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Friday, April 12, 2013

Chloe's Kitchen: Garlic Burgers

As some of you may know, Chloe is quite the cooking enthusiast. So the other day, my mom and I got this idea: why not make "cooking tutorials" a la Rachel Ray? Thanks to YouTube, you don't have to be on the Food Network to share a little food knowledge ;)

Whether you're looking to switch things up this week or impress a hot date, Chloe's Kitchen is here to help!




Click the video above for Chloe's step-by-step cooking tutorial, or try this link: http://youtu.be/ikZTrONqQ-o


Last night, Chloe decided to try her hand at Garlic Burgers, an idea she got after eating a similar burger at Sky Blue Cafe. She did not use a specific recipe for the dish, but Googled it a little to get a platform to start from. As a side, she whipped up a batch of homemade shells & cheese (aka mac n' cheese...but more fun). 

bread crumbs for the burgers
onions to sautee with the burgers
hand-formed burger patties about to go in the fridge for 30 mins!
cooking the burgers & onions
shells pasta for the mac!
American + Cheddar cheese for the mac
cooking the shells & cheese
baking the shells & cheese and toasting the burger bun
voila!

Ingredients:


  • 2 tsp bread crumbs (slice up a heel of bread) per pound of ground beef
  • ground beef (lean or regular...regular with be more juicy and have more flavor)
  • minced (1 spoonful) or fresh garlic
  • 1 onion (sliced)
  • 1/3 c. flour
  • 2.5 cups milk
  • 5 pieces of American cheese
  • 4 oz. cheddar cheese
  • a pinch of salt
  • a few shakes of hot sauce
  • fresh spinach (to put on the burgers)
  • burger buns or ciabatta rolls (which you can cut in half and use as a bun!)

Directions:

1. Cut up the bread crumbs (you can use the heel of a loaf of bread you have in your fridge, since no one really likes to eat the heel anyways...) and make sure you have enough for to put into the burgers and to make a nice crust on top of your mac n' cheese.

2. Put ground beef in a bowl along with the garlic and bread crumbs. Mix it all together with your hands (like you're kneading dough) and when your finished, form the ground beef into one big ball.

3. Take the beef ball and place it on a cutting mat. Divide it into four. Form each fourth into a patty with your hands.

4. Put the patties onto a microwave plate with a lid on it and put it in the refrigerator for 30 minutes. Start boiling a large pot of water for your pasta shells.

5. Cut up the onion into slices. The onion will be sauteed in with the burger while it is cooking and will be used to top the burger, so make sure the onion slices are a size you're comfortable eating when topping your burger.

6. Heat up a pan on medium and melt down a half stick of butter (make sure not to have the heat on too high so the butter doesn't burn!). Once the butter is bubbly, turn down the heat. 

7. Whisk flour in with the butter. Once the flour and butter are completely mixed through, then add 2 cups of milk and whisk immediately. Then add the additional 1/2 cup of milk and whisk.

8. Put the pasta shells into the large pot of water once it is boiling, and set the timer for 11 minutes (or whatever your particular pasta box recommends...ours was a Kroger brand, so yours could most certainly be different!). Stir the pasta RIGHT AWAY or it will stick together and to the pan. Stir often in the first 5 minutes. When the timer goes off, drain the noodles.

9. Put the burgers in a separate pan to cook. After they have been simmering for a few minutes, toss the onions in with them. Make sure they're touching the pan, not just sitting on top of the burgers, otherwise they won't get cooked! Use your own discretion when cooking the  burgers because it all depends on how "done" you want them (rare, medium, well done, etc.)

10. After about 7 minutes, the butter/flour/milk combo should be thickening and be frothy. Add in the cheese. One it thickens nicely, take it off the heat. Add a pinch of salt  and a few shakes of hot sauce to the cheese mixture. Whisk it together. 

11. Add the shell pasta to the cheese sauce. Stir together. 

12. If you have a convection oven, turn it onto "bake" and 350 degrees. You can use a normal oven, too, but it's more energy efficient to use a small oven when you're baking such tiny dishes. Scoop the mac n' cheese into individual ramekins, top with bread crumbs and place in oven. If you don't want to bake it, you can certainly eat it straight out of the pan! Just depends on whether you like a little crispiness or not ;)

And you're done!

If you try this recipe, let us know what you think :)

What we're listening to: Train – Mermaid

~Stay Lovely~

CAT

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