Power Burger -- Steak pizzaiola burger

I wanted a burger.


And Rachael Ray, while irritatingly perky, does make good burgers.


I decided on this recipe because it seemed pretty straight forward and I had most of the ingredients already in the house. All I needed was the bread, the provolone cheese, and the parsley.


Yes, I decided to buy fresh parsley.


It's fairly ridiculous how big a bunch you have to buy in order to get just a handful. I seriously need to find a store or market where I can buy only what I need. I need bulk bins. And not just for herbs. Maybe I only want one stalk of celery; why do I need to buy a whole bag?!


But I digress.


I cut the recipe in half because a half pound of meat for a burger is excessive in my book. I decided to use the ground beef I already had in my freezer instead of going out ad buying ground sirloin.


Except, of course, I realized as I was stuck in traffic on the way home from work on Wednesday that I had forgotten to take the meat out of the freezer.


So I stopped and got some ground round on the way home. I was already running late, what's another 15 minutes? I would have gotten ground sirloin, except I couldn't find any.


I used the smallest onion for that component because I can only handle so much onion. I used kitchen shears to chop the parsley because it was just not working with me on my glass cutting board. When the meat was all mixed up (and it really didn't want to stay together very well), I scored it in thirds so we would each get 1/3 pound, instead of the 1/2 pound the recipe actually called for. I put them in the pan and hoped for the best.


Now, my friend couldn't find sesame semolina, so she went with three-cheese semolina. Win. By the time she got there/the burgers were close to done, I was ready to eat. Really ready.


This is where I took a short cut.


I didn't even bother to read the directions thoroughly, I saw something along the lines of melting the butter and infusing the garlic and I said, Forget it. I'm too hungry for that!


So we spread a little butter on the bread, dusted it with parmesan cheese and garlic salt and put it in the oven while the provolone on the patties melted.

I realized after I started eating that I should have gotten more patty in the picture. Oh well, it still tasted good.

The burgers were delicious. Seriously. They were really good, and I'm not the biggest fan of actual onions. The bread didn't seem to hold up super well to the juiciness of the burger, but that could have been because he took that cut with the garlic butter. I'm fairly certain that's why, but the burger was just so tasty, I didn't even care my hands were a mess. It would have also helped if the patties were flatter, but like I said, I had a hard time keeping the patties intact.

Conclusion: More substantial bread. Remember to thaw the meat. Use a smaller onion. Make the patties flatter.