Smashed patty cheeseburger

I’ve had the flu for the last couple of weeks and only just coming out of it this weekend (I hope). Streaming The Menu during the week made me want to lift my cheeseburger game.

And it ruined my life. I will never buy a burger again.

These are ingredients and directions for 1 burger. Scaling up to 2, 4 or 8 or 12 is simple ingredients-wise. The logistics is the trick. 

It all happens very quickly, so you’re much better off doing 4 beautiful burgers, followed by another 4, then another 4, rather than doing 12, serving them all together with only 4 of them properly cooked.

Doing 4 burgers (8 patties) is about the limit for 1 pair of hands (or at least for clumsy ones like mine) beyond that, you’ll need to enlist the troops so you can concentrate on smashing those patties.

Fat hack

Burger mince, especially when you’re smashing the patty rather flaming it, needs at least 20% fat to keep it moist and getting that gorgeous crust.

This is no problem if you’re buying from a butcher. But not so easy from a supermarket where often 17% is the highest fat content available.

Not to worry. You have options.

You can oomph it up by chopping up some bacon fat, or adding slivers of dripping. In my example I had home-made beef stock in the freezer and scraped off some of the clarified fat and mixed it into my supermarket-source beef mince.

Ingredients

1 65g brioche bun

110g beef mince, at least 20% fat

2 tbsp vegetable oil

2 slices American cheese

3 very thin slices tomato

2 leaves baby cos lettuce, halved

1 eschalot bulb, thinly sliced

1 tbsp very thin slices cucumber pickles

1 tsp mayonnaise and wasabi sauce

1 tsp chilli and tomato chutney

For assembly

1 cocktail skewer

Method

This is 90% assembly and 10% cook. But the 10% cook is very, very important.

To get the assembly right, room temperature is your friend. The lettuce - fresh, crunchy, room temperature; the tomato thinly sliced, juicy, room temperature etc.

Having everything ready for assembly lets you concentrate on the cook.

On one board, lay out your assembly items: lettuce, tomato, pickles.

On another board, lay out your cook items: two patty balls 55g each, sliced eschalots, cheese

Halve and lightly toast the bun. I do this under a grill. I don’t want the buns to be browned, but to be crisp enough to hold it’s crispness once the juices begin to flow.

Once they’re ready, apply the salad sauce (mayo and wasabi) to the bottom bun and the bbq sauce (chilli chutney) to the top bun.

Now you’re ready to cook.

There’s really no timing involved here other than - the moment you’ve done one step, move to the next step.

Put a non-stick frying pan on a high heat. Add the oil. Once the oil starts to smoke, add the first patty and squash it down with a steel spatula to about .5cm thickness. Quickly, do the same with the second patty.

Season the top side of the first, add the sliced onion. Do the same to the second. Flip the first, keeping as much of the union underneath the patty as you can. Do the same with the second.

Season the new upside of each. Top each with a cheese slice. Remove from heat. Stack first on top of the second.

Avengers - assemble!

Bottom bun

(Mayonnaise and wasabi)

Lettuce

Tomato

Patty and cheese stack

Pickles

(Chilli sauce)

Top bun

Press the burger down gently, so that the juices cascade through. Gravity is also your friend.

Spear with a cocktail skewer, and you’re ready to chow down.

Beef back ribs and risoni

Slow cooker - your work-from-home wonder

Working from home during this COVID–19 lockdown means knocking a lot of well-worn systems out of whack.

If you’re working from home with kids at home, let me suggest dusting off the crockpot (slow cooker). You can get dinner sorted between breakfast and log-on. Then all day the aroma will be developing that says two things: yum; and don’t panic.

And I just feel tremendously carnivorous when I’m frying beef in my pyjamas!

Ribs and risoni

You could just as easily use noodles, laying the ribs over a bed noodles and ladling the juices over that. But I had some risoni in the pantry, so decided to put it to use. You could also use pork ribs. Adding some black vinegar and Korean chilli flakes is also worth a try.

This is simple and very tasty recipe. Serve with steamed greens and salad.

Ingredients

• 1.5 kg beef back ribs
• 1 medium onion
• .25 cup kecap manis (sweet soy sauce)
• .5 cup light soy sauce
• .5 cup vegetable stock
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1 cup risoni
• Enough olive oil to cover your frying pan

Method

Cut the ribs into sections that will easily fit in your slow cooker. Peel and quarter the onion.

Heat the oil in a frying pan until the oil just starts to smoke, then brown the meet and onion in batches and remove to the slow cooker.

