JUMMIES

Thanksgiving Tips From Serious Eats: Harold McGee's Top 10 Thanksgiving Tips

2010-11-22T06:22:00.000-08:00

Some interesting tips (not all of them i agree with) from one of my go-to foodie sites (Serious Eats): worth a look...

Harold McGee is the author of On Food And Cooking and the newly released Keys to Good Cooking. He is a renowned "food science" expert.

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Harold McGee's Top 10 Thanksgiving Tips

Posted by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, November 12, 2010 at 11:45 AM

"Ask yourself: am I a turkey man, or a stuffing man? Because you can't have it both ways."

©iStockphoto.com/MentalArt

We were joined this morning at Serious Eats world headquarters by Harold McGee, author of On Food And Cooking and the newly released Keys to Good Cooking. He's a food science legend, and one of my idols.

In cased you missed this morning's live webcast, here are the top 10 pieces of useful, brilliant, or just plain duh-why-didn't-I-think-of-that? tips we learned today to help make your Thanksgiving just a little bit more delicious.

1. Get a Thermometer

Harold stresses the importance of relying on temperature when cooking a turkey. Do not rely on the little pop-up thermometer—by the time it comes up, your turkey will be well beyond dry. Instead, get a good instant read thermometer like the Thermapen from Thermoworks. Not only is it more accurate than the cheap ones (those guys can be off by as much as 20°F!), it's also faster. Sure, it costs 10 times more, but it'll last a lifetime, and unlike the $10 models, it actually works.

2. Check the Temperature Early and Often

When cooking your turkey, check the temperature, check early, and check often. The final moisture level in the turkey is directly related to the temperature you cook it to. For breast meat, aim for 150 to 155°F (despite what the government says, this temperature is perfectly safe so long as you let your turkey rest for at least 15 minutes or so). For dark meat, 165°F is the goal. Check the temperature well before the expected finishing time, as any number of factors can affect how fast the turkey cooks.

3. Separate the Light From the Dark

Since both parts of the turkey need to cook to different temperatures, it's best to separate them before cooking the take them out of the oven as they finish. It may not give you that perfect Norman Rockwell moment at the dinner table, but your family's stomachs will thank you in the end!

4. Brining Is a Trade-off

Brining a turkey by soaking it in a tub of salty water (our basic brine is a cup and a half of kosher salt per gallon of water) will definitely get you moister results—up to 20% moister, says Harold—but it comes at the expense of flavor. "You've got a nice turkey with lots of turkey flavor. When you brine it, you're basically diluting that flavor with salty tap water," says Harold. A better route may be salting the bird for a couple nights. It gets some of moisture retention qualities of brining, without diluting flavor.

5. Briners: Brine for at Least Two Days

If you do choose to brine, make sure you do it for at least two days. Turkeys are large. It takes a long time for the salt to work its magic all the way through the center of the bird. Give it time. If you don't have room in your fridge, the best way to do this is to use a large cooler to hold your turkey and brine. Use several large ice packs to keep the water below 40°F, changing out the ice packs a couple times a day.

6. Don't Bother Flavoring the Brine

"Salt molecules are tiny—it's just two ions, and they work their way into turkey meat relatively fast," explains Harold. "Aromatic molecules from things like herbs and vegetable, on the other hand, are very large"—relatively speaking, that is. This makes it difficult for them to penetrate into the turkey, so aromatics added to your brine won't have much more than a superficial effect.

7. Important Question: Are You a Turkey or Stuffing Person?

Ask yourself: am I a turkey man, or a stuffing man? Because you can't have it both ways. Stuffing a bird will get you supremely flavorful stuffing as it collects the juices from the bird, but you'll inevitably overcook the meat as you try to get the stuffing up to temperature. Bake your stuffing separately outside of the bird, and you'll get a perfectly roasted turkey, but less flavorful stuffing. Which do you prefer? Harold suggests a tradeoff: "I like to pour the drippings from the turkey over my stuffing to get some of the turkey flavor in there." Sounds just fine to me!

8. Use a Scale!

Measuring things like salt or flour by volume is remarkably inconsistent. A teaspoon of Morton's table salt, for instance, weighs about 20% more than a teaspoon of Morton's kosher salt. That means if you substitute table salt for a recipe that calls for kosher, your food will be 20% saltier! For salt, make sure you always use the type specified and taste carefully for seasoning. For flour, measure everything out on a scale, not in a measuring cup.

9. On Pie Crusts

Use a mister to make your pie crust. One of the big problems with pie crust is adding the liquid. Pour it in, and it all gets absorbed in one spot. Your crust bakes and rolls unevenly, coming out tough in some spots, tender in others. Harold prefers to use a spray bottle to mist his dough with water. It applies the water much more evenly. Just make sure you know in advance how many sprays it takes to get the right amount of liquid in there.

10. Choose Your Apples Wisely

When making a pie, different apples have different cooking quality—make sure you know which is which in order to get the desired finished results. Harold points out that "fluffy" varieties like McIntosh will break down readily in a pie. Firmer, crisper varieties like Granny Smith will stay solid. It all comes down to personal taste. To test your apples before baking, cut a couple thin slices and microwave them for 30 seconds. This'll give you a good idea of how well they'll break down in the pie.

From Serious Eats: How to Make The Best Chili For a Burger

2010-09-06T06:51:00.000-07:00

Another great post from Kenji of serious eats. can't wait to try this one.

The Burger Lab: How to Make The Best Chili For a Burger (or Hot Dog!)

Posted by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, September 3, 2010 at 8:00 AM

This chili ends up with a homogeneous, saucy texture perfect for topping burgers, hot dogs, or fries. Leftover chili can be stored in the fridge for up to 1 week.

The chile is best with the whole dried chiles indicated in the recipe, but you can substitute 3 tablespoons of your favorite chili powder if desired. Add it to the pot along with the other ground spices in step 2.

Ingredients

serves about 8, active time 20 minutes, total time 95 minutes

2 whole Ancho or Pasilla chiles, stemmed, seeded, and torn into strips
1 whole New Mexico red, California, Costeño, or Choricero chile, stemmed, seeded, and torn into strips
1 whole Cascabel, Arbol, or Pequin chile, stemmed, seeded, and torn in half
2 tablespoons butter
1 medium yellow onion, diced fine (about 1 1/2 cups)
2 cloves garlic
1 1/2 teaspoons whole cumin seed, toasted and ground
1 teaspoon coriander seed, toasted and ground
1 whole clove, toasted and ground
1 whole star anise, toasted and ground
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
3 tablespoons tomato paste
2 teaspoons soy sauce
1 anchovy filet, minced (optional)
1/2 teaspoon Marmite (optional)
1 teaspoon sugar
1 1/2 pounds 80/20 ground chuck or short rib
1 quart chicken stock
2 tablespoons masa harina
1 tablespoon Frank's Red Hot
1 tablespoon bourbon (optional)
Kosher salt

Procedures

1) Combine all chiles in a medium microwave-safe bowl and cover with water. Microwave on full power for 2 minutes. Remove bowl from microwave and allow chiles to soak for 10 minutes. Using immersion blender or upright blender, blend soaked chiles until smooth, adding soaking water as needed to keep texture loose.

2) Melt butter over medium-high heat in Dutch oven. When foaming subsides, add onions and garlic. Cook, stirring frequently, until onions are softened but no browned, about 6 minutes. Add ground spices and oregano and continue to cook, stirring frequently, until aromatic, about 1 1/2 minutes. Add tomato paste, soy sauce, anchovy, Marmite (if using), and sugar, and cook, stirring frequently until paste begins to stick to bottom of pan, about 1 1/2 minutes.

3) Remove pan from heat and add 2 cups of chicken broth. Scrape up any browned bits from bottom of pan with wooden spoon. Add ground beef and break up using whisk until mixture is completely homogeneous (no large chunks of beef should remain). Add remaining chicken stock and return to stovetop and set over medium high heat. Cook, whisking frequently, until mixture comes to a simmer. Cover with lid slightly ajar, reduce heat to low, and cook for 75 minutes, stirring occasionally, until mixture is thick and intense.

4) Combine masa harina and 2 tablespoons water in a small bowl and mix until homogeneous. Add masa mixture, hot sauce, and burbon to chili and stir to combine. Bring to a boil and summer until thickened, about 2 minutes. Season to taste with salt and serve immediately on top of burgers, hot dogs or fries.

My desert island burger: Grind beef (sirloin, brisket, and oxtail) and form into loose 1/4 pound patty. Season well and griddle in beef fat until crisp and deep brown. Apply cheese and melt until gooey. Place on toasted potato roll with onions, pickles, burger sauce. Eat with napkins.

As glorious as that may sound to me, it'd be a sad state of affairs if that's the only burger I ever ate in my life. I mean, Rubber Soul may be better than Revolver, but that doesn't mean that I don't occasionally look at that pencil-drawn album cover and think to myself: I've just got to get you into my life.

