Stack It Your Way!

Watching Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution has in some way influenced my son's eating habits, in a good way that is which i am thankful.  I guess it's always much easier for stars to get a message across to these children than their nagging mums :)  He was shocked to know how much sugar went into flavored milk and what kind of meat was used to make burgers in some fast food joints.  

It was school holidays last week and son asked if he could have burgers on one of the days with homemade patties and buns. And preferably how Jamie Oliver would have made them, he added! Now look who's doing the challenging these days!

I followed what Jamie named as basic burger recipe, according to him it's possible to add in more herbs and spice once this basic recipe is mastered.  It's interesting to note that the recipe calls for cream crackers to give the patties a crunch.  I substituted with wholemeal crackers instead as i didn't have any of those.  Since the recipe calls for minimum seasoning, you taste the actual flavors from the beef instead.

As for the buns, i used a sweet bun recipe that i am familiar with. We stacked our burgers to our hearts content, lettuce, carrots, cabbage, tomatoes, avocados and topped it with a grilled portobello mushroom with melted cheese on top :)

Suffice to say my young man had 3 of these in a row, mum had one though she wouldn't mind having another :)

Recipe - Patties

Source: JamieOliver.com

• 12 Jacob's cream crackers (Wholemeal crackers)
• 8 sprigs of fresh flat-leaf parsley
• 500 g quality minced beef
• 1 large free-range egg
• Sea salt
• Freshly ground black pepper
• Olive oil

Method

1. Wrap the crackers in a tea towel and smash until fine, breaking up any big bits with your hands, and put them into a large bowl (Place crackers in a ziploc bag, press with hands and a rolling pin to smash them until fine).
2. Finely chop the parsley, including the stalks. Add the parsley, mustard, if using, and minced beef to the bowl. Crack in the egg and add a good pinch of salt and pepper.
3. With clean hands, scrunch and mix everything up well. Divide into 6 and pat and mould each piece into a roundish shape about 2cm thick. (Divided according to size of my buns, enough for 9 buns) 
4. Drizzle the patties with oil, put on a plate, cover and place in the fridge until needed (this helps them to firm up).
5. To fry patties, preheat a large griddle or frying pan for about 4 minutes on a high heat prior. Turn the heat down to medium.
6. Place the patties on the griddle or in the pan and use a spatula to lightly press down on them, making sure the patties are in full contact. Cook them to your liking for 3 or 4 minutes on each side.

Recipe for buns here.
Note: Reduced sugar to 40g.

To make hamburgers

1. Cut buns into half, spread on some butter and place on griddle for a 1 minute.  
2. Stack bun with a choice of lettuce, shredded carrot/cabbages, tomato slices, avocado slices and grilled portobellos.
3. Add on dressings like mayonnaise, mustard or tomato/chilli sauce if preferred.

I'm linking this post to Cook Like a Star, an event co-hosted by Zoe of Bake for Happy Kids, Joyce of Kitchen Flavours and Mich of Piece of Cake.