Mix the liquid ingredients in a bowl, then add the sugar and stir until it is dissolved.

Pour over the meat and onion.

Pop on the lid, turn on the cooker, and your job is done for at least three hours.

After three hours or so, move the meat around bringing the bottom bits to the top.

Now you’re done for two hours.

After two hours or so, remove the meat and bones to a plate and add the risoni, spreading it evenly across the base of the cooker.

Return the meat and bones to the cooker and cover.

After one hour, the risoni will have absorbed all those lovely juices and still hold good shape and texture.

The meat will have fallen off some of the ribs, and these can be discarded, as all their flavour has been drawn out.

A few minutes to steam some veggies or assemble a salad (or both) and you’re done!

Beef and rice noodle soup

My non-spicy son was off with buddies watching Thor part three, so I thought I’d treat my spicy son with a new dish.

Pretty much improvised, it worked out well. So here it is.

Ingredients

• 1 round steak
• 2 cups beef stock (or vegetable stock, or water if you’re caught short)
• 1 lemon, juiced
• 1 teaspoon five spice powder
• .25 cup chopped shallots
• 1 tablespoon chopped lemon grass stem
• 1 tablespoon chopped galangal root
• 2 cups frozen veggies
• 1 tablespoon Xo sauce
• 2 tablespoons light soy sauce
• 3 birdseye chillies, chopped
• 1 clove garlic, crushed
• 4 tablespoons peanut oil
• Rice noodles

Method

This is a very quick dish too assemble - all you have to do is cut the beef into rectangular slabs and pop them in the freezer about three hours ahead of time.

So - take the round steak and cut it into rectangles, removing fat and connecting tissue. You are going to slice it thinly across the grain, so you want each piece no more than 4 cm wide. Lay them flat in one layer in a plastic bag and put in the freezer for three hours. You are aiming at firm, but not hard. This will enable you to slice the beef more thinly.

Once the beef is the right consistency, slice it thinly across the grain and marinate in lemon and five spice powder.

Sauté lemongrass, galangal, garlic, chilli and shallots on low-medium heat for about 10 minutes. Stir in Xo sauce.

In a new saucepan, put on water to boil.

In the soup pan, add stock, and bring to boil. Add soy sauce to taste.

Zap veggies in the microwave.

Add noodles to the boiling water. Toss sliced beef and juices into the soup pan. Beef will cook almost immediately. Add the veggies. And you are done.

Once the noodles are tender, drain, divide into bowls, and ladle over with soup.

Stout beef casserole and cottage pie rebrand

Having enjoyed the beef, mushroom, Guinness pies a few weeks ago, I thought I’d push the same idea into a lovely, warm serve of winter heartiness.

This is basically beef bourguignon, but with stout instead of red wine. Serve with creamy mashed potato, and roast broccoli and cauliflower - adding almond slivers is also good, but last night I forgot!

Unlike the pie version, I err on the side of big with the meat pieces. It’s almost like they are little steaks which you’re encouraged to slice and smear with the sauce and mash, rather than just spoon in.

Roast veggie tip: why par boil, when you can par zap? Many roast vegetables benefit from par boiling to soften the centre, so that the outside can be crisped. A couple of minutes in the microwave means less water, less flavour down the drain - and less time wasted. Just saying…

Don't forget the French onions!

For a regular casserole, you pop it covered into the oven for 3 hours. But I use the slow cooker for 8.

As a bachelor dad, I get the recipe to the first stage a night ahead. Then pop it in the fridge.

Next morning, into the slow cooker, and away I go to work. That way, after school when my kids come home, they open the door to that rich and homey smell. They might not be here as often as I’d like, but it’s their home, and their dad loves them. Food can say that.
Serves 4

Ingredients

1kg chuck steak 75g pancetta, roughly chopped 1 cup stout 1 cup beef stock 1 tbsp salt 3 tbsp olive oil 3 tbsp butter 1 brown onion, roughly chopped 2 carrots, roughly chopped 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped 2 tbsp plain flour 3 bay leaves 8 eschalots, peeled 150g button mushrooms, sliced 2 sprigs thyme

Serve with buttery mashed potato and roast broccoli and cauliflower (with slivered almonds - if you remember... )

