Flavor-Added Turkey Burgers

Let’s face it. Open fire cooking was not developed for cooking vegetables. Grills, even the propane-powered ones, were not invented for veggie burgers. People like me tend to adapt them for that purpose, but sometimes people like me want a real burger, too.

Usually, when I make ground beef burgers, I just slap together some patties with maybe some salt and pepper or, if I’m feeling fancy, I coat them with crushed peppercorns. (Harry also likes them stuffed with blue cheese.) Recently, however, I wanted to make turkey burgers, and those seemed to need a bit more flavor and moisture enhancement.

Often, I see recipes that add eggs or some kind of oil to the ground turkey to keep it from completely drying out as it cooks. Turkey is usually pretty lean and it’s not exactly best enjoyed medium-rare, so it does need some added fat. I didn’t know if oil or egg would be the better choice for plumping up my turkey burgers, so I went with both…in the form of mayonnaise,

which is mostly just an emulsion of eggs and oil. (I made my own using this whole egg immersion blender method. Peggy discusses egg yolk mayonnaise on her blog here. Use your own discretion when working with raw eggs.)

But mayonnaise would not be enough. Not only does turkey lack in juiciness, but needs a boost in the flavor department as well. So, I turned my mayo into an aioli (garlic mayonnaise) with cilantro, which took no effort to obtain at its freshest, since it was growing well in a pot on my porch. I also added some ground coriander, which is the seed of the cilantro plant, to season the meat a little more.

I held back come of the cilantro aioli, added a bit of lime juice to it, and spread it on the buns that accompanied the burgers. If this had been a cake, that tangy aioli would have been the icing. I’m not sure the burger would have been as great-tasting without it, and I’m really not willing to take any extra measures to find out.

My turkey was quite finely ground, mushy even, so I placed the uncooked burgers on small pieces of wax paper and used that to help transfer them to the grill. That just required a little flick of the wrist, and the burgers were obedient. You can prepare the burgers and aioli at least a day ahead, cover them, and keep them in the refrigerator. I highly recommend placing the burgers on wax paper as soon as you form them, whenever you’re planning to cook them. It will help prevent frustrations and messes of epic proportions.

Turkey Burgers with Cilantro Lime Aioli
These instructions are for outdoor grilling of the burgers, but they can probably also be prepared on an indoor counter-top grill or cooked in a pan on the stovetop.

1 garlic clove
¾ teaspoon coarse (kosher) salt, divided
½ cup mayonnaise
1 cup loosely-packed cilantro leaves and tender stems, finely chopped
1 pound ground turkey
½ teaspoon ground coriander
2 teaspoons lime juice
Oil for the grill rack

1. Chop the garlic and sprinkle the ½ teaspoon salt over it. Chop a few more times, then crush the garlic and salt with the side of the knife against the cutting board. Continue until the garlic and salt form a paste. Place the garlic paste in a small bowl.

2. To the garlic paste, add mayonnaise and cilantro and stir well to combine.

3. Place the ground turkey in a medium-size bowl. Add the remaining ¼ teaspoon salt, ground coriander and 1/3 cup of the mayonnaise mixture. Stir or work with your hands gently to combine.

4. Stir the lime juice into the remaining mayonnaise mixture and refrigerate until ready to serve.

5. Form the turkey mixture into 4 patties. Place each patty on a square of wax paper on a plate to make them easier to handle. Refrigerate until ready to cook. Burgers can be made at least one day ahead. Cover and refrigerate if made ahead.

6. Preheat a charcoal or gas grill. Using a brush or a towel dipped in oil, carefully oil the grill. (The flames will flare up if the oil drips down onto them, so use extra caution.) Place the burgers on the grill, by handling them from underneath at the wax paper and flipping them onto the grill, removing the wax paper. Grill, covered or uncovered as you desire, for 10 to 15 minutes, or until the burgers are completely cooked through, turning once. The burgers are done when they are quite firm and any juices that escape when pressed are clear and not pink. If in doubt, cut into a burger to determine if it is completely cooked.

7. Serve on sandwich buns evenly distributing the cilantro-lime aioli evenly among the burgers.

Makes 4 burgers.

Other burger recipes: Beet and Carrot Burgers , Lentil Barley Burgers

One year ago: Lazy Man Pickles (Pickled Sugar Snap Peas)

Cauliflower Pasta Salad

I actually am a fan of pasta salad. I put it that way because so many good cooks and chefs complain about pasta salads an awful lot. Luckily, these people seem to like food enough to try to improve upon that salad that they like so little, rather that ditching it entirely, or I’d never find new pasta salad recipes to try. Like this one, which is based on a recipe in Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison.

I’ve had this one on my list of recipes to try for quite some time. Last week, we got our first cauliflower of the year in our CSA box, and I interpreted that as the perfect opportunity to make this recipe. The cauliflower and noodles are enhanced with capers, sun-dried tomatoes and a mustardy vinaigrette with plenty of lemon juice. Really, they had me at cauliflower and mustard, since I love tangy mustard with cabbage-y vegetables, but the lemon juice, sun-dried tomatoes and capers make this salad extra tangy and really delicious.

