Today's Feast Your Eyes post is my attempt at stretching out the relaxation and outdoor cooking of Memorial Day just a little bit longer. This image, of a freshly grilled basil burger, was taken by Flickr user Coneslayer and from the looks of things was pretty darn delicious.
How did you spend your Memorial Day weekend? If you made some good food and took pictures, make sure to upload them to the Slashfood Flickr page, so we can all see your tasty creations.
Today is the official start of grilling season, and what better way to kick it off than with a book that offers a different burger recipe for every week of the year. Sally Sampson's Recipe of the Week: Burgers (we looked at her ice cream book last week) is a nice book, with clearly written directions for every dish and lots of pictures that will make you want to fire up the grill.
This book does a good job of looking at the full range of burgers. She doesn't just focus on the classic beef patty and instead casts her net to include ground chicken, turkey, lamb, tuna, salmon, black beans and portobello mushrooms. Additionally, if you're tired of the same old burger toppings, this book offers a wealth of inspiration that will keep your grilled patties exciting for weeks to come.
As someone who eats a lot of turkey burgers (the favored recipe around our house is to include chopped onion and peas in the meat mix), I'm excited to play with some of her flavor combos. This would be a fun book to show to your kids as well, because with all the yummy pictures, even the youngest of kids will be able to help pick out the picnic fare.
Warmth is great and all, but one of the best things about summer is potatoes -- growing, barbecuing them, and of course, lathering them in all sorts of tasty things and making a potato salad.
For years I didn't go near the German variety of tater salad -- I was a strict mayo and potato gal. This is probably a good thing since I never would have dug the sauerkraut flavor that lingers in the obviously German mix. Now, they're both pretty darned tasty. The mayonnaise variety offers the creaminess of the lathered potato with the crisp crunch of celery and onions. The German variety, on the other hand, offers a warm and tasty mixture of potato and vinegary sharp goodness. (And it isn't too shabby cold either.)
With this being the start of Memorial Day Weekend, there's no better time to whip up some potato salad and kick off the awesome season of warmth. Check out the recipes that follow, revel in all things tatery, and be sure to comment about your own special touches.
Here, it is -- a classic potato salad recipe, adapted from the Big Book of Backyard Cooking.
Old-Fashioned Potato Salad
Ingredients:
Approximately 2 pounds of potatoes, the above salad used 3 large baking potatoes 4 large, hard-boiled eggs 1 3/4 cup chopped celery 2/3 cup red onion 1/2 cup of mayo The juice of half a lemon. 1 1/2 tsp cider vinegar Approximately 1-2 tsp of mustard -- ball park, dijon, or other tasty varieties. Kosher salt A few shakes of cayenne pepper
First, boil diced potatoes, whatever size you want in the salad. When they're tender, drain. I often make them a little more tender to make the mix a bit more creamy rather than crunchy. Let the potatoes cool.
Mash up the eggs in a bowl, and then mix with the celery and onion. Once that is well mixed, add the mayo, juice, vinegar, mustard, salt, and cayenne.
Add this mixture to the potatoes when cool, and mix well. Season to taste and enjoy!
E. coli be darned, I still order my burgers done "as rare as you possibly can." A girl's allowed a vice or two, right?
While plenty of places are still willing to bend the rules, legally speaking, ground beef must be cooked to 160 degrees to kill the creepy crawlies. But you can be safe while still enjoying thick, pink-centered, dripping cheeseburgers. Grind your own beef. Commercially ground beef, for reasons I won't go into here (but if you're curious, read Fast Food Nation), carries a much higher risk of contamination than meat freshly ground in a home grinder.
I buy fatty chuck - 20 percent fat, at least - and put it through the 'coarse' plate of my KitchenAid meat grinder attachment. You can get free-standing grinders pretty cheap at kitchenware stores. Then I mix it, by hand, with a healthy squeeze of ketchup, tons of salt and pepper, Worcestershire sauce and chopped garlic, maybe some cayenne. Don't mix too much, or you'll compress the beef and end up with a too-hard burger. Then onto the grill. A friend just taught me a nifty test for doneness - when pressing on the burger, if it feels firm like the skin between your thumb and index finger when you're fingers are outstretched, it's well-done. If it feels slightly loose, like the same bit of skin when your hand's relaxed, it's medium-rare.
I tend to think of Memorial Day Weekend as the time when the summer grilling season really starts to heat up. While the weather has already been nice for as much as a month in some areas, by the end of May, nearly everyone is having a surfeit of warm, sunny days and is ready to move the bulk of their cooking outdoors (so as to avoid heating up the kitchen).
Here at Slashfood, we're going to spend a lot of time focusing on all this summer outdoor cookery. We'll have a bunch of posts up for you this week, to get you ready for the weekend, but we'll be writing about grilling, barbecuing and even what to do if you don't have any outdoor space in which to grill, all summer long. Our friends at AOL Food are also featuring grilling this summer, so make sure to check in over there often for fresh tips, tricks, recipes and bbq related quizzes.
To get you started, here are some grilling links from past years:
So far this year we've had some some pretty horrendous weather where I live and I was beginning to wonder if Spring was ever going to arrive. Now that Memorial Day has passed I'm finally daring to hope that the warm temps are here to stay, and summer might truly be just around the corner.
As if on cue, Joe at Culinary in the Desert posted this Watermelon Salad and all memory of snow and storms vanished. It's not difficult visualizing a picnic in the park when looking at fresh watermelon, watercress, sliced red onions, fresh herbs, and creamy smooth feta cheese. Thanks Joe, just what the doctor ordered!
Corn on the cob is one of those foods I rarely have. It's really a seasonal thing, and considering that season is my least favorite by far (and I'm not a big cookout guy anyway) I never think of having it. But I'll try the following recipe the next time I have it.
It's for Griilled Corn with Chipotle-Lime Butter. Grilling corn on the cob has become more and more popular the past several years and I think the butter in this recipe will give it a kick your family might not be expecting if you're having a Memorial Day cookout.
It is beginning to look like unofficial hot dog day here at Slashfood, though I'd like to clarify that this recipe calls for 100% all-beef wieners rather than some of the other available alternatives. Ugh.
Anyhoo...
For those of you gearing up for some grilling this weekend, you may want to check out Bobby Flay's "Texas Dog" - a simple recipe which includes a hot dog smothered in his special homemade BBQ sauce, then topped with freshly-made coleslaw and quartered dill pickles. This is perfect for backyard "plate-less" eating since the usual side dishes are already on the bun.
Granted, this recipe may not win an award for being the fanciest dish or require a lot of skill to prepare, because let's be honest, at the end of the day it is still just a hot dog, but it tastes delicious and everything can be prepared beforehand. If you are having company over for a backyard barbecue, really, isn't that the point? I've included a copy of the recipe and instructions after the jump.
Today is the official start of grilling season, and what better way to kick it off than with a book that offers a different burger recipe for every week of the year. Sally Sampson's Recipe of the Week: Burgers (we looked at her ice cream book last week) is a nice book, with clearly written directions for every dish and lots of pictures that will make you want to fire up the grill. 
Corn on the cob is one of those foods I rarely have. It's really a seasonal thing, and considering that season is my least favorite by far (and I'm not a big cookout guy anyway) I never think of having it. But I'll try the following recipe the next time I have it.
It is beginning to look like unofficial hot dog day here at Slashfood, though I'd like to clarify that this recipe calls for 100% all-beef wieners rather than some of the other available alternatives. Ugh. 
Flank steak has a texture "like butter." Check out this recipe: Grilled Flank Steak With Ballpark Mustard Glaze (it is baseball season, after all).
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