Tuesday, March 18, 2008

Red Meat

We don't eat a lot of red meat in our house. I will almost always substitute ground turkey or chicken for any recipe calling for ground meat. I usually don't ever miss it and haven't eaten any red meat since Valentine's Day. I have even stated I am not a big steak eater. However, yesterday I was craving a burger in a big way! Not just any burger mind you but a Chili Dog Cheeseburger. I wanted one so bad I dragged both of my children to the grocery store to buy some ground beef, never mind that I had the makings for 3 other dinners at home. I wanted myself a burger and golly I was going to have it! Just so you know how much I wanted a burger, HJ pretty much makes my life miserable when I take him shopping of any kind. In the typical male fashion, he would rather have his teeth pulled than shop and is not at all afraid to let me know this any way that he can. I avoid shopping with him at all costs. Yesterday though my need for the burger overrode my vow to avoid shopping with my son!
Now I am sure you want to know what a Chili Dog Cheeseburger is and I am going to tell you (even if you don't care and don't want to know, I am going to tell you because it is my blog and I want to!)
The recipe for this unique burger comes from a great little fun cookbook by Rachel Ray, titled, Rachel Ray 365: No Repeats. It is a great fun cookbook. I love Rachel Ray and her simple, fun, fast (usually all can be prepared around 30 minutes) recipes. Her writing style is fun and matches her personality. There are a lot of great recipes in this cookbook! But I digress, yesterday the one I wanted was recipe #174: Chili Dog Bacon Cheeseburgers and Fiery Fries. (I am baconed out so I left out the bacon on ours.) Here is this fun recipe that is a super man pleaser!

8 slices thick cut bacon
1 sack crispy style frozen french fries
1 lb lean ground beef
2 hot dogs cup up in small pieces
2 TBLS chili powder
1 TBLS grill seasoning such as McCormick's Montreal Steak Seasoning
2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 TBLS plus 1 tsp hot sauce
2 TBLS ketchup
Oil for drizzling
4 deli slices cheddar cheese
2 TBLS unsalted butter
3 garlic cloves finely chopped
1/2 cup chili sauce
Hamburger buns

Cook the bacon until crispy if using it

Bake the fries to package directions

While fries cook, make the burgers. Preheat a large nonstick skillet over med-high heat. Mix the beef with chopped hot dogs, chili powder, grill seasoning, Worcestershire, 1 tsp of the hot sauce, and the ketchup. Form 4 large patties. Add drizzle of oil once around the skillet and add the patties. Cook the burgers for 6 minutes on each side. Then top each with 2 slices of bacon and one slice of cheese. Turn heat off and cover the pan with a loose foil tent and let the cheese melt for a couple of minutes.

When fries are extra crispy remove them from the oven. Place the butter, the remaining, TBLS of hot sauce, and garlic in a small dish and microwave on high 20 seconds. Transfer fries to a large bowl. Toss the fries with the butter mixture and season with salt.

Slather chili sauce on top of the split buns and put burger on the buns. Serve with fries and enjoy!

Note: I thought that the 1 TBLS of hot sauce mixed with the fries would be to much for the kids. I used about 1 TBLS chili powder in place of the hot sauce for the fries. I also just brushed the mixture over the fries using a pastry brush and then just stirred them in the baking pan as I did not want to dirty up a bowl. It worked fine!

Anyway, this is a really different way to do burgers and dogs but they are a really good treat!

1 comments:

Jennifer said...

That sounds soooo good. And we eat ALOT of red meat in our house. Hey, we live in Kansas and we buy our meat from the slauterhouse! But I am definately going to try this recipe when Shae gets home.

And I'm glad to hear that someone else has a son who HATES shopping.