So it is with chili burgers, the Sgt. Pepper of the burger world: a tad overwrought, a little bit messy, just a few too many ideas going on at once, a little more popular than it should be, but really, really delicious nonetheless. And as AHT'r cedarglen has rightfully pointed out, we've not given chili burgers their due here at the Burger Lab.

The problem is that a great chili is a meal in itself, not a condiment.

You'd think that making a really great chili burger is as simple as making really great chili and a really great burger and sticking them together. But it ain't that simple. The problem is that a great chili is a meal in itself, not a condiment. It should have a wide variance of texture: rich, thick sauce, small bits of beef that act as flavoring, and larger chunks of tender braised beef to offer some bite. Throw all that on top of a burger, and it doesn't just overwhelm the burger—it tears it to shreds and stomps on the remains.

What I was after is not just the perfect chili, but the perfect chili-as-condiment. For topping burgers, fries, or hot dogs, chili should have slightly less kick than a full-fledged, punch-you-in-the-mouth-with-flavor chili, with a much finer, sauce-like texture that doesn't distract from the crispness of the burger or overwhelm the bun.

Building Flavor

In my previous studies in chili, I'd already figured out a few of the keys to great chili flavor. Here's a brief summary:

Use dried chiles instead of powder. This is the number one way to improve your chili! Three reasons: First, because volatile flavor molecules begin to dissipate as soon as chiles are ground, whole chiles will have much more flavor. Second, grinding your own chiles gives you more control over flavor. Third, chili powder can come out gritty even after cooking. By using fresh chiles, you can soak and puree them, which gives you a smoother finished texture.

Use a mix of dried chiles. I like to use a three way mix of sweet and fresh New Mexico or Costeños, hot Cascabel or Arbol, and rich and fruity Ancho or Pasillas. Using a mix will cover the entire flavor spectrum, adding complexity and fullness.
Toast whole spices before grinding and adding them to the chili. Toasting helps develop new, more complex flavors in the spices. Toasting post-grinding simply causes the flavors to dissipate. Cumin and coriander are classic chili spices. Star anise and clove are not necessary, but add an underlying complexity without making their presence too known.

Add some "umami bombs" like anchovies, soy sauce, and Marmite. Again, this is optional, but it really improves the savoriness of the chili.
Finish off the chili with a splash of something volatile, like booze or vinegar. The more volatile the liquid, the more easily aromatic compounds will jump off the surface and into your nose.

Those of you who've read the original chili story may note that I haven't mentioned the chocolate, the use of whole short ribs, the coffee, the fresh chiles, etc. For the sake of burger chili, I've found that it's not only easier to skip a lot of the more difficult steps, but it's actually better: as I've said, the flavor of this chili is a little less complex so that it doesn't overwhelm the burger. In fact, after testing both chili made with dried chiles and chili powder, even the version made with chili powder fared just fine on top of a burger. It's not ideal, but it'd do in a pinch.

Buttered Up

The first step of chili is to cook down onions and garlic in order to get rid of some of their raw edge, and to bloom the ground spices to pull out their flavor and distribute it through the fat which will form the flavor base of the stew.

While a really great chili can take upwards of three hours to simmer to rich, complex perfection, I was after something a little faster here—my burgers just can't wait that long. In order to give the onion, garlic, and spice base of my chili a quick flavor boost, I used a trick that I first learned from Marcella Hazan, in her incomparably simple and tasty recipe for tomato sauce: Use butter instead of olive oil.

It seems a simple substitution, but it makes a world of difference. While in her recipe she simply throws everything into the pot to simmer together, I found that sautéeing my chopped onions and garlic in the butter until soft was the way to go. The sweetness and richness of butter brings out the sweetness of the onions. It more easily forms an emulsion in the sauce so that you don't end up with the "oil slick" that olive oil can sometimes give. When tasted side by side, the difference in texture and flavor was undeniable.*

After cooking down my onions and garlic, I added my toasted ground cumin, coriander, star anise, and clove and allowed them to bloom before tossing in my ground beef to brown (I figured true ground beef would form a smoother, saucier chili than the beef chunks I generally prefer). I then added some chopped anchovies, can of tomato paste followed by my rehydrated, puréed peppers before topping the whole thin up with chicken stock and simmering it for a little over an hour until the flavor had developed. To finish it, I spiked it with bourbon and a tablespoon of vinegary Frank's Red Hot.**

The results were not bad. Really good, even. Flavor-wise, it was spot on. Complex and spicy without being overwhelming. Texture-wise, however, it was a bomb. The beef still stayed in fairly large chunks, while the sauce was thin enough that it turned the whole burger into an inedibly messy affair.

After ever so briefly contemplating throwing the whole thing in the blender to smooth it out, I realized that "beef milkshake" is a place that I wasn't willing to go, even in the name of good food. There had to be a better way to get the texture right.

I knew that the browning phase can cause meat to seize up into chunks that don't break down as they simmer, so I decided to try skipping that step all together. Rather than adding the beef before the liquid, I reversed the order, adding the beef to the pot of simmering chili-liquid. It may sound gross, but there's actually precedence for this technique in Cincinnati Chili, a regional chili variant in which the ground beef is boiled in chili sauce and served atop spaghetti.

Ed Levine likes to refer to "cosmic oneness"

Despite my optimism, this attempt came out even worse than the first batch. Ed Levine likes to refer to "cosmic oneness"—the state that great fried chicken achieves when the crust and chicken meld together into a whole. I think the term is equally applicable to a good chili: The meat and the sauce should be inseparable from each other, forming a symbiotic relationship that elevates both elements to new heights.

This batch was the opposite: discrete bits of boiled beef with an almost wormy appearance surrounded by a wet sauce. But I wasn't prepared to abandon the no-brown method quite yet.

Taking Whisks

Here's a thought: When cooking scrambled eggs, two very different outcomes are possible. If you cook the eggs fast, stirring and folding with a spatula, you end up with fluffy eggs with large, tender curds. If, on the other hand, you cook the eggs slowly, stirring them with a whisk, you end up with super creamy eggs with a smooth, almost custard-like texture. Same ingredients, slightly different process, vastly different end results.

Would the same thing happen with my beef? I mean, when you get down to it, a pot full of liquidy ground beef is not all that difference from a pan full of eggs. Both are mostly water with a smattering of raw proteins mixed into it. It's the way that these proteins set that makes the difference in the finished product. Let the proteins coagulate and link up very fast with minimal disturbance, and you end up with large chunks. Cook them slowly while agitating, and you should end up with smaller pieces.

It was worth a shot.

This time, I started my chili the same way by sautéeing the onions and garlic, then adding the spices, tomato paste, chiles, and other flavorings. But instead of adding the beef directly, I first added half of the chicken stock, which rapidly cooled the contents of the pot. Off heat, I added the beef and used a whisk to mix it into the liquid until it was completely homogeneous slurry. It sure wasn't pretty, but I hoped my risk would pan out.

After adding the remainder of the chicken stock (adding all of it while mixing the beef proved too difficult to get the beef to break down smoothly), I set the pot on the heat and slowly brought it to a simmer while whisking it constantly. Things were looking good: The beef was broken down into tiny particles and the chili showed an unprecedented level of homogeneity.

75 minutes of slow simmering brought the flavors into sharp focus, but the texture was still not quite there. Despite the beef being nice and smooth, the sauce itself was still a little too thin.

I turned to my favorite chili thickener for some support:

Maseca is dehydrated corn meal treated with lime and is intended for making tortillas, tamales, and other corn meal-based products. As a thickener, it's outstanding. It provides richness and texture while adding a subtle nutty flavor of its own. Unlike a flour roux, it need not be cooked down before adding it to liquid. All you've got to do is form a slurry with equal parts cold water, then stir it directly into your stew.

A minute or two later, and my chili was literally thick enough to stand a spoon in: the ideal texture for topping a burger or hot dog without overly squishing out when you bite into it or soaking into the bun.

The real-deal-meal-in-a-bowl stuff may be the pope of chili town, but we've just elected it's official constable.

So there you go, AHT readers: No more complaints that we're not an equal-opportunity burger-topping website!

Next up: melty, gooey cheese sauce, because if I don't tackle this soon, my wife*** will kill me.

And if you'll excuse me, I've now got some chili to attend to.

Continue here for Condiment Chili for Chili Dogs, Chili Burgers, or Chili Fries

*Don't get me wrong —there are many sauces for which the flavor of great olive oil is essential—just not for chili.
**Surely this should take ketchup's place as America's greatest condiment!
***who spent the happiest birthday of her life eating cheese sauce at a Fuddruckers,

Pasta with Bacon and Corn 'Pesto' from "Paupered Chef"

2010-08-22T07:33:00.000-07:00

Now how freakin' good does this look? And perfect for this time of year with corn in the midst of its harvest. A lot of local farmers markets have corn fresh and in season right now...

