Voila: the latest fruit of my kitchen experiments.Here's how I like my hamburgers. Gather up a ball of meat, about a 1/3 to 1/2 lb. works best, and rub in some kosher salt and pepper. Splash it with soy sauce -- just a splash, or else your burger will become soggy and lose consistency. Flatten it into a patty, turn up your stove burner to medium heat, and pour some olive oil onto a cast iron pan. Throw a little butter on there, too. Drop the patty on the pan and leave it alone. Don't prod it, don't mash it with a spatula when it starts to rise, or you'll knock out the juices. Flip it once after 3-4 minutes, cook it for another 4 minutes, and take it off the heat. Drop it on a nice toasted piece of bread of your choice.
For the sauce:
1/2 onion, finely chopped
1/2 tbsp. oil (or if you just cooked your hamburger, use the leftover juice)
1 tbsp. butter
1/2 tbsp. flour
1/3 to 1/4 cup demi glace or beef stock
1/2 cup Cointreau
salt and pepper, to taste
Toss the onion into the oil/juice on medium high heat, coating it in the oil; cook for about 2 minutes. Add Cointreau and turn heat to high; cover pan and reduce by half. Add butter and flour and rapidly whisk together. Add demi glace. Check seasoning and add salt & pepper as necessary.
2 comments:
I just attempted a Cirroc-inspired variation of this. It was a highly satisfying dinner. Here are my results:
* My main reason for doing this was because I had some orange gravy, almost identical to this sauce, left over from last night's dinner. This is not recommended. As with most things, this would probably be better made from scratch.
* I also had leftover some fresh crimini mushrooms, which I sliced and added between softening the onions and adding the sauce. This is highly recommended.
* I formed my burgers into long ropes, and put them on toasted baguette (again, because that was the bread I had). This is VERY MUCH NOT recommended. It was plenty tasty, but had a tendency to topple over, and made for an awful presentation, besides being messy.
* I put a layer of fresh baby spinach between the bread and the burger. This is very much recommended. The heat from the burger wilts the spinach perfectly, and helps get some dark greens into the meal.
And as a general thing, when making a roux, brown the flour in the oven (or toaster oven) first. This removes the floury taste.
Thanks for the contribution! Josh correctly observes that this is a roux-based sauce. Alton Brown always recommends putting the flour in the oven, but I always forget. I'll have to try it.
I'm amazed that you had even marginal success with the tubular hamburgers. It's a difficult feat to pull off. But one of my favorite burger joints in Tempe used to serve a "torpedo"-shaped burger that was just masterful. In fact, I should devote a separate blog post to burgers I have known.
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