These amazing steakburgers (just look at that beauty!) are perfect for summer get-togethers.
This is truly a STEAKburger. Steakburgers are made from . . . well, steaks.
This one is ribeye. Oh, yum!
These guys ground up their own ribeyes to make these steakburgers. You can do it too.
OR, you can buy them ready-to-go here.
Check this out to see exactly how it’s done!
Photo courtesy of Food-e-Matters.com.
It’s New Year’s Eve and we are about to embark upon a new decade. Can you believe that?
So today I’d like to share with you my Top 10 Favorite Blog Posts of 2009. It’s been a year of great food and great adventures for me and my family. Thank you for coming along with us.
And . . . 2010 is full of promise. If I had a crystal ball, I’d see lots and lots of steak in my future. And yours.
But that’s just a guess.
Enjoy — and Happy New Year!!!!
TOP 10 FAVORITE STEAKY BLOG POSTS OF 2009
1. Jan. 3 — The Tenderest Tenderloin
2. Jan. 23 — Here We Go Kabob-ing
3. Feb. 19 — Three’s Company
4. Feb. 27 — Enchilada Steak Pie Recipe
5. Apr. 8 — Beef Recipe: Prime Rib Roast and Yorkshire Pudding
6. Jun. 26 — Pizza. Beef. Scrumptious.
7. Jul. 22 — Beefy Sliders
8. Sept. 25 — Dreamy Meatloaf
9. Oct. 6 — Steak and Grilled Broccoli
10. Dec. 10 — O Steaky Night
Sometimes holiday classic tunes need a little updating. And what better way to spend the 12 Days of Christmas than with the ones you love?
The foods you love, that is.
So here it goes . . . cue the carolers!
“The 12 Meats of Christmas”
On the twelfth day of Christmas, KC Steaks shipped to me:
Twelve roasts a-roasting,
Eleven pork chops sizzling,
Ten seasonings seasoning,
Nine strip steaks smoking,
Eight ribs a-braising,
Seven filets mignon-ing,
Six ribeyes marbling,
Five ste-ak-burgers, (pause, pause, pause)
Four T-bones,
Three prime ribs,
Two tenderloin,
And a hickory smoked tur-r-r-r-key!!!
Whew! I’m tired. And hungry.
Wanna send your own 12 Meats of Christmas? Start here!
Photo courtesy of KansasCitySteaks.com.
Have you visited CampbellsKitchen.com yet?
I’m all for easy meals, so I took a gander. And this one really caught my eye . . .
FRENCH ONION BURGERS
1 pound ground beef
1 can (10 1/2 ounces) Campbell’s® Condensed French Onion Soup
4 slice cheese
4 Pepperidge Farm® Classic Sandwich Buns with Sesame Seeds, split
Shape the beef into 4 (1/2-inch-thick) burgers.
Heat a 10-inch skillet over medium-high heat. Add the burgers and cook until well browned on both sides. Remove the burgers from the skillet. Pour off any fat.
Stir the soup in the skillet and heat to a boil. Return the burgers to the skillet. Reduce the heat to low. Cover and cook for 5 minutes or until desired doneness. Top the burgers with the cheese and cook until the cheese is melted. Serve the burgers on the buns with the soup mixture for dipping.
Serving Suggestion: Serve with romaine salad tossed with fresh basil and Italian salad dressing. For dessert, serve orange slices.
RECIPE TIPS
Tip: You can also serve these burgers in a bowl atop a mound of hot mashed potatoes, with some of the onion gravy poured over.
Photo and recipe courtesy of CampbellsKitchen.com.
. . . and other things, too!
I hope you had a fantastic Thanksgiving. I sure did.
We ate ourselves silly on all the traditional Thanksgiving players: turkey (smoked this year in the trusty SmokinTex), mashed taters, green bean casserole, two kinds of cranberry sauce — the real kind and the kind that comes out shaped like the can, pumpkin pie and so many other amazing things.
Now, it’s Black Friday and it’s time to stock up for the next holiday. It’s only just about 4 weeks away!
Where has my life gone? My youth and my sanity are slipping away. But, dangit, I’m going to eat well while it’s happening.
We’ll have lots of company again for the holidays so I’m taking advantage of the sale they’re having now at the Kansas City Steak Company. When you spend $49.95 or more you get 8 free steakburgers sent to you. I need those. My people are hungry.
ALL THE TIME.
I’ve got to keep a whole bunch of things on hand because when our family is here it feels like you just finished cleaning up one meal and it’s time to start the next. Ayyyy!
I’m ordering some filets, a roast and some hot dogs. With the steakburgers I’ll get, that should get us through. But ya never know.
After that, they’ll have to call the pizza joint down the street. I’ll be tired . . . but I can’t wait!
The holiday season has officially begun and my freezer is about to be well-stocked!
Photo courtesy of the KansasCitySteaks.com.
Looking for something quick — but yummy — that you can whip up in the middle of the week?