The cauliflower is blanched for this recipe, making it tender, but with a bit of bite, rather than hard and crunchy like raw cauliflower. That step really doesn’t take much extra time, since you’re boiling water for pasta anyway. Just boil the cauliflower before cooking the pasta and remove it with a slotted spoon.

Where others hate pasta salads, I hate the term “warm salad.” To me, a salad is cold, and something warm is something else. That being said, this salad really is best served a little warm. I don’t really know what else to call it but a salad, and it’s perfectly edible cold, but in the warmer salad, the mustard and lemon are more fragrant and the pasta has a nicer texture. I’m just going to have to live with that. The sacrifice is immense. Mouthwatering, but immense. Incidentally, if you’re one of those folks who can’t stand the sight of another pasta salad with tasteless dressing and pasty, cold noodles, you might want to give a less chilly pasta salad a try.

Pasta Salad with Cauliflower and Mustard Lemon Dressing

Based on a recipe in Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone by Deborah Madison.

Salt for boiling water
8 ounces chopped cauliflower
4 ounces short pasta
1 ounce sun-dried tomatoes, sliced
¼ cup chopped green onion
¼ cup chopped parsley
2 tablespoons capers, drained
1 garlic clove
½ teaspoon coarse salt
1 tablespoon sherry vinegar
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon diced onion
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon sour cream
¼ teaspoon black pepper
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add a small handful of salt. Add the cauliflower and cook about 3 minutes or until tender but not mushy. Remove with a slotted spoon and place in a medium-sized bowl.

2. Cook the pasta in the boiling water to desired firmness. Drain. Add the pasta to the bowl with the cauliflower. Add the sun-dried tomatoes, green onion, parsley and capers.

3. Chop the garlic and sprinkle the ½ teaspoon salt over it. Chop a few more times, then crush the garlic and salt with the side of the knife against the cutting board. Continue until the garlic and salt form a paste. Place the garlic paste in a small bowl.

4. To the garlic paste, add the sherry vinegar, lemon juice, onion, Dijon mustard, sour cream and pepper. Whisk to combine. Add the olive oil and whisk until well-combined.

5. Pour the dressing over the cauliflower mixture and stir to coat well. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Makes about 6 servings.

Other recipes like this one: Crunchy Cabbage, Cauliflower and Apple Salad, Broccoli and Chickpea Salad with Mustard-Pepper Dressing

Camping Soup

As I mentioned in the previous post, if I’m going to go camping, I’d like there to be some good food at the campsite. When getting ready for a recent camping trip, not only was I trying to put together a couple of good meals, but I also had to use up some ingredients in the refrigerator that I didn’t want to have greeting me in an altered form when I got back home. Among them were some beautiful fresh spinach from the CSA farm and some Italian turkey sausage. Since the weather was going to be reasonably cool and we planned to hike as much as we could, I figured a nice hearty soup would be welcome. The rest of the ingredients I needed were easily on hand, and all I had to do was take the time to make the soup.

Once the soup was cooked and cooled, I froze it in zip-top freezer bags (I double bag to guard against leaks) that I put in the cooler when packing for the trip. The frozen soup not only kept edible longer, but also helped to keep the rest of the food in the cooler nice and cold. I have a propane camp stove, so reheating the soup was trivial, especially since I actually remembered to bring a kettle. And it was as great as I hoped after a long day of hiking beautiful wooded trails.

I used fire-roasted tomatoes in this soup, which bumped up the campfire ambience, but you could use regular diced tomatoes, or even stewed tomatoes. I suppose you could use a spicier sausage, but I find that soups can get very spicy very easily, and the sweet sausage was quite flavorful. I ended up adding a bit of olive oil to the sausage when browning it for the soup because it was quite lean. If you find that your sausage is rendering enough fat to keep it from sticking to your pan (or if your pan has a particularly slick surface), you could leave it out.

We tend to think of nutrient-dense food like trail mix or granola bars as good hiking/camping food. My theory that soup would also fill that role seems to be sound. It was great to relax over a hot bowl along with some toasted whole wheat bread, and replenish the body after a good, hard day of hiking in the outdoors, as well as replenish what was taken by the mosquitoes.

Sausage and Spinach Soup
Since the salt content of chicken broth and canned tomatoes can vary, go easy on the salt initially, then add salt to taste as needed.

½ cup chopped onion
8 ounces sweet Italian turkey sausage, casings removed if necessary
1 tablespoon olive oil, optional
1 medium carrot, finely chopped
2 medium celery ribs, finely chopped
½ cup finely chopped red bell pepper
½ teaspoon coarse (kosher) salt
4 cups chicken broth (I used reduced sodium)
1 (14.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes (I used fire-roasted)
½ teaspoon dried oregano
½ teaspoon dried basil
1 dried bay leaf
4 cups fresh spinach, chopped

additional salt and pepper to taste

1. Combine the onion and sausage in a large pot or Dutch oven and cook over medium heat. Add the olive oil if the sausage does not have enough fat to keep it from sticking to the pot. Cook, crumbling the sausage into small pieces, until the sausage is browned.

