Smash Burgers

 MAKES 8 CHEESEBURGERS OR 14 SLIDERS

EQUIPMENT

• A seasoned cast-iron skillet or fl at top
  
• A stiff spatula
  
• A #12 salad scoop for full-size cheeseburgers, #16 salad scoop for sliders (see Note)
  

THE BURGER

• 8 potato buns (make sure to get the right-size buns for either cheeseburgers or sliders)
  
• Peanut oil, or other neutral oil
  
• 2 pounds (about 1 kg) fresh-ground 80/20 chuck
  
• Salt, for seasoning
  
• American cheese, thinly sliced (preferably fresh-sliced cheese from your deli counter, not prepackaged “singles”)

THE TOPPINGS
Not here, my friend. This classic American cheeseburger needs no condiments. So, before you add anything, taste it. There’s a good chance you’ll become a purist like me on the spot.

Note: If you’re making sliders, the patties will take slightly less time to cook than is listed here. Watch for red liquid to know when to flip.

1. Toast the buns in a preheated cast-iron skillet or on a preheated flat top and set them aside.

2. Preheat the cast-iron skillet over medium heat (or a flat top to medium) and add a drop or two of peanut oil. Use the spatula to spread the oil, coating the cooking surface.

3. Put the ground chuck in a mixing bowl. Using the salad scoop, form balls of beef (they should be heaping scoops), placing them on the heated skillet as you go. Each ball should have about 3 inches (7 cm) of space around it. (Depending on the size of your cooking surface, you may only be able to cook 2 or 3 burgers at a time.)

4. Sprinkle a generous pinch of salt on each ball of beef and then, using a stiff spatula, press them down, hard. Don’t be afraid, press harder! Press each ball until it’s a wide patty, just a bit larger than the bun it’s about to meet. Here’s the trick, though: Once the patties are flat, step back and don’t touch them again. Let them cook for 2½ minutes or until reddish liquid begins to form on the surface of the patties.

5. Flip them once and resist the temptation to press the patties again.

6. Add a slice of cheese to each patty and let them cook for another 2 minutes.

7. Remove the burgers from the skillet and place them on toasted white buns.

Garlic Sirloin

You need to put this one your grilling to-dos before summer over!!

Garlic Sirloin
1 lb sirloin steak
1/2 cup butter
2 TBS minced garlic
1 TBS garlic salt
1 tsp salt

 Melt butter. Mix together butter, garlic, garlic salt and salt. Cut steak meat into about 1.5 inch pieces (cubes).
 Baste butter mixture onto steak pieces. (We put meat and butter mixture in a large ziploc and coated)

Stick steak pieces onto kabob sticks. Grill for about 15 minutes.

 Rotate skewers every couple of minutes, cooking evenly on each side.  Re-baste meat throughout grilling process, because a lot of the flavor will cook off. Check steak temperature when you are done grilling, meat should be 150 for medium well/ or cut one piece open to check the color inside, should be light pink for medium well steak.

You could also use this recipe for cooking steaks this way.

Lemon and Garlic Grilled Chicken

This recipe is by far my favorite for grilled chicken. It's not a chicken that will need BBQ sauce or any other condiment that doesn't belong on chicken. This chicken is delicious. Even though a full breast is shown in the picture, I usually cut them into tenderloin sized pieces. Marinate the tenderloins to increase the delicious lemon/garlic flavor.


Lemon and Garlic Grilled Chicken
Printable Version

Juice of 1 lemon, approximately 3 tablespoons
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon minced garlic, about 2 medium cloves
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1 pound chicken breasts (Cut really thick chicken breasts down to thin them out and make the pieces a little smaller so they absorb the marinade better - I trimmed and cut the breasts into tenderloin size pieces)

Combine all marinade ingredients. Place chicken in a ziploc bag and pour marinade over chicken. Seal bag and place in fridge overnight. (I only marinaded my thawed tenderloin sized pieces for 2hrs - worked great! I put them in a 9x13 and covered it with cellophane) Grill (or cook in frying pan). Serve with sides of your choice or cut into bite sized pieces and add to desired recipe.

Double the marinade and chicken and grill it all up and freeze the extras to use later. It would be great chicken for a salad, aunt renees, Hawaiian haystacks, pizzas, pastas, fettuccine alfredo etc... really any dinner that needs cooked chicken.

Recipe by MyKitchenCafe