triticale - the wheat / rye guy

Tartare Burgers

There's an old joke about sushi, to the effect that "I took some home, fried it up, wasn't half bad." Turns out the same is true of Steak Tartare, and the result is quite tasty. Eating finely chopped or ground, highly seasoned uncooked beef is something of a New Year's tradition around Milwaukee, but I was already grossed out by the thought before we moved here. I'm the sort who responds to a rare steak by claiming to have seen cattle recover from worse wounds than that. Highly seasoned, however, is always popular around here, so I didn't hold this recipe's origin against it.

1 pound freshly ground beef - high end lean steak based stuff, not the $.99 pound family pack stuff I usually buy
1 egg yolk
1 teaspoon mustard - Dijon or suchlike
1 teaspoon whatsthishere sauce
2 teaspoons sriracha sauce
4 anchovy fillets - chopped
2 tablespoons capers -drained
6 tablespoons finely chopped onions - sharp not sweet
salt and pepper to taste

Divide the ground beef into six equal portions, and press into three inch diameter patties. Use a burger press if you shoud happen to possess one.

Beat egg yolk, mustard and sauces together. Mix in the chopped and drained stuff. Grind pepper and sprinkle salt over one face of three of the burger patties, and scoop one third of the filling thereupon. Spread the filling to close to the edge, lay the reserved patties atop, crimp the edges and press evenly. Using the burger press again would be elegant.

Cook as you usually cook burgers, to an internal temperature of 160F. I got the concept from the cookbook included with a beta-test convection oven which did not reach the mass market, but prefer to grill burgers by sprinkling salt on a hot skillet so they don't stick before some fat renders out. I myself use no other salt; you may wish to back off on the salt to taste if using this method.

Posted by triticale at November 25, 2006 09:12 AM | TrackBack