2. Stir in the carrot, celery, red bell pepper and ½ teaspoon salt. Cook about 1 minute more.

3. Add the chicken broth, diced tomatoes (do not drain them), oregano, basil and bay leaf. Cover and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and boil gently, covered, until the vegetables are tender, about 20-30 minutes.

4. Remove the bay leaf. Stir in the spinach and cook, uncovered a few more minutes, or until the spinach wilts. Taste the soup and add salt, pepper or other seasonings if needed.

Makes 4-6 servings

Another recipe like this one: Tomato and Roasted Pepper Soup

One year ago: Chinese-Style Barbecue Sauce and Marinade

Camping Salad

We recently took a little camping trip to Great River Bluffs State Park in southeastern Minnesota. This park has wooded hiking trails that lead to beautiful bluff prairies and fabulous Mississippi River views. Although the noise from I-90 and busy railroad tracks does encroach on the park, the preserved and reclaimed natural setting with its unique habitats and vistas goes well beyond refreshing and inspiring.

I do have a few personal rules when it comes to camping: 1) If at all possible it should be in a campground with a shower. 2) There must be something cushy between me and the ground when I try to sleep. And 3) The food has to be good.

A little planning allowed 1) and 2) to come together pretty well, and some additional planning and preparation were all that was needed to tackle 3). Among a few other things, I prepped and packed Peanut Butter Granola Bars (like these but made with peanut butter instead of almond butter), homemade Granola, homemade yogurt, Beet and Carrot Burgers (which were a disaster because I forgot a spatula), homemade jam and homemade wheat bread, and chocolate chip cookies. I also put together a salad, much like one I had made on request for my inlaws a few weeks ago when they came to visit. It’s simple, fresh, delicious and keeps and travels very well.

I made the salad with cooked wheat berries (I talked about cooking them here. You can freeze extras to have on hand.) and vegetables I happened to have in the refrigerator, including some crisp sugar snap peas and red bell pepper. (I also have used asparagus when making this when it’s in season). A handful of fresh herbs (from my container garden on the porch) and simple vinaigrette with fresh lemon juice, perk up the starchy wheat berries without being perishable like a mayonnaise or dairy-based dressing would be.

I also used garlic scapes to flavor this dish. Scapes are tender, dark green, curly stems that carry the immature flower buds of the garlic plant. They’re included in our CSA boxes in the spring as they are harvested to help the underground garlic bulbs become all that they can be. They’re probably hard to find unless you grow garlic or know someone who does. You may be able to get them at some farmers’ markets or stores that carry local and/or organic produce. The season is probably over for them by now, but mine have lasted very well in the refrigerator and I’m still using them.

Garlic scapes are milder in flavor than garlic cloves, but are stronger than chives or garlic chives. You can use them pretty much interchangeably with both garlic cloves and chives as long as you are prepared for the rather pleasant difference. I use them in soups and sauces in place of garlic, and hardly notice the difference as long as I use enough. You could use a small, finely-minced garlic clove in place of the scapes in this wheat berry salad if you really want the garlic flavor. If, however, you’re planning to snuggle into a tent with someone after eating it, be sure you’ve both achieved a good dose of garlic breath so no one causes offense.


This salad was great for camping meals. It’s refreshing (when kept cool), flavorful and quite healthy and doesn’t get mushy over time. In fact, the whole trip was a big success, with the exception of the accidental omission of one extremely important item. Under conditions ripe for the development of a DEET-based religion, there I was without my mosquito repellent. I’m still itching!

Wheat Berry Salad with Sugar Snap Peas and Lemon Vinaigrette
If you do not have garlic scapes, you could add a small, finely minced garlic clove instead, but the flavor is likely to be stronger.

2 cups cooked wheat berries
1 cup chopped sugar snap peas, trimmed, tough strings removed
½ cup finely chopped red bell pepper
2 tablespoons finely chopped garlic scapes (optional)
1 tablespoon chopped fresh oregano
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 tablespoon coarse Dijon mustard
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon black pepper
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1. In a large bowl, combine the wheat berries, sugar snap peas, red bell pepper, garlic scapes, parsley and oregano.

2. In a small bowl, combine the lemon juice, mustard, salt, pepper and olive oil. Whisk well to combine completely. Pour over the wheat berry mixture and stir to combine and coat well.

Other recipes like this one: Grain Salad with White Beans and Artichokes, Wheat Berry Salad with Roasted Vegetables and Maple Walnut Vinaigrette (more of a fall or winter salad)

One year ago: Rhubarb Yogurt Cake