Cook seasonal, folks. Forget that it is good for the environment and local small farms and all that. Your food simply TASTES BETTER when you cook with seasonal and local ingredients. Trust me, it's true.

Got this recipe from Serious Eats via one of my new favorite food sites, The Paupered Chef, run by 2 Chicagoans, Nick Kindelsperger and Blake Royer. Great stuff. Enjoy.
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Dinner Tonight: Pasta with Bacon and Corn 'Pesto'

Posted by Blake Royer, August 13, 2010

When it comes down to it, my favorite food is pasta. And if you held a gun to my head, I'd probably say that carbonara is my favorite pasta. I love its creaminess-with-no-cream, the chewy, salty bits of bacon, the roundness of Parmesan, the bite of black pepper. So it's not with any flippancy that I say that this recipe reminds me of carbonara, and in the best of possible ways. It's creamy, bacony, and satisfying—yet it's also a lot lighter and more fitting for summer.

The creaminess comes from the starch in the corn, which is blended up with Parmesan and pine nuts to make a "pesto" of sorts that glossily coats the noodles. I found the recipe in Bon Appetit in a feature about ways to use up those staples of summer produce: corn, tomato, and zucchini. The corn is softened in the rendered fat from the bacon, then some of the corn is left unblended to give the pasta more texture. Slivered basil gives the whole dish that unmistakable fragrance of summer, and black pepper lends a hint of spiciness.

Ingredients

serves 4,

4 slices thick bacon, cut into lardons
4 cups fresh corn kernels from about 6 ears
1 large clove garlic, minced
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup grated Parmesan
1/3 cup pine nuts, toasted
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
3/4 pound taglietelle, fettucini, or other pasta
3/4 cup slivered basil leaves

Procedures

In a large skillet, cook the bacon pieces over medium-low heat until chewy and beginning to crisp and the fat has rendered into the pan, about 10 minutes. Remove the bacon with a slotted spoon and drain on paper towels.
Add the corn and garlic to the skillet and toss to coat in the fat. Add a couple pinches of salt and pepper and cook until the corn is just tender, about 5 minutes. Reserve 3/4 cup of corn, then scrape the rest into a food processor. Add the pine nuts and Parmesan and pulse to combine. Add the olive oil with the machine running and blend until almost smooth. Add some water if necessary to smooth it.
In the meantime, bring a pot of salty water to boil and cook the pasta until al dente. Reserve 1 1/2 cups of the pasta cooking water before draining.
In the pasta cooking pot, combine the cooked pasta, corn pesto, reserved corn, most of the basil, and 3/4 of the bacon. Over low heat, toss to combine, adding some of the reserved pasta cooking water until the sauce comes together and coats all the noodles. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
Divide the pasta among bowls and top with remaining basil, bacon, and freshly grated Parmesan cheese, if desired. Serve immediately.

Printed from http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/08/pasta-with-bacon-and-corn-pesto-recipe.html

From A Hamburger Today: George Motz Makes a Smashed Burger

2010-08-20T07:36:00.000-07:00

A short but sweet primer on makes a fresh, easy burger at home I got (aggregated) from one of m favorite sites, A Hamburger Today. George Motz is the author of the classic hamburger tome, Hamburger America. A book that chronicles the best of this American classic from coast to coast.

I'm a big believer in the hot cast iron skillet method, and I use the very same meat grinder attachment to my stand mixer that is used in this clip. I do deviate a bit from the method on the video, though, as I tend to like to form my patties (gently and lightly packed) so i can more control the size and thickness of my patty.

The key, though, is to use fresh, high quality, well-sourced beef (or lamb) and grind it yourself. It really, really does make a difference folks. Believe me. Really.

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Video: George Motz Makes a Smashed Burger

Posted by Robyn Lee, August 17, 2010 at 5:30 PM

Hamburger expert George Motz appears in this short film about burgers by director Mac Premo for Made Possible. "The most difficult way to make a hamburger is the way that everyone thinks is the easiest way to make a hamburger, which is to put it on a flame grill," Motz says. "I prefer to cook mine on a flat top or in a skillet." Them he proceeds to make a smashed burger topped with super thin slices of onions. Cue drooling. Watch the video after the jump.

A Hamburger Today: A Road Trip Burger at The Harris Ranch Restaurant

2010-07-29T06:03:00.000-07:00

From A Hamburger Today is a review of Harris Ranch's burger from their dining operation. Seems like worth a stop for anyone taking a trip to or from Northern California and Southern California.

A Road Trip Burger at The Harris Ranch Restaurant in Coalinga, CA

Posted: 28 Jul 2010 12:37 PM PDT

From A Hamburger Today

[Photographs: Damon Gambuto]

The Harris Ranch Restaurant

24505 West Dorris Avenue, Coalinga CA 93210 (map); 800-942-2333; harrisranch.com
Cooking Method: Grilled
Short Order: A quality ranch turns the roadside inn into a vacation and burger destination
Want Fries with That? Yes— the skinny fries have great flavor, but send them back if they come out cold
Prices: Ranch Burger w/fries, $11.95
Notes: If you've got a cooler with you, load up on some excellent and inexpensive beef

So one of my closest friends was celebrating a birthday this past weekend and that meant a trip to San Francisco. San Francisco is only an hour plane ride north, but being that I'm both a fan of road trips and an inveterate cheapskate, I filled up the Saab and Google Mapped my route.

There are basically two options when heading to San Francisco from Los Angeles. The 101 (and its sister roadway, US 1) is the proverbial scenic route. It's an attractive roadway that takes you along the coast and then winds its way through wine country. The 5 freeway is a trucking route that plows through the Central California agricultural landscape that has all of the charms you'd imagine our contemporary industrial farming landscape proffers; that is to say, few. That said, it is the fast way, and, being that the trip was really about seeing my great friends, I opted for speed.

I actually had imagined I'd wind up testing some new fast food burger somewhere along the way, but as my eyes began crossing with fatigue I saw a vision in the distance that made me think that my frugality was part of a larger plan. Towering overhead I saw the "Harris Ranch" sign inviting me for a few moments of rest, and, more importantly, a proper burger lunch. I've been eating Harris Ranch beef for years as one Los Angeles's most revered purveyors, Huntington Meats, sources much of their beef from the decades-old ranch, but this roadtrip lunch would be my first burger from the source.

The Harris family began farming the San Joaquin Valley in 1937 and has managed to maintain its family ownership through all these years. John Harris currently oversees what is now described as a "vertically integrated" agribusiness, which, from what I can glean, means they not only raise their cattle, but also grow all of their own feed. Their beef, which is distributed all over the country and sold online, has developed a reputation for quality.

I put that reputation to the test in the form of their 1/3-pound Black Angus burger in their restaurant. For about thirty years, they've run an inn and restaurant in Coalinga that is a surprisingly upscale vacation destination that, to an Angeleno, seems right between nowhere and who-knows-where, but when I walked in on a late Saturday afternoon, the Western-themed dining room and gift shop were buzzing with activity.

There are a number of burger creations on the menu, but the Ranch Burger, with a choice of cheese, lettuce, tomato, red onion, and special sauce seemed the option most suited to a high quality patty.

Mine came out looking beautiful save the pre-cutting the burger receives before it comes out of the kitchen (I recommend asking them to leave it whole.) The potato bun was spongy and delicate and measured perfectly against the 1/3-pound beef patty. The local veggies were vibrant and fresh. They seem to embrace this the height of the tomato season. My tomato was the best I've been served on a burger in a very long time. The special sauce was, as you'd guess, a Thousand Island spread that fits the California aesthetic. The grilled beef was just as I'd hoped—fantastic. Rich with fat and salt, it offered a clean beef taste that was deeply satisfying.

The quality ingredients made me happy to spend the extra money ($11.95 in this case) for a higher quality burger, but there were a few missteps that seemed out of sync with the attentive service. My burger came out a bit overcooked and, more than that, my meal seemed a bit sloppily handled generally. The cheddar cheese, which was portioned properly, didn't get any heat other than the patty so it was just sweaty, rather than nicely melted. My skinny fries had a great flavor, but were clearly not fried to order. I'd hoped that these problems were a the result of say a cook who was a bit tired, but when I stopped in again on my way back to Los Angeles, I found similar problems with my burger.

In the end, these mistakes weren't enough to make the burger anything less than very good, but considering the quality beef and other delicious high quality ingredients it seemed like a missed opportunity. A little more attention in the kitchen and I might have said it's worth a special trip to the home of one of California's historic ranches. As it stands, I'd say make it a point to stop if, like me, you happen to be driving by.

