Hog On Ice

Hog On IceLately, I've been eating a lot of grilled cheeseburgers. When you have a gas grill, burgers are ridiculously convenient to cook, and naturally, that appeals to me. You just turn on the grill, get the burger ready while it heats up, throw it on, and take it off. And then there's almost no clean-up. Or, in my case, none.

Here's how I fix them these days. I start with between a third and a half of a pound of ground chuck. "Ground beef" probably tastes better, but God knows what's in it. Everytime you go to McDonald's, you probably eat half of a bovine penis and seven sphincters. I assume ground chuck is a little less disgusting. But I refuse to buy ground sirloin, because it's dry.

Anyway, I throw the meat in a bowl and salt it generously. I'll tell you something I have learned through experience. A burger with salt mixed into it will taste a lot better than a burger with salt ON it. Try it yourself and see. I also add pepper, and then I press a clove of garlic into the meat. Powder isn't the same. Then I mix it up and grill for 3.5 minutes per side. That makes it a little black on the outside, but not completely cooked inside. I don't care about the bacteria. Once you get to a certain age, your body deals with filth pretty well.

I like using Swiss cheese on these things, not just because of the taste, but because it's a fairly tough cheese that doesn't break up and fall into the grill or on the patio when you handle the burger.

I generally use Pepperidge Farm "Farmhouse" sandwich buns with onions or sesame seeds. These buns are bigger than the tiny, stupid regular buns, and they're always available. Homemade buns or something from a bakery would be better.

I prepare the buns by throwing them on the rack above the grill when I start cooking, dark side down. That warms up the outsides of the buns and takes the limpness out of them. Then a minute before the burger comes off, I put them face-down on the grill, and I toast them a little. When the burger is done, the buns are hot, and you can throw the cheese on the burger and put it on the bun and count on it to melt. You don't have to put it on the burger while it's cooking and stink up the yard.

It works really well. Hamburger has lots of flavor, so you don't really need to pimp it out much, although you certainly can.

Some people mix Lipton onion soup mix into their burgers. That's pretty good. I was thinking one of these days I might start adding a few carraway seeds, like on the famous Ollie burgers of the Seventies.

I also like a fried egg on top of a cheeseburger. Wonderful. I ought to try bleu cheese some day, too.

I don't salad my burgers up, but if I did, I'd go all the way, like a Whattaburger or a Whopper with everything.

Oh, hey, have you tried grilling bacon for your cheeseburgers? It's very nice. More flavor than stove bacon, and you don't have to clean a skillet.

I'm not a burger expert, but you'll get good results if you try it my way. If you learn nothing else from me, make sure you learn to mix the salt in before cooking.

Man, a couple of these babies with fries cooked twice in beef fat...oh, that would be sinful. Oh. Oh.

I'm back now.

You should probably also butter the buns after they toast. I'm too lazy.

Geez, that sounds good. Now I'll be thinking about it all day.

Jimmy Buffett was right about Heinz 57 on cheeseburgers, by the way. I also like ketchup and brown mustard, but Heinz is excellent.

Damn it. Why did I go read that? I just know I'm going to go turn the grill on.

In other news, Dan From Madison tried the ribs recipe from my cookbook, and he really liked it. Now that I'm set up for convenient smoking, I don't use my fake-rib recipe any more, but it really is good. Also, Dan is well on his way to becoming a troublemaker and agitator like me.

I may as well accept the fact that I'm going to grill today.



I make my bugers similarly, but with some different details.

I use 80% lean ground chuck usually, because it's enough fat to grill well, but not so much that it shrinks excessively.

In the bowl I mix the meat, some grated parmaggiano and romano, salt, black pepper, some crushed whole dried red chilis, some prepared mustard, and some crushed garlic.

The mustard, vinegar, and chili add some great tang, and the cheese salt, and pepper do for the savoriness.

I then very lightly butter the buns (or I use my home made chili oil - light olive oil infused with red chili) and grill them.