Method

1. Cut beef into 4–5 cm pieces.
2. Place the stout in a saucepan and reduce by a third over a medium-high heat, then add beef stock and bring to a boil.
3. In frying pan, heat 1 tbsp olive oil and 1 tbsp butter over a high heat. Season the beef with salt and fry in batches until caramelises as the edges and corners. Set the fried beef aside and add another 1 tbsp oil and 1 tbsp butter to the dish. When the butter is foaming, add the onion and carrot and reduce heat to medium-low . Cook for about 8 minutes, then add the garlic. Cook for a further 4 minutes, then add flour , mix through and gently cook for about 3 minutes.
4. Gradually pour the hot stout and stock mixture over the onion and carrots, stirring to ensure no lumps form. Bring to a gentle boil. Return the beef to the pan with any resting juices and bay leaves. (Stage 1 complete) Cover and cook in oven for 2 ½ hours in oven, or 8 in slow cooker.
5. In a frying pan, heat the remaining oil and butter on a medium-high heat, add pancetta and cook until lightly coloured, about 4 minutes, then remove from the pan. Add the eschalots and cook until they deepen in colour (about 3–4 minutes), then remove. Finally, add the mushrooms and lightly sauté (about 4–5 minutes).
6. Add the pancetta, eschalots, mushrooms and thyme leaves to the braised beef. Cook for a further 15 minutes. Serve with buttery mashed potato, extra thyme and freshly ground pepper, and roast veggies.

Rebrand

Next day, pull out the leftovers from the fridge and cut the beef and veggies into small pieces. Scoop up all the sauce, and place everything into a pie pot.

Take the mash leftover and combine with 2 tablespoons of breadcrumbs and 1 tablespoon of grated pecorino cheese.

For best results, as ever, let the whole lot come to room temperature.
Preheat oven to 160º

Top the casserole pie filling with the mash mix, fluffing it up with a fork. Cook in the oven for 30 minutes. If necessary, pump up the heat at the end to get the browny edges happening.

Rendang danging

(Indonesian beef and coconut curry)

One of the things I like about this dish is that it’s like a western casserole in reverse - in western casseroles, you fry first then simmer; in rendang danging you simmer first, then fry.

At the end, you have a rich, dark, semi-dry curry that goes very well with rice, and even better with flat breads such as roti canai or chapatis.

Ingredients

• 1.5kg diced chuck steak
• 1 400ml can coconut cream
• 4 cloves garlic
• 2cm cube fresh ginger, sliced
• 1cm cube fresh galangal, sliced
• 2 coriander root
• 8 birdseye chilli
• 2 onions
• 2 stalks lemongrass, sliced
• 1 tsp turmeric
• 1 tbsp fish sauce
• 1 tsp ground coriander seed
• 4 curry leaves
• .5 cup tamarind liquid
• 2 tbsp peanut oil
• palm sugar to taste
• garnish - torn coriander leaves, dry-fried desiccated coconut

Method

This one goes fast slow fast. It works well to do the assembling around lunch time, pop it in the slow cooker for the rest of the day, then back into the frying pan for about half an hour to reduce and finish. So…

Roughly chop one onion, thinly slice the other.

In blender, blitz the chopped onion, garlic, chillies, ginger, galangal, lemongrass, coriander root with just enough enough coconut milk for it to form a paste.

Once done, fry in peanut oil until the oil starts to separate from the liquid. Stir in beef cubes until they are coated, then add remaining coconut cream. Raise temperature to bring to a boil. Add remaining ingredients except the tamarind, sugar and garnish.

Once it has reached a strong boil, drop the temp and simmer, covered for about 2 hours - or, which is how I like to do it, transfer to a slow cooker and cook for 6 hours - in which case you give the frying pan a clean, because you’ll use it again!

After 6 hours in the slow cooker, transfer the mixture to the frying pan, bring the heat up and cook off the liquid until it just clings to the meat. Stir in sugar and tamarind.

Garnish to serve.

Pepper beef pie

Pastry

3 sheets short crust pastry
2 sheets puff pastry
1 lightly beaten egg

Filling

4 tablespoons olive oil
2 onions, diced
1 kg chuck steak, cut into 1cm cubes
1 tablespoon tomato paste
2 cups beef stock
1 portobello mushrooms, chopped - about 2 cups
1 30g can green peppercorns, including brine
1 cup Guinness
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
3 tablespoons cornflour
¼ cup water
salt and pepper to taste
Yields - six pies

Method

As with just about all cooking, the key thing is to start well by having everything (including the Guinness - and especially the meat) at room temperature.

In a heavy-based saucepan, fry meat in the oil a handful at a time to brown. You want a little caramelisation to happen. Set cooked meat aside.

Reduce heat and sauté onion and garlic, and then mushrooms, until soft.

Raise heat and add Guinness, bringing it to a strong boil to cook off the alcohol.

Add stock, peppercorns, tomato paste, Worcestershire sauce, then return meat to pan and simmer uncovered for an hour and a half.