Kenji Alt's In-N-Out Double-Double Animal Style at Home

2010-07-24T11:17:00.000-07:00

Hello all... i know i haven't posted in some time, but sometimes life takes you in other directions and one must prioritize, prioritize, prioritize... but enough of my rationalizations...

I think the posting below from "The Burger Lab" guru from Serious Eats' A Hamburger Today page, Kenji Alt is a very fitting posting to represent my prodigal return. If you enjoy what you read you might want to check out Kenji's own site. In addition to being a regular contributor to Serious Eats, he has his own page, Good Eater Collaborative, as well. It is well worth checking out.

Though i live in Southern California and can hop in my ride and go to the iconic In-n-Out anytime i please, i do fear a day when career and circumstance might take me from the sunny shores of California. In that eventuality, I know I will now have a go-to guide if i want to try to replicate what i think is, without a shadow of a doubt, the very best "fast food" style cheeseburger you can get for under $3.25.

Enjoy.

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The Burger Lab: The Ins-n-Outs of an In-N-Out Double-Double, Animal-Style

Posted by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, July 23, 2010 at 9:00 AM

It's time for another round of The Food Lab. Got a suggestion for an upcoming topic? Email Kenji here, and he'll do his best to answer your queries in a future post. Become a fan of The Food Lab on Facebook or Twitter for play-by-plays on future kitchen tests and recipe experiments.

Gone animal. [Photographs: Kenji Alt]

In-N-Out's Double-Double, Animal Style at Home

Posted by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, July 23, 2010 at 9:00 AM

[Photograph: Kenji Alt]

Want more details? Here are the ins-n-outs.

- makes two 1/4 pound burgers -

Note: store-bought ground chuck can be used in place of the fresh ground, but I highly recommend grinding your own!

Ingredients

1/2 pound fresh beef chuck with plenty of fat, cut into 1-inch cubes
2 teaspoons vegetable oil, divided
1 large onion, finely chopped (about 1 1/2 cups)
Kosher salt
2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons mayonnaise
1 tablespoon ketchup
2 teaspoons sweet pickle relish
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon distilled white vinegar
2 soft Hamburger buns, preferably Arnold brand
Freshly ground black pepper
8 dill pickles chips
2 quarter-inch-thick slices ripe tomato
2 leaves fresh iceberg lettuce, white core section removed, torn to bun-sized pieces
1/4 cup yellow mustard
4 slices deli-cut American Cheese

Procedure (Meat Grinder)

1. Place feed shaft, blade, and 1/4-inch die of meat grinder in freezer until well-chilled. Meanwhile, place meat chunks on rimmed baking sheet, leaving space between each piece and place in freezer for 10 minutes until meat is firm, but not frozen.

2. Combine meat in large bowl and toss to combine. Grind meat and refrigerate immediately until ready for use. Handle as gently as possible. Proceed with step three below.

Procedure (Food Processor)

1. Place bowl and blade of food processor in freezer until well-chilled. Meanwhile, place meat chunks on rimmed baking sheet, leaving space between each piece, and place in freezer for 10 minutes until meat is firm, but not frozen.

2. Combine meat in large bowl and toss to combine. Working in two batches, place meat cubes in food processor and pulse until medium-fine grind is achieved, about 8 to 10 one-second pulses, scraping down processor bowl as necessary. Refrigerate ground meat immediately until ready for use. Handle as gently as possible.

3. Preheat the oven or toaster oven to 400 degrees while you cook the onions: Heat 1 teaspoon oil in a 10-inch non-stick skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add onions and 1/2 teaspoon salt to skillet. Reduce heat to medium low, and cook, tossing and stirring occasionally until onions are well browned, about 15 minutes. Once onions begin to sizzle heavily and appear dry, add 1 tablespoon water to skillet and stir. Continue cooking until water evaporates and onions start sizzling again. Repeat process, adding 1 tablespoon of water with each iteration until onions are meltingly soft and dark brown, about 3 times total. Transfer to a small bowl and set aside.

4. Make the sauce: Combine mayonnaise, ketchup, relish, sugar, and vinegar in small bowl. Stir to combine.

5. Place closed buns in preheated oven for 2 minutes until slightly darkened and crisped. Heat 1/2 teaspoon oil in 12-inch non-stick skillet or griddle over medium-high heat until shimmering. Open buns and add face-down to skillet. Toast until dark brown around the edges, about 1 minute total.

6. Form ground beef into four 2-ounce patties, using damp hands to press each into a patty about 3/16ths of an inch thick and 4 inches wide. Season generously with salt and pepper. Add remaining 1/2 teaspoon oil to pan, swirl to coat, and heat over medium-high heat until lightly smoking. Add burger patties and cook without moving until well browned and crusty on first side, about 2 1/2 minutes. While they are cooking, spread 1 tablespoon mustard on raw side of each patty with a spoon. Meanwhile, top each bottom bun with up half of spread, 4 slices pickles, 1 slice tomato, and lettuce. Flip patties with a thin spatula so mustard side is down and continue to cook for 1 minute. Top each patty with a slice of cheese. Divide onion mixture evenly between two patties. Place the other two patties directly on top of the onions , sandwiching them between the beef. Transfer patty stacks to bottom bun. Top with top bun, and serve immediately.

ANALYSIS AND DECONSTRUCTION OF THE "MAKE AT HOME" VERSION

You West Coasters have it easy. Your dogs have yards to run in. Your grapes have vines to grow on. You get to watch the sun setting and the ocean at the same time. You're never faced with the tough decision of Motorino Brooklyn or Motorino Manhattan. Even the darn earth's rotation goes in your favor, letting you sleep three hours later than me every single morning!

And all that before we even mention In-N-Out, perhaps the second most compelling reason to move out west like my wife would like me to*.

I've been a rabid, if underexposed fan of the cult-ish fast food burger joint since I tried my first Double-Double (that's two patties, two slices of cheese) a couple years back. As burgers go, it's an oddity in my book, in that it's not about the beef.

It's a bomb that's rigged to hit every pleasure center on my brain's taste analyzation terminal

Sure, the fresh-never-frozen patties are tasty enough, but the sandwich is more than that. It's the interplay between the ooey-gooey American cheese, the sweet, darkly-toasted bun, the juicier-than-average tomatoes, the crisp iceberg, the full, un-separated-into-rings slice of onion, and the all-important sweet, tangy, pickle-laden Spread. It's a bomb that's rigged to hit every pleasure center on my brain's taste analyzation terminal (by which I mean my tongue). Salty, sweet, savory, soft, crisp, and fresh. "Overrated", people say? I think not. Let me quote the much more eloquent Nick Solares in saying "In-N-Out at the very least represents the platonic ideal of what a fast food hamburger should be."

Order the burger "Animal Style" off of their not-so-secret menu, and you bring the party to a whole new level. The onion slice gets replaced with a dollop of a sweet, darkly caramelized chopped onions, an extra stack of pickle chips goes underneath the tomato, and the patties get fried with mustard directly on the griddle.

But here's the thing: I've had my share of regular In-N-Out burgers, but never an Animal Style. That's something that needed to change, and stat.

Of course, the biggest problem with In-N-Out is that due to their commitment to freshness, they have a policy of never opening up a location that's not within a day's drive of their meat processing plant in Baldwin Park, California. For us East Coasters, that leaves two options: We lobby to put money into revolutionizing our ground transportation system and wait, or we get off our a*ses and try and make the darn things ourselves.

Option 2 sounds much more fun to me.

Fresh Frozen

Before I could begin, I'd need to get a good model to work off of.

The Mission: Get a West-Coast-only In-N-Out Animal Style Double-Double to my New York front door with less than 24 hours notice. There was only one man up to this job: I put in a call to my former MIT colleague Marios Assiotis. There are certain things that slightly nerdy Cypriot expats living in San Francisco and working for Microsoft are particularly cut out for.

Needless to say, he jumped at the excuse to hit In-N-Out. $120 in overnight delivery fees later, the UPS man showed up at my door at 9:30 the next morning, golden package in hand.** Inside were two regular Double-Doubles, two Animal Style Double-Doubles, two plain cooked beef patties, two packets of Spread, and one large chunk of dry ice to freak out Dumpling with.

I knew that the flavor of a frozen-then-thawed burger could never compare to the freshness of the original, but nevertheless I felt compelled to resurrect them—not a minor feat in and of itself!

After a totally failed attempt at reheating one whole, I realized that the best way is to separate it into individual components, and reheat each individually, tossing the veg and replacing them with fresh ones. Within the hour, I had my lunch of Zombie In-N-Out burgers:

Why did you disturb my peaceful slumber? [Photograph: Kenji Alt]

Delicious? Certainly. As good as real? Absolutely not. But still, as a research tool to base the rest of my fresh sandwich construction on, it was invaluable.

