Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Introductions and the basic burger

The Bachelor Gourmet...

 First off what is Bachelor Gourmet? Well simply it is food that goes beyond your simple reheated spaghetti, Kraft dinner or a microwave TV dinner while taking a minimum of preparation time and dirtying a minimum number of dishes. Some call them one dish wonders but regardless of what you call them it simply comes down to the fact that lazy people want to eat well too.

In different posts on this blog I will go into such subjects as ingredient quality, food handling, food storage, eating out, flavour experimentation, and calorie counting/low calorie cooking but I will begin with a post on what I believe to be one of the easiest ways to elevate one of the most basic and common dishes to a true culinary experience. The basic Burger.

Traditionally the basic burger is a fatty slab of ground beef smothered in processed cheese, sickly sweet and 'tangy' sauces, lettuce, and tomato, slapped between to halves of a cheap white bread bun, not necessarily a bad meal but definitely not fitting of calling itself anything even close to gourmet. Now while ingredient selection can do some to help this such as going with local free range or organic beef (I always think you should buy locally grown/produced food whenever possible) and using real cheese rather than processed crap it still comes a way from being considered gourmet. So without further ado, here is the recipe.

Lumberjack Burger Provincial

 Prep Time- 15 minutes, Dishes Dirtied- 1 frying pan, 1 spatula, & 1 plate

Ingredients
1/3 lb. Lean Ground Sirloin
1 Egg
1-1/2 Strips of Bacon
3-4 Slices of Brie
Worcestershire Sauce

First preheat your frying pan to a high medium temperature (about 6 on most stoves) you then take the bacon and cook it in your frying pan until it has achieved the desired level of crispiness. While the bacon is cooking form your burger patty from the beef and once the bacon is done remove it from the pan and place it on paper towel to drip.

You now begin cooking the burger by placing it in the pan you cooked the bacon in without changing the temperature. Cook for about 2 minutes on the first side and when you flip it put a few drops of the Worcestershire sauce. The second side you cook for about 4 minutes then flip again. Now you place the Brie and the Bacon on the burger and cover for about 2 minutes. The burger is now done take it and put it on your plate but there is one final step so don't eat it yet.

Now keeping the frying pan at the same heat we fry our egg sunny side up or over easy/hard if you prefer. I recommend sunny side up but the choice is yours. The simply place the egg on top of the burger serve with some chips or a salad, the beverage of your choice and enjoy.

You will find the complexity of all the flavours mingling when you break into the yolk and in runs over everything absolutely delicious and at the end of everything you only have the 3 dishes to clean.

Just a couple notes on this recipe. First off if you are using grocery store or frozen ground meat you will have to cook your burger for about 2-3 minutes more per a side to insure it is totally cooked through as it tends to be not as safe as locally grown and acquired beef is. Second if you wish you can swap out just about any variety of cheese you want for the brie although I would generally recommend either a very rich cheese like brie or a very flavourful cheese like very old cheddar or swiss.

Well I hope you've enjoyed this little introduction and please check back from time to time to see what new recipes I've been able to conjure from the recesses of my mind. Also please do not hesitate in the slightest to give me your feedback on what you think of this blog on your ideas of how I might improve it.

Bleeding Teddy – The Bachelor Gourmet

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