Baked Brie Burger

Recipe blogging is HARD WORK.  Maybe it’s just difficult because it’s foreign to me or I’m not set up to do it quickly and easily … Regardless, I need a better setup and some more practice doing these. 

I fucked this recipe/burger up pretty damn good.  I don’t even know how much of everything I used by volume, either, so I’m just spitballing as far as some of the amounts go, and I’ll just be dead wrong in some places, so this is just practice.  It is the first Baked Brie Burger Recipe on the web, and it sounded like a great idea, but this is not the recipe you want to follow.  Let me rephrase that: if you follow this recipe, you better do some heavy modifications and credit me when you make a much tastier version.  I took the pictures, I ate it, it was of acceptable taste, and I’m posting it, so fuck off if you don’t like my first attempt at menu creation – just be happy that I’m not going to get any worse. 

I was going to call this the Sex Burger: The burger so good, it makes you want to have sex with the chef.  After eating it, I’d say this version is closer to the Cialis Burger: You’re really excited about the idea of it, but it just don’t work at the moment. 

Here are the ingredients.  I took pictures of some of them because that’s what you’re supposed to do as a recipe blogger (seriously, if you want to leave, you can; this post isn’t getting any better). 

A few Shallots
A little bit, but not too much Brown Sugar
A lot of Butter
However much Balsamic Vinegar you feel is necessary
One egg; preferably a big one.  If it’s a small one, you might need two
A light pour of heavy cream
A handful of Panko
A good amount of Chopped Pecans
One whole Brie of Brie
Some crumbles off a wedge of Gorgonzola
Ciabatta or other rolls if you can’t find Brioche, but I really wanted brioche. 
Salt and Pepper to taste, obv

Look at how fancy that is!  It’s like I stole this recipe from the Bon Appetit test kitchen, but I didn’t.  It’s just a font, and it comes standard with all macs. 

I was cooking this in a friend’s kitchen, and she hates me using it (I once fried brussel sprouts there with horrendous, oil-spattery results).  After this recipe, I now know what the contestants on Hell’s Kitchen feel like:

And if you can’t tell which character I play in this drama, it’s not the alpha role.  I really can’t do anything right here, and even when I got to the table, I got yelled at.  I dropped a knife onto the table and the girl just about murdered me.  I guess it was her grandmother’s tablecloth that they take out for special occasions.  This just in, tablecloths are used as a shield to accept substances unwelcome to the item it is shielding.  I just stopped paying attention to her at this point.  Later, I agreed not to cook anything in the kitchen after this issue; it’s a much better situation (even though my skills need the work). 

I started by making some caramelized shallots as a garnish like the sauteed onions that go on the Black Label Burger (hooking the #10 Google spot up with some link love).  I usually toast some baguette and serve this with goat cheese, but I figured the sweetness would be a nice balance and work together with the rest of the salty burger.  Too bad I put too much sugar in (it ended up crystallizing it) and I had to use raw sugar instead of brown sugar … You see what I did there?  Fucked.  To make the caramelized shallots:

Chop up the whole lot of shallots, throw about half the butter into a saucepan and melt it all the way down, toss a pinch of salt in there for good measure.  Put the shallots in for about five minutes, then put the brown sugar and balsamic in, cover and simmer on low for about 45 minutes, stirring every so often, but make sure that shit don’t burn. 

The burgers, we just threw some salt, pepper, and a bit of worcestershire sauce in, but we got some ribeye and had them grind it down into burger for us.  Next time, instead of only ribeye, I’m going to go with 50/50 ribeye and regular ground chuck.  The burgers were just fine, but I could have used a teeny bit higher fat content. 

For the baked brie:

Toast the chopped almonds with a little butter.  Combine the cream and egg to make an egg wash, slice up the brie into burger sized wedges, spread the panko onto a plate, then dip the rind side into the egg wash, take it out, and coat the brie with panko, pan fry until golden brown, then crumble some gorgonzola onto the brie and flip it face-down into the toasted pecans.  Press down to create a second rind of pecans, and place panko-side down into the oven at 250 for 15 minutes. 

For the rolls, I buttered them and pan-toasted them for a while, they turned out great, by the way. 

For the burger:

Grill the burger to a nice medium-rare

And voila:

It doesn’t even look that appetizing – I need a lightbox or something.  Aside from the over-caramelized shallots, the meat was cooked to well-done (but it was still moist – I attribute this to the quality of the meat), and the toasted pecans/panko wasn’t as crunchy as I had hoped it would be.  A dinner guest came from a picnic in the park and brought cheese and cherries:

I was done with my burger, but had these sliced up to add – two people tried the cherry topping and said it really added to the flavor, so I’m going to have to take their word for it. 

I apologize – I really stunk it up on this post.  To all of you that read to the end, I owe you a beer and 2:25 of your life back.  I can only make good on one of those promises.