Looking Back: Burgers

My blog may be horribly neglected, but fortunately I've still be cooking and taking pictures when I remember or have time. For this post, I'm going to go way back to the August issue of Cooking Light which featured several different tempting-sounding gourmet burgers. I've already reviewed the Italian Meatball Burgers, but we've also tried the Saté Burgers and the Southwestern Turkey Cheddar Burgers with Grilled Onions.

I don't have pictures of Saté Burgers, but they were quite good. This is a turkey and pork burger that combines the elements of a typical sate with ingredients such as peanuts, lime, cilantro and fish sauce. The result is an exotic, moist, flavorful burger. The recipe suggests skipping the bun and serving them with rice. We decided to be burger traditionalists and decided to serve them on hamburger buns but were put off by the fact that there was no sauce - it seemed like they would be a bit boring and bland just slapped on a dry bun. We decided to try them with bottled Teriyaki sauce and that worked pretty well, but I think perhaps CL knew what they were talking about when they suggested the rice.

Southwestern Turkey-Cheddar Burgers with Grilled Onion

The next burger we tried was the Southwestern turkey burger. This burger is a bit more straightforward, combining turkey with a few Tex-Mex spices and a bit of wheat germ. The burgers are topped off with grilled onions, cheddar cheese and a spicy Chipotle-Poblano ketchup that really takes this burger up a notch. Our only complaint with this burger is that it perhaps had a bit too much onion in the burger itself - this seemed unnecessary with the grilled onion topping.

As a side note, each of these recipes makes 6 burgers. We didn't want to end up with 2 leftover burgers, so instead of reducing the recipe to make 4, we upped the recipes to make 8 and froze the leftovers for a later meal. In fact, I think we still have some of the Southwestern burgers left, waiting for a cold day this winter when we want to bring a little summer indoors.

Only one burger left to try from that issue - the Korean Barbecue Burgers. Yum - I love Korean barbecue - called bulgogi and/or galbi - so we will definitely give these burgers a try and I'm pretty sure we won't be able to wait until summer......

On this day in..........
2006: Sweet Rolls on Sunday
2005: Would you cook if you couldn't taste anything?

Happy Thanksgiving!

No food pictures to post today, so I'll just post a photo I took earlier this fall - I loved the way the fog was settled in amongst the fall foliage. And if you look closely, you can see Bailey out enjoying the beautiful day. We still have quite a few leaves on the trees around here! It looks more like the end of October than the end of November!

I continue to neglect my blog, but I appreciate all who stop by to take a look. Though I haven't been writing, I have been taking pictures of quite a few of our cooking ventures, so I hope to get caught up on my posts in the near future.

Have a wonderful holiday.

On this day in.....
2005: Moving Madness

Peanut Butter Brownie Update

A photo update, that is.

As I make recipes I've previously reviewed on this blog, I try to take new pictures if my previous attempts were lacking. This was one of those recipes......or photos.

Peanut Butter Brownies

I sure miss baking, but I just don't have as much time as I did last year. The weather has been pretty mild, so the focus has still been on outdoor work, but I think we've finished most of that for the fall. Hopefully that means I'll get more time to warm the kitchen with the smells of some fresh baked goodies.

Until then, I'll just keep checking Joe's blog to get my baking fix. No matter what's going on or how crazy things get, he's always got something delicious coming out of the oven. Speaking of which, now is the time to start betting on how many different cookies/confections come out of his kitchen this holiday season. Or how many pounds of butter he goes through!

On this day in....
2005: Weekend Dog Blogging

Delicious "Pumpkin" Pasta Recipe

Last week I was planning my menu and decided to crack open my 365: No Repeats from Rachael Ray. I didn't get very far down the list when I came upon a recipe for Pumpkin Pasta with Sausage and Wild Mushrooms. I didn't look any further - this sounded perfect.

I've put the pumpkin in quotes because I actually used butternut squash. My husband's great aunt was here for a visit earlier this year and brought us 4 or 5 huge butternut squash. The funny thing is, she said she didn't even plant any butternut squash - they were all volunteers! Anyway,I recently roasted all of the squash, pureed it (because of texture aversions, I can only eat it pureed), divided it into 2-cup quantities and put it in the freezer.

Pumpkin Pasta with Sausage and Wild Mushrooms

I did change up the recipe a bit from what was in the cookbook - I left out the olive oil which seemed wholly unnecessary, I drained the sausage and a few other changes. The recipe I've included in my link is slightly modified from the one in the cookbook, but I've tried to note the major changes. The recipe goes together quite easily, but it tastes like you went to a lot of work - that's my kind of recipe!

DH and the boys weren't quite sure when I rattled off the ingredients in the recipe, but I was pretty confident that we would all like it and I was right. It was a big hit - the 3 boys went back for seconds, always a good sign.

2 cups down, 12 more to go...........

On this day in....
2006: This and That

Tuna is a treat!

Wow, it's a new record - posts two days in a row!

We love fish and would eat it more often, but around here it's very, very expensive - usually $12 per pound or more. When it was just the two of us eating it, no big deal, but with 2 growing boys eating adult or near adult-sized portions, it's really hard to spend that kind of money. Most of the time we're stuck with salmon and tilapia, but I can also find pretty decent tuna for about $9-$10 per pound. Still pretty pricey, but I get so tired of not eating fish, so I splurge once in a while. It's a shame, really - we like fish and it's so healthful...........sigh.

Tuna with Wasabi Cream

When I started looking for a recipe for the tuna, I knew I wanted Asian flavors. I came upon this recipe from Cooking Light and it jumped out at me. This recipe is very easy to put together and very flavorful. The seasonings on the tuna give it a nice kick and while the sauce has its own kick, it also has a nice contrasting coolness from the sour cream and mayonnaise.

I served it with mushrooms and onions that I roasted in a mixture of sherry, soy sauce, salt and pepper - these turned out very nicely and I liked that it freed up my stove for making the spinach. I used the basics of this spinach recipe, substituting sesame oil for the olive oil. Add a side of plain white rice and you have a simple but elegant and delicious meal with relatively little fuss.

The only thing I didn't like about this recipe? The name. The official name is Tuna "London Broil" with Wasabi Cream. I don't get it......................

On this day in....
2005: Weekend Dog Blogging