I personally like to put the chees on the burger cold, and let the heat from the buns and burger do whatver melting.

Oh and I think the best cheese for a good juicy burder is smoked gouda, or horseradish sharp cheddar.

I've done the grilled bacon trick, but I prefer to pan fry the bacon, and then use the drippings and some butter to fry steak fries in.

Posted by: Chris Byrne | April 8, 2006 02:46 PM

If you enjoy spicy burgers, in Austin they used to make something called a Primo at a place called Mad Dog's by the UT campus. I finally figured out how to make one after years of effort. More cleanup, but great taste:

Ground chuck
raw onion
raw jalapeno
raw bacon

All in a Cuisinart or other food processor with the blade attachment so it gets hacked and mushed together. Then make medium thick patties and cook slow, between 12-20 minutes depending on thickness. Best burger ever. Made them for 20 people last summer at a friend's birthday party and literally every single person wanted the recipe, and half of them said it was the best burger they had ever had.

If you don't like spicy, dump the jalapenos and just use onion and bacon. I tried precooking the veggies and bacon to cut down on grill time, but the burgers don't hold together when you do that.

Will probably double comment this at Acidman's.

Posted by: Uncle Mikey | April 8, 2006 02:50 PM

Same thoughts on the gas grill.
My $0.02 on Grilled Turkey CheeseBurgers
Throw the following into a bowl and use your hands to mix it up:
- Ground Turkey
- Diced Onion
- Diced
- Chopped Cilantro
- Garlic (powder or fresh diced)
- Salt
- Ground Pepper

Throw it on the grill then add pepper-jack cheese after the flip - add the bun/roll to the grill at this time as well

Cook till just past rare.

Posted by: Brian | April 8, 2006 03:12 PM

"That can't be anything but good."

we'll be waiting for the report. Best burger I ever ate, was at Fat Alberts in Gridley, Illinois. Called a Fatburger. 1/2 lb of ground beef. 1/2 lb of ground pork. Grilled separately, then smooshed together around a chunk of cheese the size of a wallet. Wrapped in a deep-fried bun. Spread with some buttery substance which I'm sure was raw cholestrol. I gained six pounds just then. And now I'm drooling uncontrollably. I think only one of those in my life is the limit.

Posted by: og | April 8, 2006 03:32 PM

Waking up after a severe MI several years ago, I saw a cardiologist looking down at me. His first words were, "You don't know it yet, but you had a pretty interesting experience there."

A few minutes later, after some discussion of payment for his services and other thoroughly exasperating issues, he continued with, "You know . . . you're going to die . . ." and then paused for effect. Confident that he had my focused and thorough attention, he continued, "Unless . . ." which included a ridiculously long list of things NOT to do or eat, chief amongst them salt, fat, and sweet.

In rehab, a cardiac nurse put it all in perfect perspective for me: "If it tastes good, spit it out, 'cause it's not good for you." That, of course, reiterated the doctor's list of condemned items (i.e., salt, sweet, fat).

So I began to read labels and modified my diet in hopes that my arteries would unharden and my cholesterol and triglycerides would come down from the high hundreds to under 200 or so.

One of the substitutes I tried was Boca Burgers for good ol' honest-to-goodness foodburgers made from large, hairy, stupid, smelly ruminants. At first they were simply awful, a kind of mystery meat sans flavor with no redeeming features except that they fit the whole-wheat buns I had shifted to.

Particularly hungry one day after mowing the lawn, I nuked two Bocas with salt substitute and minced garlic on 'em. Laid out two buns and smeared 'em with fat-free mayo, plopped a thick slice of yellow onion on the bottom half and a generous slice of big, red termater on the top half.

Somethin on the moron monitor distracted me for a few moments, but soon I had grabbed one of the sandwiches and was munching away, happy with my ability to self-delude and imagine that I was indeed consuming a forbidden menu item.

As I walked back to the counter to lay the pattie on the second bun, I saw TWO faux burgers there on the nuke pad. It was then that I learned how really unsatisfying the damned Bocas truly are.