Mix the cornflour in the water, and stir through the pie filling until it thickens. Remove from heat.
Preheat oven to 180º C.

Smere the pie trays with butter, and sprinkle with flour. Line with the shortcrust pastry. Place in the oven for 5–10 minutes. You want them to firm up a little, and just begin to go gold.

Remove, and loosen from the tray using a spoon, or the back of a bread knife. Spoon in mixture. Cut the 2 sheets of puff pastry into four squares each, then place over the top of the pies. Beat the egg, and glaze the puff pastry. Slice up the remaining puff pastry and do something that tries to be creative but isn’t. Glaze that too - you might as well.

Pop them into the oven for 30 minutes, repositioning every 10 minutes so that your pies are evenly golden brown.

A nice piece of skirt

Here in Australia, barbecue season has begun.

In Sydney, there was masses of rain shortly after the autumn holidays, and I let my courtyard and garden go ratso. While the boys were away with their mother over winter, I went on the attack (along with a tradie with a high pressure hose), and reclaimed this important out-door space, ready for barbecues and the planting of yummy things!

Thursday night was the sixth and final spring holiday night with my boys, and this was capped off when my grownup niece and her partner came over for dinner and a movie.

Barbecue steak, veggies, green beans and couscous. But it’s not this, it’s tonight’s bachelor version I’m dealing with here.

The salad

For the Thursday night, I combined couscous (in vegetable stock) with browned slivered almonds, a barbecued tomato, chopped, and sliced tender green beans. But I held something in reserve (well, I forgot to add it, but it comes to the same thing): dried cranberries.

The sauce

Parsley, shallots, oregano, one clove garlic - chop finely, or pound in a mortar. Chilli oil and olive oil.

And now for the skirt

When thinking of the ideal barbecue cut, most people think porterhouse or t-bone, that sort of thing. But cheaper and better is skirt. You just have to treat it right.

I see skirt in the butcher most often rolled in cling wrap ready for roasting. But it is also one of the most flavourful cuts for the grill. It also accepts a marinade very well. And it is about half the price of porterhouse.

The key is: cut across the grain.

Unroll the skirt roast, and cut into steaks along the grain.

On a hot barbecue grill, cook three minutes, then turn once, cooking for another three minutes.

Remove to rest on a cutting board, then slice down at a 45 degree angle and across the grain. It will be as tender and juicy as a prime cut, but with much more flavour.

The steak pictured (top) was cooked a little too long (more like four min each side) (I got distracted) and left to rest for not long enough (I was hungry) - so it’s not pink enough and too much juice is on the outside. But it was still very, very soft and yummy.

And the combo

Warming the green salsa and the couscous salad and layering with the freshly barbecued skirt over a warmed, soft corn tortilla - well, it was warming.

Stock management

On a dry winter weekend, with my mornings set aside for the boys’ soccer, and my arvos free - it was a good opportunity to stock up.

One of my local butchers is the Chop Shop at Hurlstone Park. I also like Mick’s Meats on New Canterbury Rd.

With local butchers you have the advantage of knowing a few things. You just ask. When does the meat come in? Where is it from? How was it fed? The chop shop saved me a lovely piece of point end brisket for a steak and mushroom pot pie, also used for pulled beef burritos.

For the pie, and for this week’s ragu, I also asked for bones for stock. Leg bones, rib, neck, all make good stock.

The equation is 1 kilo of bones for 2 litres of water, to yield .5 litres of stock.

So, the way I generally do it is 2k bones, 4l water, yielding 2 litres of brown stock.

Roast the bones with some olive oil, a couple of onions, a couple of mushrooms, carrots and celery sticks - 180º. 15 minutes, turn, then another 10.

While this is happening, bring 4 litres of water to the boil. My pots have handy litre measurements - but that’s not essential here.

What you do is take note of how far the water is up the pot - use a wooden spoon for instance. Then add the roasted bones and veggies. Then simmer back down to the level before you added the solids.

Remove most to the solids with tongs, the strain the rest into another saucepan, keeping just hot enough to make the mixture even, then ladle into containers for storage or freezing.

That’s about 5 family meals worth, right there.

Bachelor stockings!

There is something about the very small effort over a very long time when making stock that just works!

With my under–9 football team’s game rained out (go the mighty Wanderers!) - and a rainy weekend ahead of me - I took the opportunity to go to my local butcher and spend a couple of bucks on bones. I already have three chickens worth of backs and wingtips in the freezer. So: Saturday is beef stock; Sunday is chicken stock.

