3-4 minutes on each side or until lightly browned. Serve on buns with cheese. Top with pickle slices, mayonnaise {or lemon garlic aioli} and ketchup, if desired.
{I used my grill pan with just a little evoo}
I served them with a slice of lowfat cheddar on a multi-grain sandwich thin and a small chopped salad.
{Jay got some mac n queso on the side to make up for the absence of meat in the meal! ;-)}
They were delish and suuuuper flavorful ~ very falafel[esque]. I will definitely be making them again.
So tell me, are there anymore closet chickpea lovers out there?
{mixed greens, carrots, red pepper, sugar snap peas, cucumber, red onion, raisins, blue cheese, garbanzo beans and light ranch}.
Tonight we’re having the SAME thing.
Although, I’m adding some curried carrot soup…again, one of my faves and super easy.
Looks like I’m going to have to do some serious meal planning action.
Fortunately there is a Cooking Light subscription with my name on it making it’s way to the mailbox soon.
I need some new ideas.
Stay tuned…..more new recipes to come!
And speaking of staying tuned….we’re NOT going to be….we’ve {Jay} has decided that for the first quarter of 2011 we’re turning off Direct TV.
No Bravo.
I’m dying inside.
And then he informs me that the new TVs these days do not have antennas so you can’t even get a fuzzy showing of local channels!
A pair of old skool rabbit ears is looking pretty attractive right now.
BUT…
I think it will be good. I can’t imagine how much more I’ll/we’ll get done without our dear friend, Mr. Samsung. Last night as I was in the workout room watching RHofBH, I thought at least I may get more elliptical and treadmill time in if I HAVE to go to the gym at night to watch TV!
It’ll be interesting to see how it goes ~ it could go either way.
Who wants to invite us over to watch the Superbowl?
*****
On another note, here is a hint {a big one} of the theme of Holden’s birthday next month:
But…he wanted a “real” burger and I could tell that he was eluding to a trip to Red Robin.
My penny pinching self sprung into action and after a quick trip to Trader Joe’s, created a burger bash for less than a fifth of the cost of a trip to RR.
Mini Burger Buns: $1.19
One Pound 80/20 Ground Beef: $2.49
Garlic Fries: $2.69
(I had all the other ingredients already on-hand)
I decided to make Pioneer Woman sliders ~ caramelized onions, blue cheese and Tabasco mayo!
And the TJ’s garlic fries are just like the ones from Gordon Biersch….garlic chunks galore!
But, the best part was that the kids ate them, too and I didn’t have to play short order cook and prepare 15 different things!
….all because of several “P”ioneer “W”oman recipes that I tried.
We took a little drive and played in some “P”owdery “W”hite!
There were a couple “P”igskin “W”ins to determine this year’s Superbowlers.
So I guess you could say that it was a “P”erfectly “W”onderful weekend!
On Saturday night I made Pioneer Woman’s “most favorite burger ever (for now)”. You can find the recipe here.
They were delish and a nice departure from the turkey burgers with cheddar and horseradish that I’ve been making for the past few years now! Jay was pleased that I finally made some HAMburgers with real ground BEEF!
Here is a “before” pic:
Um, let me just say that what you see above is 2 pounds of meat…PW uses 2 pounds of meat for TWO burgers! What? I mean I know cowboys work hard and all and can put some food away, but WOW! Those’d be some GRANDE burgers! Half pounders are MORE than enough for us!
Here is the “in process” pic:
And, my friends, here is the “after” pic when these babies are all dressed up and ready to go:
Please don’t tell PW that I served her fave burgers with Ore Ida Seasoned Crinkle Fries! Shhhhh!
I tell you, I have a whole new appreciation for the Kaiser Roll! I usually use toasted english muffins for my burgers, but kaisers are a tad crunchy on the outside and soft and chewy on the inside! I followed PW’s orders and buttered and toasted them and OMG! Sorry, little english muffins, but these were fantastic and the tabasco mayo, caramelized onions and bleu cheese put them over the top. I used fresh baby spinach as my “green” just so I could feel like there was some sort of healthy component to this meal!
After this scrumptous dinner, I ran to Target to get Holden some boots for the snow since we had a little mini road trip planned for Sunday morning. This is what I found:
Lovin’ all the Paul Frank stuff at one of my favorite stores these days!
I got up early Sunday morning and made some Monkey Bread. Another evil concoction that PW has on her blog!
Now this stuff is like a drug so be careful!
After we ate the sinful Monkey Bread, we headed to Frazier Park for some fun in the snow!
The quesadillas were good…Jay said the shrimp was “not evident”…hmmm, I think the camarones should be evident in a quesadilla named after them so next time I’ll add more of the little critters. He also wasn’t a big fan of the green salsa, so next time maybe some homemade red salsa to go alongside. After indulging in the monkey bread earlier in the day, I felt guilty about adding butter to the pan to brown and crisp up the tortillas…but I had to follow PW’s orders. Next time I may try to make them a little more figure friendly….I tried to go a little lighter on the queso, too. But overall, they were good!
I also made some quacamole….I can’t blame PW for that. That was all MY doing, unfortunately.
Guac:
2 ripe avocados
1/4 onion (red or white), minced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 small tomato, seeded & chopped
bunch cilantro, chopped
juice of 1 lime or 1/2 lemon
salt & pepper to taste
dash cumin
That’s it! Mix it all up and dig in with your favorite tortilla chips.
I think I’ll have to incorporate more “P”lentiful “W”orkouts into this week’s agenda because there are a couple other visions of yumminess I’d like to try on PW’s blog…it’s a vicious cycle!
