Saturday, 5 December 2009

Monkey Bay Sliders.

With the boat still in uproar and the offspring due in less than a week I had the perfect excuse yesterday for a little cooking therapy! Just the thing to quiet my nerves was an invite to our next-door-boat birthday celebration last night. With the request to bring along something to eat I set to and decided on 'sliders' the mini-burger latest fashion accessory for hungry boaters...

I found a good recipe from Jaimie Oliver and adapted it a little. They sound fiddly but with a bit of organization on my work surfaces the whole lot was prepared from start to finish in under 40 minutes, not bad!

  • Olive oil
  • 2 medium onions, peeled and finely chopped
  • 6 Jacob's crackers or 4 slices of bread, crusts removed
  • 500g (1lb 2oz) good-quality lean minced beef
  • 1tsp sea salt
  • 1 heaped tsp freshly ground black pepper
  • 1 large egg, preferably free-range or organic, beaten
  • A handful of freshly grated Parmesan cheese
  1. You can make these burgers or sliders in an oven at full whack, on the barbecue or in a hot pan. If you're using the oven or barbecue, preheat it now. Put a splash of olive oil into a large frying pan on a low heat and add your chopped onions. Fry for 10 minutes or until the onions have softened, then put to one side to cool completely.
  2. Blitz your crackers or bread in a food processor until you get a fine consistency. Oil a clean baking tray and put aside. Put the cooled onions into a large bowl with the rest of the burger ingredients. Use clean hands to scrunch the mixture together really well, then divide into 6 equal balls for burgers and 18 equal balls for sliders. Wet your hands and roll the balls into burger-shaped patties about 2cm thick.
  3. Place your burgers or sliders on the oiled baking tray and pat with a little olive oil. Cover them with clingfilm and put the tray into the fridge for at least an hour, or until the patties firm up..

I finished them off with a piece of lettuce, slice of tomato, dollop of ketchup, piece of cheese(melted on the burger) and a piece of crispy bacon.

I had to use the picture from Jaimie's article as all mine were eaten before I got the camera out! And yes they did look just the same...well apart from no pickles and no sesame seeds but what's that between friends!

I really like miniature 'real food' canapes, sort of wicked but not too filling. You can always eat a lot of them, well we can!

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