Cooking Light (June 2011)
Ever since we made the Umami Burgers with Port and Stilton, we've had a hankering for another hamburger. Those umami burgers were good, but they left us wanting more.
We needed a real, honest-to-goodness, amazing burger. We're talking the kind that's packed with flavor, prepared on the grill, and piled high with delicious toppings. The kind of burger where the first bite makes makes you open your eyes wide with joy.
Well, we found it with these Burgers with Blue Cheese Mayo and Sherry Vidalia Onions.
Light or not, we knew we wanted to try this burger. We still had ground beef and plenty of Stilton cheese left over from our umami burgers (we swapped the Stilton in for the blue cheese here). And we already had most of the rest of the ingredients (onion, sherry vinegar, Tabasco, thyme) on hand. So these burgers were easy to pull together.
We didn't have any mayo, so we made our own, which is easier than you might think. Whisk an egg yolk with a tablespoon of lemon juice, then whisk in a cup of oil (adding the oil in a very slow, steady stream). A bit of elbow grease later: Mayonnaise!
One other tip for a great burger? Handle the meat as little as possible, and pack it as loosely as you can while still keeping the patties together.
The burgers and onions are grilled as you might imagine, but there's an interesting twist to the preparation of the onions that we didn't expect. After grilling, you place them in a sealed plastic bag for five minutes. That gives them a quick steam and makes them even more tender. It's a very smart little trick. Once out of the bag and tossed with the vinegar and thyme, the onions are heaven-sent.
One other step we did which isn't spelled out in the recipe: We grilled out hamburger buns. Just a quick brush with oil and then about 2 minutes on the grill (watch 'em closely, though, so they don't burn). It really takes any burger up a notch.
Every bite of these burgers has the perfect mix of flavors: the peppery arugula, the sweet onions punched up by the pungent thyme and vinegar, and the salty patties. Not to mention that ooey-gooey, savory blue cheese mayo, spiced up with hot pepper sauce that we absolutely loved.
It's pretty much all you could ever hope for from a burger.
Burgers with Blue Cheese Mayo and Sherry Vidalia Onions
Cooking Light (June 2011)
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- YIELD: 4 servings
- TOTAL TIME: 45 MINUTES
- Nutritional Information
INGREDIENTS
1/2 cup (2 ounces) crumbled blue cheese
1/4 cup canola mayonnaise
2 teaspoons chopped fresh thyme, divided
1/4 teaspoon hot pepper sauce (such as Tabasco)
1 pound lean ground sirloin
1 teaspoon black pepper, divided
1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil
4 (1/4-inch-thick) slices Vidalia or other sweet onion
Cooking spray
2 teaspoons sherry vinegar
4 (1 1/2-ounce) whole-wheat hamburger buns, toasted
2 cups loosely packed arugula
DIRECTIONS
Preheat grill to medium-high heat.
Combine 1/2 cup blue cheese, mayonnaise, 1 teaspoon thyme, and hot pepper sauce in a small bowl; stir well.
Divide beef into 4 equal portions, shaping each portion into a 1/2-inch-thick patty. Sprinkle beef evenly with 1/2 teaspoon black pepper and salt.
Brush oil evenly over both sides of onion slices; sprinkle with remaining 1/2 teaspoon pepper. Place the patties and onions on grill rack coated with cooking spray; cover and grill for 3 minutes on each side. Set patties aside; keep warm. Place onion slices in a zip-top plastic bag; seal. Let stand 5 minutes; toss with remaining 1 teaspoon thyme and vinegar.
Spread cut sides of buns evenly with mayonnaise mixture. Arrange 1/2 cup arugula on bottom half of each bun; top with 1 patty, 1 onion slice, and bun top.
