lonely avocado
This past Monday, Jan left an avocado on the counter with a note that said, "Have a 'cado on your salad if you want...". Monday are usually our salad nights because it's sometimes a late day for me and dog training classes at night for her. I snickered at the word-play of her note but wasn't in an avocado mood so I left it alone. By Friday, it had gone all bad inside it's skin and was put out to pasture. However, I felt just bad enough that I decided to make *something* with avocado and it just had to be a hand-chopped burger...
The theme was bacon-avocado burgers but with a twist. Instead of bacon, a thin but very crisp slice of pancetta. Instead of avocado mush, a "ring" of avocado. And instead of caramelized onions...um, well caramelized Maui onions.
I usually buy a New York "cut" steak (with a bit of extra fat) which is not the same as a New York steak for some reason. It is not as expensive and surely not as tender but for a hand-chopped burgers it does nicely.
My "hands" in the operation is a small food processor in which cut up chunks of the aforementioned meat and extra fat are placed. Pulse 10 or 12 times and voilá, "hand chopped" burger meat.
OK, onto the rings of avocado. I found a baby-huey-shaped avocado which allowed me to cut off it's bottom about 1/4" into the seed. The trick now was to extract the seed. I used the tried and true "whack it with the sharp edge of the knife and pull up" method which worked to loosen the seed but it was now like an ungainly eyeball rolling around in a socket (yeah, yeah, not appetizing but one has to be descriptive to get the point across).
I stabbed the seed with the pointy end of the knife and slowly pulled it out. What was left was perfect for slicing "rings" of avocado. Inside those rings was a perfect compartment of a small pile of the caramelized onions.
So you get the drift...sear/cook the burger, toast the egg-bread rolls pressed into duty as buns, stack burger, pancetta, avo, onions, a grinding of black pepper and dinner's served. Oh yeah, and I flash-fried some long and thin pieces of yam for a twist on ye olde French fries as well. Nice.