Spread 'em

I never understood why In-N-Out refers to their sauce as "Spread". Maybe they're just a little too cool for school. In any case, all it is is a basic Thousand Island-style dressing: a mixture of ketchup, mayonnaise, and sweet pickle relish. But as anyone from the Thousand Islands will tell you, not all dressings are created equal. What's the exact ratio of ketchup to mayo? Are there other seasonings involved?

Now, gifted as I am with an extraordinarily delicate and precise palate, I could do this the artistic way, tasting the path to victory, adding a little of this and a bit of that until I'd achieved a good enough balance. But the inner nerd in me is always seeking ways to express itself, so I decided to take the mathematical approach.

According to the In-N-Out nutrition guideline, replacing the Spread with ketchup results in a decrease of 80 calories per sandwich. I know that ketchup has about 15 calories per tablespoon, so If we estimate that an average sandwich has about 2 tablespoons of sauce on it (that's the amount that's inside a single packet), then we can calculate that the Spread has got about 55 calories per tablespoon (110 calories in two tablespoons of Spread minus 30 calories in 2 tablespoons of ketchup = 80 calories difference in the sandwich). With me so far?

It just so happens that relish has about the same caloric density as ketchup (15 calories per tablespoon), and that mayonnaise has a caloric density of 80 calories per tablespoon. Using all of this information and a bit of 7th grade algebra, I was able to quickly*** calculate that the composition of the Spread is roughly 62 percent mayo, and 38 percent ketchup/relish blend:

To calculate the ratio of relish to ketchup, I washed two tablespoons of Spread through a fine mesh strainer, which got rid of the mayo and ketchup, but kept the pickle particles. Two tablespoons of rinsed Spread resulted in 1 teaspoon of strained pickle relish.

So the final Spread formula (rounded to the nearest convenient measure) was: 2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons mayonnaise (62 percent), 1 tablespoon ketchup (23 percent), and 2 teaspoons pickle relish (15 percent). Damning the math, I also decided to add a tiny splash of vinegar and pinch of sugar to round out the flavors before moving on to the next phase of the operation.

Sweet Success

A regular Double-Double gets a full slice of onion in between the two patties. Upgrade to an Animal style, and those onions come intensely caramelized, their sweet complexity playing perfectly off the beefy patties. We're talking onions slow-cooked to oblivion, French-onion soup style. They're melted into a near fondue-like consistency.

I've had some experience cooking onions, but my first try at these, done by simply slow cooking a fine dice of onions in a little oil fell miserably short. They were brown alright, but they still had a distinct, crunchy, oniony texture. I was cooking them over the lowest heat possible, but they simply weren't melting—they were threatening to burn before they were sufficiently broken down.

if onion soup-like texture is what I'm after, why don't I use the onion soup method?

Then I thought—if onion soup-like texture is what I'm after, why don't I use the onion soup method? I slowly caramelized onions in a little oil, then deglazed the pan with a little water and repeated this process several times, allowing the liquid to evaporate and the onions to brown further with each iteration. By doing this, the onions cool as they cook, allowing for slower caramelization, as well as distributing the browned sugars more evenly throughout the mix, improving texture and flavor.

That's 6 whole onions there, cooked down to a single cup of meltingly sweet, spreadable jam.

The Smoking Bun

In-N-Out has their buns custom made for the restaurant, and I briefly considered baking my own buns for this process, but decided against it. I can bake a good loaf of bread, but I've never come across a recipe for a soft, squishy burger bun that's an improvement on the supermarket offerings. To my mind, a Martin's potato roll or an Arnold burger bun is the apex of its form. Just like toilets or my mom's dumplings, the best you can hope for by making them yourself is an interesting variation, not an improvement.

I scanned the supermarket shelves with my frozen Double-Double in hand until I found a bun that matched it perfectly in size: Arnold it is.

The only issue is that the In-N-Out buns are a little darker. A two-minute stay in a 400 degree oven (I used my toaster oven) solved that dilemma handily. And like all good buns, these ones get toasted—nearly burnt in fact. It adds a key component to the flavor, and helps solidify its structure, crucial to keeping the torrent of gooey juices at bay.

How Fatty's the Patty?

Next up: the beef. This was going to be a little bit tougher. All I knew so far from the In-N-Out Food Quality page was that the beef is 100 percent ground chuck and that it's never frozen. That leaves a lot of room for interpretation. How big are the patties? What's the fat ratio?

Well, sizing the suckers was no problem. I simply had my good man Marios ship a couple of cooked plain patties. They both weighed in at precisely 37 grams (1.3 ounces). Accounting for the standard 35 percent loss**** in weight for a well done thin patty, that kicks us up to 57 grams or exactly 2 ounces pre-cooking—that's 1/4 pound for a Double-Double.***** A nice, round number.

As for fat content, it was time to break out the math guns again. My goal was to figure out the amount of fat vs. protein in a single In-N-Out patty. The information I have from their Nutrition Guide:

A single burger: 16 grams of protein and 19 grams of fat
A single cheeseburger: 22 grams of protein and 27 grams of fat
A Double-Double: 37 grams of protein and 41 grams of fat

By subtracting the value of a hamburger from that of a cheeseburger, we can calculate that a single slice of cheese contains 6 grams of protein and 8 grams of fat. Then, subtract the value of a cheeseburger plus the value of a slice of cheese from the value of a Double-Double, and you've got the fat and protein makeup of a single burger patty. It breaks down to 9 grams of protein and 6 grams of fat. Not accounting for both moisture loss and fat rendering during cooking (which in my experience is about equal), that leaves you with a 60 percent lean, 40 percent fat beef blend—a far higher fat percentage than any store-bought ground chuck. No wonder the things are so-darned delicious!

This could mean only one thing: I'd have to grind the beef myself.

I went to the butcher and got the fattiest chuck steaks I could find and ground them without trimming away any of the excess fat.

And by the way, if any of you are still buying pre-ground beef, you should stop this instant! Grinding your own meat is super easy, and is the single best way to give any burger an instant and gigantic upgrade in quality. Do it.

The Full Cast

The patties: 2 ounces each, pressed flat to 4-inches in diameter
The bun: Arnold, toasted whole in a 400 degree oven for 2 minutes, cut sides toasted on a lightly greased hot skillet until dark brown
Pickles: Standard on the Animal-style burger. Four dill chips
Real American cheese: Thick-sliced, from the deli
Black pepper: Fresh ground
Kosher salt: Lots.
Iceberg lettuce: Fresh, leaves picked, core removed, torn to bun-size
Tomato: The best hothouse tomatoes I could find, sliced 1/4-inch thick
Spread: Tangy, sweet, creamy, delicious
Caramelized onions: The stuff dreams are made of
Yellow mustard: Signature Animal-Style trick (more on this later)

After carefully studying photographs and performing several meticulous autopsies on my frozen burger cadavers, I derived that the sandwich is built by first laying a mortar foundation of 2 tablespoons sauce on the toasted bottom bun, along with a layer of pickles slices for the Animal Style version. Next comes the tomato, followed by the lettuce.

As for the patties, Animal Style is described only as "mustard grilled," which in my book, is not all that well defined. For the complete rundown, I turned again to my spy network (a.k.a. my Facebook fan base) for support. I was almost immediately aided with photos (thanks Joe Sparks!) and detailed descriptions from past (thanks Dave Tytell!) and current employees.

The process is simple: Sear the patty on one side, and squirt some mustard on it as it sizzles. Flip the patty over so that the mustard cooks into the second side.

The patties are covered with the cheese, then the caramelized onions are applied liberally to a single patty before topping it with the second, fusing all the elements together into a single cheesy, beefy, sweet, oniony, gooey, salty, oozy, crispy, meaty, savory, melty, delicious mess. American food don't get much better than this!

So there I had it: my first taste of an honest-to-goodness, scientifically re-constructed Animal Style Double-Double clone. Would it compare with the real thing? Honestly, I didn't care—it was that good******.

Indeed, the only thing I can think of that would improve this burger is if it were available across the entire nation or—dare I say it?—the world. Don't you just love the internet?

Now about those Animal Style fries...

* Reason #1 is the burger at Pie 'n Burger in Pasadena

** If anyone has ever wondered what's in the Pulp Fiction Briecase, it's frozen In-N-Outs.

*** Full Disclosure: I completely forgot 7th grade algebra, spent 30 minutes trying to figure this out, then gave up and emailed my really smart wife.

**** Which I've calculated through ruthless efficiency and an almost fanatical devotion to the burger

***** The same size as a Shack Burger, by the way. And a Quarter Pounder, for that matter.
****** Still, if anyone in CA feels like going on joining me for an In-N-Out run to do an actual side-by-side tasting next time I'm there, I'm game!

