Odds and ends

Today we're having hamburgers and french fries for supper.

By the way, that brings up an interesting topic - what do you call the meals at your house? We say breakfast, lunch and supper. "Dinner" just doesn't enter into it except we might say "Sunday dinner" or "Christmas dinner" for those special occasion type meals.

Hubby loves hamburgers and could eat them 7 days a week I think. I only have a few hamburger hints, and you're going to think I'm OCD when I share them with you.

I keep my kitchen scales out and always measure out my lumps of ground beef so that they are equal. I do this so that they will cook in the same amount of time and because I have found that the size of the buns determines the weight of the pattie for us. I actually prefer what we call fatty ground beef, the 73% fat, for juicy hamburger patties, but today I have some Angus ground chuck, 80% fat to use.

I usually cover either a bread and butter plate or a salad plate with plastic wrap and use the depression in the dish to shape the patties. The weather here is pretty rotten today so I'll be cooking the burgers inside. If we're going to cook outside on the grill (hubby's domain), I will make the patties about an hour ahead and put them in the freezer to firm up so that the risk of them coming apart and falling through the grill is reduced.

Where ever the patties will be cooked, if they are large in diameter or more than 1/2 inch thick, I use my index finger and make a hole in the middle of the pattie. The hole will disappear as the burger cooks, but it helps the middle of the pattie cook faster and more evenly. I believe I got this hint from someone on Allrecipes.com, one of my favorite sites.

I'll be glad when the new George Foreman grill comes in so that I can toast the cut surfaces of the hamburger buns on the flat grill plates. Until then, we'll continue to run them under the broiler for a light browning.

Hubby picked up three tomatoes (beefsteak variety) at the grocery store yesterday and they cost $5.85. I am horrified, but it's not a hamburger to him if there aren't tomato slices on them. I am sooo longing for sun ripened summer tomatoes.

I'd better get busy. I have nine pounds of the ground chuck to deal with - some for tonight's burgers, and the rest to be frozen in 1/2 lb. and 1 lb. packages in freezer ziplock bags and flattened to stack on a cookie sheet I keep in the freezer so that things will freeze flat for stackability.

I'll talk to you again tomorrow. That's all for now.