The first sandwich had been bread, mayo, tomato, and onion. And it tasted good . . . but only because I had duped myself into believing that it would be. With the second one, the alien substance of the patties doubled in one bun overwhelmed the other, natural flavors.

Moral: you can talk yourself into one helluva lotta shit if you think it'll permit you to continue that nasty habit of breathing . . . but there ARE limits.

I would murder a gaggle of nuns for the ability to eat cheeseburgers with cardiovascular impunity. Hell, I'd take out the entire state of Massachusetts with thermonuclear weapons if I could eat pizza once in a while and not have to worry about that goddam elephant sitting on my chest again.

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Love Poems and Readings

Love Poems and Readings

Quote

The day Microsoft makes something that doesn't suck, is probably the day they start making vacuum cleaners.
-Ernst Jan Plugge

To My Dear

To My Dear
and Loving Husband
Anne Bradstreet

If ever two were one, then surely we.
If ever man were loved by wife, then thee;
If ever wife was happy in a man,
Compare with me ye women if you can.
I prize thy love more that whole mines of gold,
Or all the riches that the East doth hold.
My love is such that rivers cannot quench,
Nor ought but love from thee give recompense.
Thy love is such I can no way repay,
The heavens reward thee manifold I pray.
Then while we live, in love let’s so persever,
That when we live no more, we may live ever.

To One in Papadise

Thou wast all that to me, love,
For which my soul did pine-
A green isle in the sea, love,
A fountain and a shrine,
All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers,
And all the flowers were mine.

Ah, dream too bright to last!
Ah, starry Hope! that didst arise
But to be overcast!
A voice from out the Future cries,
"On! on!"- but o'er the Past
(Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies
Mute, motionless, aghast!

For, alas! alas! me
The light of Life is o'er!
"No more- no more- no more-"
(Such language holds the solemn sea
To the sands upon the shore)
Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree
Or the stricken eagle soar!

And all my days are trances,
And all my nightly dreams
Are where thy grey eye glances,
And where thy footstep gleams-
In what ethereal dances,
By what eternal streams.

The New Colossus

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

JoeRoseBlog

JoeRoseBlog

The perfect penis

The perfect penisBe careful what you wish for.

The Straight Dope: In what language do deaf people think?

The Straight Dope: In what language do deaf people think?

Winds of Change.NET: Fabrizio Quattrocchi Awarded Medaglia d'Oro

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Chris Bliss - Smart Comedy for the Information Age

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AMAZING JUGGLER!!!!

Bad Example

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Cafe Hayek

Cafe Hayek: " I also do not think that true love of liberty was ever born just from the sight of material goods that freedom produces; for this often succeeds in hiding it. It is certainly true that in the long run, freedom always brings, to those who know how to keep it, ease, well-being, and often riches; but there are times when it briefly hinders the enjoyment of such goods; there are others when only despotism can temporarily afford their enjoyment. Men who prize only these kinds of goods have never enjoyed freedom for long.

That which, in all times, has so strongly attached certain men's hearts to freedom, are its own attractions, its own peculiar charm, independent of its benefits; it is the pleasure of being able to speak, act, and breathe without constraint, under the government of God and the laws alone. Whoever seeks anything from freedom but itself is made for slavery.

Now such men and women who love freedom so dearly are easily accused, chastised, castigated as being ideologues -- as if commitment to some non-material value is shameful or evidence of simple-mindedness."

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The Brier Patch

The Brier Patch

It is strange the way the ignorant and inexperienced so often and so undeservedly succeed when the informed and the experienced fail.

--Mark Twain

The Brier Patch

The Brier Patch: "It is strange the way the ignorant and inexperienced so often and so undeservedly succeed when the informed and the experienced fail.

--Mark Twain"

The Brier Patch

The Brier Patch: "It is strange the way the ignorant and inexperienced so often and so undeservedly succeed when the informed and the experienced fail.

--Mark Twain"