Continue here for a Homemade In-n-Out Animal Style Double-Double »

Follow Kenji on Facebook or Twitter. About the author: After graduating from MIT, J. Kenji Lopez-Alt spent many years as a chef, recipe developer, writer, and editor in Boston. He now lives in New York with his wife, where he runs a private chef business, KA Cuisine, and runs the collaborative blog GoodEater.org about sustainable food enjoyment.

Top Ten Tips for Making a Better Burger

2010-03-12T06:09:00.000-08:00

Great burger making primer from the Serious Eats ancillary website: A Hamburger Today (AHT). A good thing to review if you want to improve the quality of your made-at-home burgers.

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The Burger Lab's Top Ten Tips for Making Better Burgers

From A Hamburger Today

It's time for another round of The Burger Lab. Got a suggestion for an upcoming topic? Email Kenji here, and he'll do his best to answer your queries in a future post. Become a fan of The Food Lab on Facebook for play-by-plays on future kitchen tests and recipe experiments.

We're taking a break from hardcore testing at the Burger Lab and Food Lab for the next two weeks* but I thought I'd use the time to write something that a lot of folks have been asking me about: a basic handbook for taking your burgers to the next level.

*Full disclosure: my wife and I are in Spain backpacking, eating, drinking, and generally having a much better time than you are as you read this. Sorry.

The tips I'm setting out here are ones that, with very few exceptions, apply universally to all hamburgers, regardless of style. Thus, one thing you will not find in this list is specific cooking instructions in terms of heat source, strength, and timing. As far as taking a formed patty from raw to cooked, there are no hard and fast rules that apply in every situation.

And without further ado, here are The Burger Lab's Top Ten Burger-Making Tips:

1. Grind Your Own Beef

My nightly bit of action.

Buying store-bought ground beef is a crap shoot. You're never quite sure when it was ground, what part of the cow it came from, or even how many different cows are in the package. Not to mention baddies like e.coli, freshness issues, rough handling, and tight shrink-wrap packaging that can lead to leaden patties.

If you've never ground beef yourself, the task may seem daunting at first, but take it from me: once you grind, you never rewind.

A heavy-duty dedicated electric meat grinder is fantastic, but impractical unless you own a restaurant or hunt. I use the KitchenAid attachment—with good results—although even a decent hand-cranked model will deliver beef worlds better than store-bought.

Don't have either? You can use food processor. Just dice your meat into 1-inch chunks, spread them on a rimmed baking sheet, put them in the freezer for about 15 minutes until they're firm but not frozen, then working in 1/2-pound batches, pulse the meat to the desired grind size (about 10 to 12 one-second pulses).

Grind your own beef, and not only do you control everything from the meat blend, to the grind size, to the fat content, but even better, you get to tell people that you grind your own beef.

Instant street cred.

2. Keep Everything Really Cold

Until your burgers are fully formed, heat is their mortal enemy. Warm fat is soft and pliable, and tends to stick to your hands and work surfaces. And if that fat's on your hands, then it ain't in the burger.

When grinding your own meat (and I certainly hope you are), make sure that everything—the feed shaft, the grinding blades, the plate, and the meat—is well chilled to avoid fat smearage. I keep my meat grinder stored in the freezer so I'm ready to grind at moment's notice. Pat La Frieda has yet to make an accidental delivery to my door, but when he does, I'll be ready for him.

3. Weigh and Size Your Patties

Weighing your meat as you divide it and measuring your patties as you form them will ensure that all your burgers will be uniform in shape and size, which in turn will guarantee that they all cook at the same rate. A scale and a good eye are all you need (though the truly OCD like myself will want a ruler as well).

Bonus tip: if you're into big, fat patties (we're talking 6 ounces or more), you must have experienced the dreaded "meatball syndrome" at some point. You know—when your patty bulges as it cooks, turning it into an impossible to eat football-shaped blob? Form your patties with a slight dimple in the center, and they'll maintain their shapely disk-form as they cook.

4. Use a Thermometer

A burger starting to edge up on medium-rare.

Sure, you can be all macho and try and gauge a burger's doneness by poking at it with your finger (if you can do that with 100% accuracy, you are a far better cook than I), or you can suck it up and buy yourself a good instant read thermometer.

The Splash-Proof Super-Fast Thermapen by Thermoworks ($96) is the cadillac of thermometers and will tell you in three seconds or less whether your créme Anglaise is going to thicken or if your oil is hot enough for your fries. But even an inexpensive one ($16.95) will do the job in a pinch, albeit slightly slower.

With really large burgers (8 ounces or more), some carryover cooking may occur, so pull them off a few degrees before optimum, and give them some time to rest. I aim for a medium-rare 130°F, but I understand that inexplicably, not everybody prefers optimizing juiciness and beefiness in their burgers.

Here's a rough temperature guide:

120°F and below for rare (red/raw in the center)
130°F for medium-rare (pink and warm)
140°F for medium (totally pink, starting to dry out)
150°F for medium-well (grayish pink, significantly drier)
160°F and above for well done (completely gray, very little moisture)

5. Season Liberally

This is what a well-seasoned patty looks like.

No matter how carefully you select your meat blend, without salt and pepper, you're better off dining with the King or the Clown, who, despite their significant shortcomings, at least understand the benefit of a little sodium chloride.Freshly ground black pepper from whole peppercorns is a must—it's far more flavorful than the insipid pre-ground powder.

Whatever people say, kosher salt is not more or less salty by volume than table salt. I like to use it because its large crystals are easy to pick up with your fingers. Take a large pinch of kosher salt and hold it at least eight inches above the patties as you sprinkle to ensure even coverage.

And to all you New Yorkers: don't let the damn city tell you how your food should taste. Season your burgers as liberally as you'd like. You can eat a salad tomorrow.

6. Do Not Salt Beef Until Patties Are Formed

A salted vs. unsalted patty.

I repeat: do not salt your beef until the patties are formed. Salt will dissolve muscle proteins, which subsequently cross-link, turning your burgers from moist and tender to sausage-like and springy. The effect is dramatic. Need proof? See it here.

The best time to season your burgers is within minutes of the time their gonna hit the grill or griddle. Salt starts affecting meat—dissolving proteins, drawing out moisture—the moment it comes in contact with it, adversely affecting the exterior texture of your patties. And that's not a good thing.

7. Flip Your Burger as Often as You'd Like

An oft-flipped burger cooks more evenly.

How many times have you read that you should only flip your burgers once while they are cooking? Well forget about it! We recently proved that the nervous flippers are actually right. Flipping your burger repeatedly (as often as once every 15 seconds) encourages faster, more even internal cooking, shaving off as much as 1/3 of your grill time.

In the end, the difference is not particularly great, so there's no need to go crazy. Who wants to—or can—flip a grillful of burgers constantly? But next time you come across one of those backyard grill-nazis (you know the type) who absolutely insists that one flip is the way to go, just smile, nod, and let him cook the way he wants to.Rule one of grilling is never question the guy with the spatula.

But do make sure to quietly revel in your superior knowledge and maybe make fun of him behind his back.

8. Don't Futz With Your Meat

Despite outward appearances, ground meat is not dead. From the moment you lay your hands on it, it is changing dynamically, reacting to every knead, every sprinkle of salt, and every change in temperature. Working the meat unduly will cause proteins to cross-link with each other like tiny strips of velcro, making your finished burgers denser and tighter with every manhandling of the grind.

For the most tender burgers, grind your meat fresh, and form your patties as tenderly as possible. For griddled patties with superior nooks and crannies for cheese-catching, I sometimes like to grind my meat directly onto a sheet tray and gently coax it into patties without ever picking it up until just before I cook it. Superb.

There's a corollary point here: adding junk like onions, herbs, eggs, breadcrumbs, anything to your ground meat not only forces your to over-handle the mix, but it instantly relegates your burgers into the "meatloaf sandwich" category. If you absolutely must add junk to your burgers—and with a good, well-selected meat blend, there's really no need to—mix it with the cubes of beef prior to grinding (but don't add the salt yet!), so that it can be evenly distributed without the need to overwork the beef afterward.

9. Choose Your Bun Wisely

A grilled Martin's Potato Roll.

Buns come in all shapes, sizes, densities, and flavors. Make sure you've got the right one for the job at hand.

For smaller, thinner patties, like a good Shake Shack-style griddled burger or small Northern Jersey-style sliders, soft, sturdy, and slightly sweet Martin's Potato Rolls set the benchmark, although any soft, squishy, standard-issue supermarket bun will do.

A bigger, pub-style burger can overwhelm a soft bun with juices, soaking through and dissolving the base before the burger even hits your table. Toasting the bun can mitigate some of these effects, but for the most part, you're better off selecting a sturdier roll, or if you've got one nearby, a custom burger bun from an artisan bakery. Brioche has its adherents, but I prefer my buns to be a little more bland, so as not to compete with the flavor of the beef.

