Chimichurri Burger Heaven

I've been restless lately, food-wise.  Tired of my long list of go-to recipes and needing to try something new.  So, I've been guinea-pigging my family - a lot.  Some of my recent AWESOME finds include Southwest Stuffed Peppers (regular stuffed peppers have way too much meat, and, in my opinion, are BO-RING.  These are vegetarian, and my family devoured them - even my carnivore husband raved about them) and Baked Pasta and Broccoli with Ham and Cheesy-Creamy Cauliflower Sauce (whew that name is long, but the dish is ooooohh so good!).

I have a TON of venison that we are trying to go through, and I've been trying to find ways to use the ground stuff (the steaks are easy to use up) in different ways. 

I found a recipe for Chimichurri Burgers and decided to give it a go (I love a big juicy burger...)

What the heck is Chimichurri?  Chimichurri is a thick herb sauce found in Argentinian cooking.  Kinda looks like pesto, and I think it's pretty much Argentina's version of it.  I think it's really yummy.  Plus, it's fun to say - just try it - "Chimichurri".  See?  Don't you feel exotic? 

Here's a picture of some.

For those of you who love pesto, this picture is making your mouth water.  For those of you who don't - you are probably gagging right now.  Hopefully most of you fall into the former category...

Anyhow, so the burgers are seasoned to have a touch of spice (didn't bother my kids one bit - it was very subtle), and the chimichurri sauce is tucked inside the burger (you'll see how in the recipe - it's pretty cool) and brushed on the buns.

I definitely tweaked the recipe a bit to make it better (well, better in my opinion) and my family LOVED the result.  Even our picky picky Josephine gobbled it up (though she "ruined" hers, in my opinion, by putting ketchup and pickles on it, but hey, she was happy with it, so whatever.  And by the way, I LOVE ketchup and pickles on my burgers normally, just not on this type of burger, but I digress...)

Here's the recipe:

Chimichurri Burgers with Grilled Plantains

Ingredients

• 2 teaspoons whole cumin seed, freshly ground, or 1 tablespoon ground cumin

• 1 cup lightly packed fresh cilantro leaves

• 1 cup lightly packed fresh Italian parsley leaves

• 2 tablespoons champagne vinegar or white wine vinegar (I used white wine vinegar)

• 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper

• 1/2 teaspoon sea salt or coarse salt (sea salt all the way, baby!)

• 1/4 cup canola oil (I did half canola, half olive - seemed like better flavor to me)

• 2 pounds lean ground beef (or venison, in my case)

• 1/4 teaspoon salt (I added a bit more)

• 1/4 teaspoon ground red pepper (I added a bit more, maybe 1/8 tsp more?)
• Worchestershire sauce (this is my addition, because after adding just the salt and the red pepper, the meat seemed too plain still, and venison needs a LOT of seasoning to cover the gamey flavor.  Maybe regular ground beef wouldn't need this, but it sure would take good!  Oh, and I didn’t measure this, just added till it smelled right)

• 6 Mexican bolitos or burger rolls, split and toasted (I added the toasted part.  Oh, and I have no idea what bolitos are - I just picked up a six pack of Kaiser rolls at Wegmans)

• Sliced tomatoes and onions (sautéed red onions are EXCELLENT!  I used about ¾ of an entire large red onion, sautéed on low for about 30 min to carmelize but not burn them)
• Sliced swiss cheese (I added the cheese to this recipe.  Lou liked a mix of swiss and American)

• Grilled Plantains (optional)

Directions

Cover the bottom of a small skillet with the cumin; cook and stir over low heat for 2 minutes or until lightly toasted. Remove from heat. For chimichurri, combine the cumin, cilantro, parsley, vinegar, red pepper, and sea salt or coarse salt in a blender container (I used a food processor for this because I was afraid all the dry ingredients would jam up my blender). Cover and blend on lowest speed, slowly adding the oil.

Combine ground beef, the salt, and the ground red pepper and worchestershire sauce in a large mixing bowl. Shape into 12 patties 3-1/2 inches in diameter. Spoon about 1 tablespoon of the chimichurri mixture in the center of each of 6 of the patties. Place remaining patties on top and seal edges.

Place burger patties on the lightly oiled rack of the grill directly over medium heat. Grill for 18 to 22 minutes or until an instant-read thermometer inserted in centers registers 160 degree F, turning once halfway through grilling. Toast rolls (optional), then brush them with some of the chimichurri sauce. Top with burgers, cheese, remaining sauce (I didn't do any extra sauce because I thought it might be too much), and tomatoes and onions. Serve with Grilled Plantains, if desired. Makes 6 burgers.

You can just cook these on the stove in a pan, too.  That's what I did, and they turned out just fine.  I cooked them over medium heat. 

Grilled Plantains: To make the Grilled Plantains, bias-slice peeled plantains into 1/2-inch-thick slices. Brush with peanut oil. Grill directly over medium heat for 8 minutes or until centers are just soft, turning once. Drain on clean paper towels. Serve warm.


 I forgot to take a picture of my burgers.  Here's the pic from the website:

Those funky yellow-looking things are the plantains.  I didn't make any because I forgot to buy them, though I think they are absolutely delicious (but heads up - DON'T try to eat them raw).

This isn't really what my burgers looked like, though.  I only put the chimichurri sauce on the buns, not the burger (that seemed like too much to me), and I skipped the tomatoes (I hate raw tomatoes).   Oh, and I added cheese (the swiss mentioned above), because it just seemed like the right thing to do. 

So my burger looked more like this:

Except mine didn't look like it had big piles of cilantro all over it, just the Chimichurri sauce brushed on the buns.  But I just liked the way the cheese looked in this picture.  Oh, and the onions are wrong, too.  I sauteed my onions until they were carmelized (I hate raw onions even more than raw tomatoes) - which means they were buttery and sweet and melt-in-your-mouth texture - perfect.

They looked kind like this:

So maybe this picture is close to my end result:

Okay, maybe not quite because I didn't use a whole-wheat bun, and is it just me, or does that burger look kind of pink?  Oh well, mine came out looking like a combo of these pics.  Juicy burger on a toasted bun brushed with chimichurri sauce, with melted swiss cheese and a plentiful serving of carmelized red onions on top.

If you want to make these (you know you do, by now), I would advise to NOT skip the onions or the cheese (or the toasted bun - burgers are always better on a toasted bun!).  The way they combined with the chimichurri sauce pretty much "made" this burger.  The combined flavor was rich, layered, and heavenly.   Mmmmmm...I want another one right now...