I keep these on hand for just those occasions . . .
These babies were hard as a rock when I decided that’s what we were having for dinner. Planning ahead just wasn’t happening on a Wednesday evening.
But that didn’t stop me.
I thawed the patties in the microwave on “defrost.” (Not my favorite method, but it was my only option.) Then I poured the olive oil in a pan, salt and peppered the steakburgers and we were off!
Soon, the house was smelling like a real home, with meat cooking and wine flowing. I found myself whistling and humming in anticipation of a meal that did not include “Mc” in its name or instructions like “Poke a hole in the plastic wrap to ventilate while microwaving.”
Thirty minutes from frozen to steaming hot on a plate is just perfect for me. And it meant a lot to skip the drive-thru. And THAT makes for a peaceful, pleasant dinner at home which I think is something we all crave whether you’re the chef or the grateful diner.
This week, I think I may have made the most perfect steakburger I’ve ever attempted.
I pan fried them in olive oil and just at the last moment placed a glistening slice of cheese on the top so it could meld itself to the burger, fitting perfectly.
Out in the backyard, my 5-year-old son ate an orange Popsicle while I took photos of this masterpiece.
“Whatcha doin’, Mommy?”
“Taking pictures of this beautiful burger.”
(What? Doesn’t every mom take pictures of their dinner before they serve it to their family?)
“It looks like sunshine on a mountain,” he said. “And there’s the grass. And a red swimming pool.”
Classic. Now THAT is why you have kids, people. They show you new ways of looking at things you’ve seen a thousand times before.
It made me teary-eyed that he had put so much thought into this. This steakburger had created a real MOMENT between us.
Then, my precious son pummeled his empty Popsicle stick at a rabbit that had the misfortune of hopping through our yard at that exact moment.
That bunny was just trying to live his life, man. Sheesh.
But the moment was good for the 30 seconds it lasted.
We went inside to eat our sunshine-on-the-mountain burgers and the innocent stick that had been turned into a lethal weapon went promptly into the garbage.
But that’s life in the ‘burbs for ya. Go tough or go home, Thumper.
Ed Levine knows good food. And this Labor Day weekend I plan to cook some burgers for friends and family.
I don’t want to mess this up . . . so he’s going to help. Why on earth would you chance ruining a perfectly great burger???
Here are his warnings against making the 6 most common ways to ruin a burger.
1. Not Sticking to Salt Plus Beef: Use Kosher salt (and pepper!) on both sides of the beef patty before slapping it onto the grill. Salt is a glorious thing for red meat-it draws out the natural juices and helps with the charring. Try to avoid turkey, bison or other alternative meat options, which have a much higher risk of moisture and flavor deficiency. Don’t get crazy here, just stick with beef. Motz even says, “if it’s not beef, it’s not a burger.” Here is Bobby Flay’s recipe for the perfect beef burger.
2. Bad Beef-to-Bun Balance: There’s no hard-and-fast ratio for beef-to-bun balance. It’s like Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said in ?Jacobellis v. Ohio (1964) “I know it when I see it.” In the case of beef-to-bun balance, taste it. Beef-to-bun balance all depends on your patty size. If you’re cooking up a thin patty, don’t use a jumbo bun-you don’t want a mouthful of bread and hardly any meat, do you? When in doubt, make your patties bigger or stack a double burger. It’s bettern to err on the side of more meat.
3. Condiment Overload: Building a burger with “everything” is a huge mistake. Avoid the garbage pail approach. In most cases, going beyond onion and ketchup (arguably the most popular condiment) masks the beef taste and creates an absurd flavor profile. Seriously, a pastrami burger? Pastrami is not a condiment. However, we will make one exception for Fatty Melts-when grilled cheeses become condiments.
4. Wasting Precious Burger Juices: If you’re cooking the burgers over a flame, pressing down on them will send the precious meat juices straight into the coals. Those juices are valuable-they belong in your mouth. While it’s very tempting to apply pressure with a spatula, don’t. Unless you want a dry hockey puck. Sometimes they do it on TV, but just close your eyes.
5. Overcooking: This should be a crime recognized by the federal government. For the popular medium-rare, grill the meat exactly three minutes on one side (keeping the grill lid closed) and two minutes on the other. If you’re going to add cheese, let it melt on top for another minute (and keep that cover closed!). We like our burgers medium rare, so much we’ve even sent them back at restaurants when they go beyond medium.
6. Machine-Formed Patties: If you really want to ruin your burger, try a machine-formed frozen patty! No, don’t. While making every ingredient from scratch is not necessary (see: Heston Blumenthal’s Blumenburger) try to form your own patties from ground chuck (80 percent lean is good) purchased at your nearest market or better yet, butcher.
Photo and excerpt courtesy of food.yahoo.com.
So, any and every holiday is an excuse for me to cook steaks.
There, I said it.