Do avoid anything with an overly chewy crumb or a tough crust, unless you want your burger to suffer from the dreaded backslide.

10. Don't Let Anyone Tell You What to Put on It

A standard selection of Fake Shack ingredients.

I like American cheese, raw yellow onions, pickles, special sauce when applicable (mayo when not), and tomatoes, but only when they are very very good. My wife likes American cheese, grilled onions, and a ketchup/mayo blend.

Am I right? Of course I am.

Is she right? Well, of course she is.**

**At least this time.

The point is, don't let anyone tell you what should and shouldn't go on your burger. If you want to go commando, do it with gusto. Do you like pecorino, pimentos, and peanut butter on your patties? Yes? Well, pile it on.

Then get your head checked. Really.

The 2009 Burger of The Year.

Obviously, this is only the tip of the iceberg. Burgers are an endlessly fascinating subject, and there's always more to learn. At least I hope so, if only for my column's sake.

About the author: After graduating from MIT, J. Kenji Lopez-Alt spent many years as a chef, recipe developer, writer, and editor in Boston. He now lives in New York with his wife, where he runs a private chef business, KA Cuisine, and co-writes the blog GoodEater.org about sustainable food enjoyment.

Recipe: Spaghetti d’Arvier via "Local Lemons"

2009-12-29T07:01:00.001-08:00

now how smashingly delicious does this look? this "re-posted" blog entry is from one of my new favorite food blogs called "Local Lemons". the blogger, Allison Arevalo, is a brooklyn transplant to the bay area and she does a great job of sharing her love of food, cooking and local sourcing of ingredients. you should really check out her blog.

regarding this recipe... i personally believe (even and an admitted degenerate carnivore) that mushrooms may be the most underrated and underused ingredient in cooking. they just pack such a flavor punch.... i both loved the ingredients and also the "story" behind how she came to find this dish. check it out....

One suggested change: I think that when i give this dish a try I may substitute arugula or "rocket" for parsley to see if it gives the dish a bit more bite and flavor complexity... if it's turns out to be "too much", then i'll go back to the parsley. also, if the sourcing of the "porchini spaghetti" is difficult, i'm sure this recipe would still taste great with regular fresh or homemade spaghetti. thoughts?

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Spaghetti d’Arvier

Without thinking too long, can you recall the best meal of your life? I know it’s a tough question, but I am lucky enough to remember every minute detail of the most amazing food I have ever tasted.

The meal was at Cafe Du Bourg, in the small town of Arvier located in the Valle d’Aosta in northern Italy. This town has two restaurants, and is known for their local red wine, Enfer d’Arvier. This particular region of Italy churns out magnificent dairy products, and this is because the fresh water that rolls down from Mont Blanc feeds the grass, which in turn feeds the happy cows.

As for the meal, it included fresh cheese, two homemade pasta dishes, and a steak I still drool over. When the waiter asked us how we liked the food, Alejandro responded, “The chef is truly an artist!” To that, the waiter replied, “La chef? Es la mia mama!” From there, to say they treated us as family would be an understatement – it was the Italian experience you only dream about.

This dish is my adaptation of my favorite part of the night, spaghetti with wild mushrooms, tomato and fontina cheese. I bought homemade porcini spaghetti from the farmers’ market, and found fontina from Aosta at my local Italian shop. If you spot this cheese at your market, pick it up! It is earthy, creamy and nothing like fontina from elsewhere.

Ingredients for Spaghetti d’Arvier
1 lb fresh porcini spaghetti
4 types of wild mushrooms, chopped – I used black trumpet, hedgehog, yellowfoot and organic button
4 ripe tomatoes, seeded, cored and chopped
3 egg yolks
1/2 cup fontina d’aosta, finely grated
Handful of parsely, finely chopped
About 3 tbsp high-quality fresh butter
Extra-Virgin olive oil

First Phase:
Set a big pot of salted water to boil

Heat up a large saute pan, add 1 tbsp butter and 1 tbsp olive oil.
Saute button mushrooms on high heat for 5 min. Remove the mushrooms from the pan and set aside.

Add one more tbsp. butter, and the rest of the mushrooms. Saute for 5 min.

Add the chopped tomatoes and the last of the butter. After 2 min, throw the button mushrooms back in the pan, and turn the heat to low.

Add the parsley, salt and ground pepper – stir. Turn off the heat.

Second Phase:
Put the spaghetti in the boiling water for no more than 4 minutes. Reserve 1 cup of pasta water before draining.

Meanwhile, combine the egg yolks and the fontina cheese and sitr together.

When pasta is done, add it to the saute pan with the mushrooms and tomatoes. Add the reserved water and the yolk/cheese mixture – stir quickly. Sauce should now be nice and thick.

This recipe is my contribution to Festa Italian at Finding La Dolce Vita and Proud Italian Cook.

Tips and Changes:

- Farm fresh, organic butter is key for this dish.
- Be sure to stir quickly after you add the yolks so the eggs don’t cook and set.
- I cook the button mushrooms first because their texture is different from the others. If your mushrooms vary in size and texture, I suggest you don’t skip that step.
- Fontina cheese is strong. I may use less next time.

Where I shopped:
Fontina Cheese: The Pasta Shop on College Ave. in Rockridge.
Wild Mushrooms: The Berkeley Bowl on Shattuck Ave.
Porcini Pasta: The Phoenix Pastificio, Berkeley Farmers’ Market

The Food Lab: How to Cook a Perfect Prime Rib

2009-12-21T09:04:00.000-08:00

i will be using this as a "primer" (pun intended) for this year's Christmas dinner... looks good! I found this on the "Serious Eats" website. Anyone that has followed this blog knows I'm a fan... check it out.

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The Food Lab: How to Cook a Perfect Prime Rib

Posted by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, December 18, 2009 at 7:30 AM

It's time for another round of The Food Lab. Got a suggestion for an upcoming topic? Email Kenji here, and he'll do his best to answer your queries in a future post.

Perfect Prime Rib

Posted by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt, December 18, 2009 at 7:15 AM

Note: Want to read about the development of this recipe? Check it out here.

- Serves 3 to 12, depending on size of roast -

This recipe works for prime rib roasts any size from 2 ribs to 6 ribs. Plan on 1 pound of bone-in roast per guest (each rib adds 1.5 to 2 pounds to the roast). For best results, use a dry-aged, prime grade or grass-fed roast.

To further improve the crust, allow it to air-dry, uncovered in the refrigerator on a rack overnight before roasting. Seasoning with salt up to a day in advance will help the seasoning penetrate the meat more deeply. If timing goes off and your roast is ready long before your guests are, the roast can be re-heated by placing in a 200°F oven for 45 minutes before continuing with step 2.

Ingredients

1 standing rib roast (prime rib), 3-12 pounds (see note above)
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper

Procedure

1. Preheat oven to lowest possible temperature setting, 150°F or greater (some ovens can't hold a temperature below 200°F). Season roast generously with kosher salt and fresh ground black pepper. Place roast, with fat cap up, on v-rack set in large roasting pan. Place in oven and cook until center of roast registers 120°F on an instant-read thermometer for medium-rare, or 135°F for medium. In a 150°F oven, this will take around 5 1/2 to 6 1/2 hours. In a 200°F oven, this will take 3 1/2 to 4 hours.

2. Remove roast from oven and tent tightly with aluminum foil. Place in a warm spot in the kitchen and allow to rest for at least 30 minutes, and up to an hour and a half. Meanwhile, preheat oven to highest possible temperature setting (500°F to 550°F)

3. 10 minutes before guests are ready to be served, remove foil, and place roast back in hot oven and cook until well-browned and crisp on the exterior, 6-10 minutes. Remove from oven, carve, and serve immediately.

Commentary:

[Photographs: J. Kenji Lopez-Alt]

This is a four-pound joint of well-marbled prime beef rib—it is not cheap. And while my friends provide me with as many mental and philosophical riches as a man could ask for, and my wife supplies an adequate amount of emotional wealth, being a humble food writer, dollars and cents are not something I part with lightly.

As such, when I buy a quality piece of beef—and honestly, does beef get any better than prime rib?—I have a great impetus not to mess it up, as do, I imagine, most of you.

So this week, at the Food Lab, I've decided to get through a lifetime's worth of messings-up so that in the future I (and hopefully you too!) will never again serve anything but a perfectly cooked roast.

So what exactly is a Perfect Prime Rib anyway? Whether you buy prime or select, fresh or dry-aged, corn-stuffed or grass-fed, if you don't cook it right, it ain't going to be good. Here is my definition or perfection, in three commandments:

Commandment I:

The Perfect Prime Rib must have a deep brown, crisp, crackly, salty crust on its exterior.

Commandment II:

In the Perfect Prime Rib, the gradient at the interface between the brown crust and the perfectly medium-rare interior must be absolutely minimized (as in, I don't want a layer of overcooked meat around the edges).

