The humble burger and a Memorial Day preview

Or as humble as I can get

The wife and I love an excuse to grill out and thankfully can do so year round. Sure, the bugs may eat me alive (mosquitoes seem to think I taste better than Katherine) and the heat may kill me come August, but firing up the grill in January is a huge perk of living in the South.

For you Northerners, and anyone else who’s ushering in summer on Monday, we’ll be posting some recipes over the next few days that are perfect for a barbecue. If you live outside the U.S. and aren’t even sure what Memorial Day is, no worries. Hopefully, you’ll see something you like.

We’ll have some barbecue baked beans, grilled corn on the cob, a few potato salads, deviled eggs, a refreshing cocktail and maybe even one of those cakes with strawberries and blueberries in the shape of an American flag. Whoops, wrong holiday.

So let’s get things started with what else, a nice juicy burger. This recipe makes two nice burgers. If you’re cooking for a bigger crowd, double, triple, heck quadruple the recipe.

A note about the buns. I use a recipe from The Bread Bible. But I’ve been thinking of making up a batch of these beauties from Flour, Water and Yeast once I’ve cleared out the ones I froze from my last batch.

Portabello burger

• 1 pound lean ground beef
• half an onion, diced fine
• 1 tsp porcini powder (about one-two dried porcini mushrooms ground up in the coffee grinder)
• two portabello caps
• splash of balsamic
• salt and pepper to taste
• fresh Mozzarella, tomato and basil to taste
• two hamburger buns

Combine meat, onion, porcini powder, a splash of balsamic, salt and pepper in bowl. Mix well. Shape into patties, packing well. Cook on a grill until done to your liking. When the burgers are almost done, brush the portabello caps with olive oil and balsamic. Cook until tender, about five minutes depending on how hot the fire is. Top each burger with a portabello cap, fresh Mozzarella, basil and tomato. (We’re holding out on those for a few more months.)