Labor Day is no different. In fact, it’s the quintessential holiday for steak grillin’.
There, I said “quintessential.”
Labor Day’s the unofficial close of summer (boo!) and we ALWAYS get outside and swim and eat and soak it in. It’s fun because it signals the start of football season and a break from hot, hot weather.
But, it’s sad because, well, we LOVE summer around our house.
We’re going to relax with some steaks, some ribs and some burgers. Some friends are coming over and we’re going to talk about where the time went and how we could possibly be this old and how it came to be that the top of our kids’ heads now reach our shoulders and how our alma mater’s football team better win this year.
You know, the same stuff we always talk about — but never tire of.
How about you????
Remember how I wasn’t sure if my photos would do the cute little mini steakburgers justice? You know, the ones I grilled at the beach?
Well, check this out . . .
I think they turned out all right!!!
The combination of the gorgeous slider and the beautiful beachy sunlight made this a PERFECT meal. And photo. This was just taken on a white plate out on the balcony.
I was pretty sure I couldn’t mess up the grilling on these little guys. And I was right about that. I whipped out my George Foreman Lean Mean Grillin’ Machine and our little condo was filled with such an amazing smell. All I did was salt and pepper them. That’s it! The kids played as these babies sizzled and everyone kept asking, “Are they ready yet?”
They had been delivered to my door the day before and it was so nice to not have to hunt through the local supermarket’s selection of beef. We’ve been to this resort town before and it’s often iffy at best.
My kids loved how small and cute the sliders were. We bought Hawaiian rolls, sliced them in half and we had the perfect little buns for our mini steakburgers.
What a treat to have these little guys delivered to us halfway across the country!
Seriously, one of our absolute favorite aspects of a vacation is cooking great meals at night. We take the time to savor the experience of cooking and eating.
These sliders were so fun and flavorful. And to me, that’s what life’s about.
Did you have a good 4th of July?
We screeched up to our condo here in Florida just as the fireworks were beginning. We were happy to have made it after driving ALL day.
Michael Jackson tunes had been on the iPod the ENTIRE 10-hour drive. My 5-year-old began requesting “Dirty Diana” after a while. And when the kids started to fuss and fight they’d say, “You better not ‘Wanna Be Startin’ Something!’”
On top of the parking garage at the condo (classy, yes) the kids enjoyed the fireworks show for about 7 minutes, then I began to hear, “Mom, do we have any Popsicles? What about strawberries?”
Anything with water in it sounded good. Apparently, they were thirsty, hot and tired.
So inside we went.
Happy birthday, America!
We have so many great meals planned for the week: a roast with potatoes, the mini steakburgers and steaks I ordered, ground beef tacos — oh yeah, and some frozen pizzas thrown in for good measure.
It’s always a good time sharing good food with the people you love. And here in what we think is the most gorgeous place on earth it can’t get any better.
It’s almost July 4th! How did that happen?
In celebration of our country’s birthday, our family is making our annual pilgrimage to the beach. We’ll watch fireworks at night and eat way too much.
We can’t wait!
This 4th of July we’re having some mini steakburgers delivered to our condo so we can make sliders. We’ve never done it before. But how hard can it be?
Here’s what I’ve ordered . . .
Now, will my photos look as amazing as this? That remains to be seen . . . but I KNOW I can’t mess up the grilling on these babies.
What are you doing for July 4th???
Photo courtesy of KansasCitySteaks.com.
Like burgers?
Like cheese?
Check this out . . .
I know. It’s really pretty, right?
Just thought you’d like to see how we’ve been spending our time over here.
Carry on.
The conclusion of our Memorial Day carnival of carne came in the form of some amazing barbecue ribs.
We allowed them to share the grill with the steakburgers. They earned it.
See what I mean? Those ribs were awesome. We dipped them in some spicy barbecue sauce and all was right with the world.
And the steakburgers? Well, they rocked the house. I don’t think we had any left.
It’s a sad day around here when we don’t have leftovers from a HUGE cookout.
But that just tells me it was a job well done! 
We couldn’t celebrate Memorial Day without some good old-fashioned burgers.
Steakburgers, to be exact.
I’ve been informed that there IS a slight difference between hamburgers and steakburgers. Steakburgers have actual steak in them. Hamburgers do not.
And being a steak lover, I MUST have steakburgers.
Here are the burgers just before the addition of some pretty tame flavoring: salt, pepper and my mother-in-law’s mystery seasoning.
Then we pulled out two steakburgers to ruin, er, season for my husband. He likes tons of Tabasco Worcestershire.
And so it was done.
Tomorrow I’ll show you how they turned out, PLUS the other delectable item we cooked. Can you guess what that is?
Hi! My name is Dena P., and I love steak. In fact, I’ve been on a quest for the perfect steak for a few years now.
I love experimenting with food and I like to get my family, friends and neighbors involved. They add a lot to my cooking experience by helping me perfect techniques and sharing recipes.
