Burgers Jamie Oliver Style

My go to recipe for hamburgers in the past has been “The Botham Burger”, a fantastic cricket ball sized hamburger from The Return of the Naked Chef, Jamie Oliver’s second book. The “Botham” bit is of course because of the cricket ball size of these delicious burgers. What I love about these burgers is that you cook them in the oven – a healthy way of cooking plus you can do something else while they cook.

Recently, while reading Jamie’s fabulous book Comfort Food, I loved the sound of Jamie’s “Insanity Burger”  –  an interesting burger with lots of nice things to go with it.

So the solution seemed obvious – combine the two recipes to get the optimum Jamie Oliver burger! I basically used the ingredients and oven cooking method for the Botham burger, and added in mustard glaze, cheesy layer and all the beautiful accompaniments that go with the Insanity burger. Result – a tasty, moist and tangy hamburger.

I made my own burger rolls, to feature in a later post, but any good softish rolls would do.

The ingredients below are half Jamie’s quantities – 500gms of minced steak gives you 2 really big burgers or 4 smaller ones.

For the burger:

Ingredients

500g minced beef, preferably organic

1 medium red onion, finely chopped

1 free-range egg

1 handful of fresh breadcrumbs

1/2 tbl of coriander seeds, crushed

A small pinch of cumin seeds, crushed

1/2 heaped teaspoon of Dijon mustard

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

+ A couple of drops of Tabasco combined with 2 tsp American mustard

+ 2-4 slices of good cheddar cheese

For the bits and pieces that go with the burgers:

2-4 soft  bread rolls

2-4 gherkins

1/4 -1/2 red onion, cut in slices

Any green leaves you fancy

4 tsp good quality smoky barbecue sauce

4 tsp mayonnaise

2 tsp tomato ketchup

Method

Preheat the oven to 230 degrees C or 210 degrees C fan-forced.

Scrunch all the ingredients together. Use the breadcrumbs as required to bind and lighten the mixture. Divide into 4 for smaller burgers or 2 for bigger ones, then lightly mould and pack each burger together into burger shapes. Place in the oven and bake for 15 minutes for smaller ones, 20 minutes for bigger ones. The burgers should  still be pink in the middle – cook for a few minutes longer if you want them more well done.

About 5 minutes minutes before you think they are cooked, liberally brush the tops of the hamburgers with the Tabasco and American mustard mixture. Just before they are done, place a slice of cheese on top of each burger and place back in the oven for a minute to just melt the cheese.

To serve:

Cut rolls in half and place on a serving platter. Place a burger on top of half of a bread roll. Chop the gherkins or leave whole if small. Scatter the gherkins, the red onion slices and the greens over the platter. Serve with barbecue sauce on the side and a little sauce made with the mayonnaise combined with the tomato ketchup. Then build your own burger!