So my system allows me to make a meal in less time, that tastes better, and I know what's in it. - I think.
I got up one morning and was relieved to see that summer wasn't just a rumour after all. mmmmmmm a grilled burger would be great! I'm going to buy some hamburger and patty them up today!
I found myself at one of those "Clubs" looking at hamburger that was $2.89 a pound, but I know I have purchased it for less, so I passed it by. While picking up the rest of the items on my "Club" list, I spied at a box of angus bacon and cheese burgers - $12 for a box of 12 1/4lb burgers, and thought to myself that's about $4 a lb, which isn't too bad, but then I realised that I was paying for the bacon and cheese, plus they were those machine pressed ones, and decided I could do better.
My quest begins at finding/making hamburger for as close to $2 lb as possible. A sudden desire to buy a grinder and grind up thoser cheaper cuts of meat popped into the forefront of my always busy brain. Oh, I have one of those antique grinders, but it has no blades. Yeah, I'd like to kick myself for it, but instead I think I'm gonna go out there and find me a grinder with the blades, and then I'm gonna grind me up my own burgers!
I went home with only my short list of purchases, and the dream of an awesome burger in my future.
The next day, I went out "Saling" as my husband calls it, and at the second garage sale, I found it. An old meat grinder with 4 plates for $3. Great, now all I need is the meat. The next morning my daughter announced to me she had a track meet that day, so I dutifully went and after about 4 hours, I was board out of my skull. Had I known it was an all day affair, destined to reek havoc on my back, I would have planned better. Packed a lunch, brought my back brace, ect. After her last race, when she assured me there was only an hour left, I ran to the local grocery store that I remember having good prices on meat. I was disappointed to discover they didn't have any "Hamburger" only ground sirloin for about $5 lb! but I did find some Angus Denver steaks marked down to $1.99lb, and grabbed both of those. That was only about 4 lbs, so I looked for more and found a package of boneless porkchops, also for $1.99lb and got it too. So now I have about 6 lbs of meat for $12. OK, so now we have matched that Club price. All I have to do is make it work.
The next day, I got all my stuff ready to go, when I noticed that these old grinders that clamp to a countertop didn't quite make the trip on my newer counter top. If I used my kitchen table, it would leave a mark, but the biggest obsticle seemed to be that once clamped on to the edge, it faced the wrong way, and only stood about 4" from the surface of the table, making it impossible to get a bowl under it. Now here's one of the many things I love about my huband. He's a wood worker, and can make anything. Yes, ANYthing! He was currently making a set of bow front cabinets, which takes a lot of time calculating, making jigs, and bending wood, and here I run into the shop with my grinder and a bowl and tell him I need a stand for the grinder to clamp on that will hold it above the bowl, with a platform for the bowl to sit on that's big eoungh to clamp to the table so the whole thing won't tip over when I crank down on the grinder. He's got wood and shavings all over, and I need this in about an hour so that he can grill us burgers for dinner. If that didn't wreck his train of thought, poor guy . . . but he loves me so
He did it!
I was fortunate to have found an old Hall mixing bowl that was 14" wide and about 8" tall and held 2 gallons [for a mere $10] on one of my Saling trips. I just knew I would need a giant bowl like this one day!
So I got my frozen peppers, fresh onions, bacon, cheese and meat all cut up and ready to go, and procede to layer it all in by feeding it into the grinder in an alternating fashion. It was amazingly easy! I say amazing, because I was wondering to myself the whole 15 minutes of time it took, why no one else does this? When it was all done, I gently tossed it like a salad, so's not to compress the meat. I pattied those up into 6 ounces, and set aside 3 for us. When I was finished, I got 17 - 6 ounce burgers, as opposed to the measily 4 once ones that Club was trying to pass off on me. and for about the same price! If I add in the $2 for the cheese and bacon, I paid only $2 more, but got 5 more burgers, plus mine are 2 ounces bigger, so I think I done good!
How did they taste? I will have you know we were just a bit skeptical, and didn't add any lettuce, tomato pickles or the like, figuring if they turn out bad we didn't want to waste those things, and if they are really good, they don't need em anyway. Turns out they were really good, and we raced to split that 3rd burger. I won and got the bigger half. My wonderful husband then turned to me and says what he always says when I make something great, "You can make that again!"
and I will.
Now if you want to make them exactly like I did: I used 4 lbs Angus Denver steaks, with a lil bit of fat trimmed off, 2 lbs of boneless pork chops, 2 handfuls of frozen green peppers, and 2 handfulls of frozen sweet peppers, one whole onion, a 2 ounces of cooked crumbled bacon, and an 8 ounce bag of cheese. The peppers must be frozen so they don't turn to mush when they run through the grinder. You can buy frozen peppers, but I buy fresh in season and wash, cut, and freeze them myself for way less. Our grocery store sells them for $2 each, but I can buy enough at a farmers market to fill a gallon Zip lock bag for the same $2. I only cut the meat into 2" wide by 3" or 4" long pieces. The screw thingy in the grinder pulls them in pretty well, and I used the 2nd to the largest grinding plate. There are 4 plates if you buy one of these things. For the record, peroxide is what you want to clean your cutting board, and untinsels with - before and after. Bleach is just ok, but peroxide is better.
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