For beef stock, the best bones to choose are marrow and chuck bones - the leg and the neck.

My meal plans for the beef stock I’m making today are: slow-cooked rendang danging (Indonesian beef curry), slow-cooked osso bucco with citrus and, for when my children come back from a holiday with their mother, spaghetti bolognese. I’ll have enough for another two meals at least, but don’t want to give myself a headache from thinking too far ahead!

For this recipe, which yields 2 litres of stock, you’ll need an 7 to 8 litre stockpot.

Recipe - brown beef stock

Ingredients

• 2 kilogram beef bones
• .25 cup olive oil
• 2 carrots
• 2 onions
• 2 stick celery
• 2 portabella mushrooms
• 2 medium tomatoes
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 4 litres water
• 5 black peppercorns (lightly crushed)
• 2 bay leafs
• 2 sprigs oregano

Method

1. Have your butcher cut the marrow and chuck bones into pieces. At home, remove any excess fat
2. Preheat oven 200°C (fan-forced) and place bones in a large baking tray, drizzle with olive oil. Roast for 15 minutes. Turn, then roast another 15 minutes
3. While the bones are browning, chop vegetables into chunky pieces
4. Heat for litres of water in a stock pot
5. When bones are done, remove them to the stock pot and add some water to the roasting pan to deglaze. Add bay leafs, oregano sprigs and pepper corns
6. Place chopped vegetables into the pan and return to oven. Cook for a further 15 minutes
7. Place vegetables into the stock pot and bring to boil for about 10 minutes. Reduce to simmer a slow boil - you need more of a boil than a simmer to make sure you extract all the marrow and other goodness from the bones
8. Over the next few hours, come back every 30 minutes or so to enjoy the aroma, and to skim the froth can scum that rises to the top. A slow boil for 4 hours is best, or a little higher for 2 is also ok.
9. When you’re ready, remove the big bits from the stock pot with tongs
10. Skim and strain through a muslin lined sieve into a clean container, before dividing, stir to get an even consistency at the end
11. Cool quickly by dividing stock into small containers - about 2 cups is good, and refrigerate for several hours or overnight.
12. Remove layer of fat, under which you will have fantastic, jelly consistency, super-tasty beef stock!Reseal
13. Label and date stock and freeze for up to 3 months

Three pots

In praise of the three pot rule

In some ways this is even more important in a big kitchen where all that bench space can tempt you to reach for one pot after another the moment you feel the need. Yet, for the bachelor kitchen, the three pot rule is equally relevant.

In fact, the only rule more relevant is this one: “Everything in moderation (including moderation)”.

Now, where were we?

Figuring out how the family meal (even on the nights when it is a family of one) can be accomplished with three pots or less is a way of planning the meal project, getting it done with good care and little waste.

My favourite pot is a Le Creuset shallow casserole dish. One of the many things I like about it (apart from it being a gift from good friends) is that the lid handle allows the lid to sit stable and flat, making it the perfect place to rest browned meat or sautéed vegetables.

Like this.

Recipe: Braised steak with onions, mushrooms and red wine

Ingredients

• 1 large onion
• 2 cloves garlic
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste
• 2 tablespoons Lea and Perrins (or other Worcestershire sauce)
• 4 tabasco or birds eye chilies
• 1 double handful button mushrooms
• 1 double handful garden herbs (parsley, oregano, basil)
• 2 round steaks
• 1 cup beef stock
• 1 cup red wine
• 1 cup plain flour
• 1 tablespoon each: dried oregano, ground black pepper
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method

• Place flour, dried oregano and pepper in a clean bag
• Halve the steaks and shake in the flour bag one at a time and set aside (like on the lid of your handy casserole dish!)
• Peel and slice onions into rings
• Clean mushrooms (I like to leave them whole for this dish, just trimming the stalks)
• Peel and slice garlic cloves, chop chilies
• Heat oil in a heavy based pan
• Brown steaks on each side, then set aside
• Add onion and drop heat to low. Sauté for a few minutes. Add garlic and sauté a few more minutes
• Turn up heat, then add wine and boil off the alcohol and deglaze the pan
• Add mushrooms and chilies and, once the liquid boils again, add stock, Worcestershire sauce and tomato paste, and again bring to boil. Return the steaks to the pan. Then, when the liquid boils one last time, drop to a very low simmer
• Cover and simmer for one to two hours
• 30 minutes before serving, toss in round beans and cover again
• 15 minutes before serving, toss in garden herbs and cover again

Serve with steamed rice (pot number two)

A two-pot screamer!