The Crabby Cook - by Jessica Harper

Who doesn’t love a good burger? I know I do. Well, in Sydney, a certain chef loves ‘em so much he was willing to spend three months planning the construction of the largest burger ever  made.Weighing in at over 210 pounds, the mega-meal took 24 hours to make (120 eggs were involved) and four men to flip.  (Click here to view the meaty masterpiece.)

I am way too crabby to attempt such a thing. First of all, I can’t get my head around planning a meal more than 4 hours in advance, let alone three months. And if something takes more than 30 minutes to put together, it ain’t happening in my kitchen. Just the task of cracking all those eggs would be cause for medication.

I will be sticking with the more diminutive variety of burger. I made these sliders for a daughter home from college and she flipped. Well, I flipped (without the help of four men), she ate.

Sliders With Chipotle Mayonnaise

1 pound ground beef

1 1/2   tablespoons olive oil, plus extra for the pan

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

Kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper

½ cup mayonnaise

2 teaspoons chipotle puree (see Note)

1 tablespoon lime juice

1 teaspoon minced garlic

½ cup grated cheddar cheese, or a mix of cheddar and Monterey Jack

8 dinner rolls

1. Preheat the broiler. Place the ground beef in a large bowl, Add the oil, mustard, ½ teaspoon kosher salt and ¼ teaspoon pepper and mix well. Divide the meat into 8 portions and form 8 small patties.
2. In a small bowl, mix together the mayonnaise, chipotle puree, lime juice, garlic, ¼ teaspoon salt and ¼ teaspoon pepper.
3. Rub a large skillet lightly with a little olive oil, and set it over medium heat. (Of course you can also do this on your outdoor grill, lightly oiled and preheated to medium.) When the skillet is hot, add the patties and cook until they are well browned on the bottom, about 3 minutes. Flip the patties over and sprinkle each one with a tablespoon of the grated cheese. Continue cooking until the cheese has melted and the sliders are well browned on the other side, about 3 minutes.
4. While the sliders are cooking, split the rolls horizontally, place them on a baking sheet, split side up, and toast them lightly under the broiler. Spread a little of the chipotle mayo on the toasted sides of each roll.
5. Sandwich each slider in a dinner roll, forming a mini-burger, and serve hot.

Note: If your market doesn’t carry chipotle puree, simply puree a small (7-ounce) can of chipotle peppers in adobo sauce in your food processor.

Tags: ambrosia on the spot, chipotle, hamburgers, Randwick, slider, slider with chipotle mayonnaise, Sydney, world's largest burger

This entry was posted on Friday, June 11th, 2010 at 10:30 am and is filed under Meat Me. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.