Commandment III:

The Perfect Prime Rib must retain as many juices as possible.

Sub-Commandment i: The Perfect Prime Rib must be cookable without the use of heavy or specialized equipment, including propane or oxy-acetylene torches, sous-vide machines, or C-vap ovens.

Highs and Lows

Before I tried to start figuring out how to achieve all these goals simultaneously it was helpful to note that when cooking beef to medium-rare, there are really only two temperatures that matter.

125°F (or 51.7°C) is the temperature at which beef is medium rare—that is, hot but still pink, cooked but still moist and able to retain its juices. Any higher than that, and muscle fibers start to rapidly shrink, forcing flavorful juices out of the meat, and into the bottom of the roasting pan.
310°F (or 154.4°C) is the temperature at which the Maillard reaction—that wonderfully complicated process by which amino acids and reducing sugars recombine to form enticing roasty aromas—really begins to take off. At this range, meat qill quickly brown and crisp.

Ah—a dilemma revealed itself: In order to maximize browning I had to cook the meat in a sufficiently hot oven—I tried 400°F. At the same time, I didn't want the interior to come up above 125°F.

Since a big beef roast cooks from the outside in, by the time the center had reached 125°F (that is, 120°F in the oven, followed by a 5°F rise in temperature afterresting), sure there was a perfectly browned exterior, but the outermost layers had risen closer to around 165°F or 180°F, rendering them overcooked, gray, and dry, their juices having been squeezed out.

I was left with something that looked like this:

I know, I know—not pretty.

Score:

Commandment I

: Perfect Crust? Check.

Commandment II

: No Gray Zone? Negative.

Commandment III

: Full-on Juiciness? Negative.

OK, so what if I went to the opposite extreme, cooking the steak at a much lower temperature?

I cooked another roast in a 200°F oven until the center reached 125°F. Well, just like with boiled eggs, the temperature at which you cook is directly related to the difference in temperatures between the center, and the exterior layers.

In other words, by cooking it at a lower temperature, you make sure to minimize the volume of beef that comes above the ideal final temperature. I was able to almostcompletely eliminate the gray band of overcooked meat.

Of course, any browning that I was getting was also right out the window, leaving me with a roast with pale, flaccid exterior that looked like this:

I know, I know —again, not very pretty.

Score:

Commandment I

: Perfect Crust? Negative

Commandment II

: No Gray Zone? Check.

Commandment III

: Full-on Juiciness? Unknown.

The Myth of the Sear

Jump back a couple of decades and the solution to my dilemma would have been obvious. It was a commonly held belief (and still is, by many home cooks and professional chefs alike), that in order to help a roast, steak, or chop retain moisture, your goal should be to first sear it, creating a crust that will "lock in the juices."Now anyone who reads their Harold McGee or has ever seen juices squeeze up through the seared side of a steak after you flip it over on the grill know that this can't possibly be completely true. But what about partially true?

Could a sear actually help retain at least some of the juices?

In order to test this, I cooked two roasts cut from the same rib sections, with comparable surface areas, weights, and fat contents according to the following processes:

Roast 1: Seared in a pan with 3 tablespoons of canola over high heat on the stovetop until a well-browned crust formed (about 15 minutes total). Transferred to a 300°F oven and roasted to an internal temperature of 120°F, removed and rested for 20 minutes (during which time the center rose to 125°F then dropped back down to 120°F).

Roast 2: Roasted in a 300°F oven to an internal temperature of 120°F, removed and seared in a pan with three tablespoons of canola oil over high heat on the stovetop until a well-browned crust formed (about 8 minutes total) and rested for 20 minutes (during which time the center rose to 125°F then dropped back down to 120°F).

If searing does in fact "lock in juices," then we would expect that the steak which was first seared then roasted should retain more juices that the steak that was first roasted then seared. Unfortunately for old wives' tales, the exact opposite is the case. I carefully weighed each roast at each step of the process to gauge the amount of moisture and fat lost during cooking. These are the results:

The meat that was seared first them roasted lost 1.68% more juices than the one that was roasted first then seared. It's not a particularly huge difference, but the knowledge that searing conclusively does not lock in juices was certainly liberating in the ways that it allowed my to think about the recipe.

Score:

Commandment I

: Perfect Crust? Check.

Commandment II

: No Gray Zone? Negative.

Commandment III

: Full-on Juiciness? Check.

Inside and Out

So great, you may be thinking—you can sear first or you can sear after, and it makes no difference. What's the big deal?

Well the big deal, as some of the more astute readers may have noticed in the timing above, is that if you are starting with a completely raw roast, in order to get a well-browned crust, it takes around 15 minutes in the hot pan, during which time, the meat under the surface on the outer layers of the roast is busy heating up and overcooking, just like they did when roasted in a 400°F oven.

On the other hand, in order to get a well-browned crust after the prime rib has roasted, you need only around eight minutes in the pan. Why is this?

It all has to do with water.

In order for the surface of a roast to reach temperatures above the boiling point of water (212°F), it must first become completely desiccated. When searing raw meat, about half the time it spends in the skillet is spent just getting rid of excess moisturebefore browning can even begin to occur. You know that vigorous sizzling sound when a steak hits a pan? That's the sound of moisture evaporating and bubbling out from underneath the meat.

On the other hand, a prime rib that has first been roasted has had several hours in a hot oven, during which time the exterior has completely dried out, making searing much more efficient, and thus giving all but the very exterior of the meat less of a chance of overcooking.

aking what I learned from both the oven temperature testing and the searing testing into account, I now knew what I had to do to fulfill all three commandments

Taking what I learned from both the oven temperature testing and the searing testing into account, I now knew what I had to do to fulfill all three commandments: My goals should be to cook the interior of the roast as slowly as possible (IE, at as low a temperature as my oven could maintain), then sear it as quickly as possible (IE, at as high a heat as possible). Searing in a pan is not that practical for a joint bigger than a couple of ribs wide, so I needed a way to do this all in the oven.

While some recipes will have you simply pump up the oven temperature towards the end of cooking, this is sub-optimal. An oven can take 20 or 30 minutes to go from it's lowest temperature to its highest temperature setting, during which time, once again, the outer layers of beef are busy overcooking.

But then, I thought, 20 to 30 minutes is exactly how long a rib roast needs to rest anyhow. What if I were to first cook it at a low temperature (200°F or lower), take it out of the oven, allow it to rest while I heated the oven to its highest temperature (500 to 550°F), then pop it back in just long enough to achieve a crust?

What I achieved was nothing less than Prime Rib Perfection:

Score:

Commandment I

: Perfect Crust? Check.

Commandment II

: No Gray Zone? Check.

Commandment III

: Full-on Juiciness? Check.

As you can see, no gray overcooked meat, a crisp brown crust, and a rosy pink from center to edge.

But wait—there's more!

The best part? I found that by cooking with this two stage method, I had a much larger window of time to serve the beef. Once I got past the initial low-temperature phase of cooking, so long as I kept the roast covered in foil, it would stay warm for over an hour. All I had to do was pop it back into its 550°F oven 8 minutes before my guests were ready to eat, and the roast would emerge hot, sizzling, and ready to carve, no need torest it after the 500, since the only part that is being affected is the very exterior.

Family gatherings will never be the same. Now if only I could find a way to expose the rosy center under my sister's crusty exterior, we'd really have something to celebrate at the holidays!

Continue here for Perfect Prime Rib Recipe »

Recipe: Homemade Big Mac w/ Organic Ingredients...

2009-12-19T06:10:00.000-08:00

who woulda thunk it? looks pretty tasty to me, though... This is from the Local Lemons blog. find the recipe and blog entry here.

Note: the blogger mentions that she didn't end up serving the double patty at her "big mac party" because it was "too big"... now really... too big? i'll take my chances, thank you. double patty, please...

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Big Mac: Make Your Own, Have a Party

DECEMBER 8, 2009

Twelve years ago. The last time I stepped foot into a McDonald’s. At least I think – it’s not like it was momentous enough to recall dates and times. But surely my oreo/ramen/milkshake regimen of freshman year included a nugget or two from Mickey D’s. Probably some fries too slopped in gooey ketchup.

I’m kind of scared of fast food now. I think I have a right to be. I mean, they put beef in french fries. Seriously. Beef, in French fries. But Big Macs at home, with fresh, local organic ingredients – that’s a cow of a different color. And what could be better than having a party and sharing them with friends?

infamous Big Mac lies in the special sauce. That creamy, tangy, oddly hued sauce slathered between two hunks of meat, with lettuce, pickles and American cheese.

To mimic the sauce, I made an olive oil aioli and combined it with homemade French dressing and organic shallots from La Tercera Farms. My thinly sliced pickles were from Happy Girl Farms, and the ground chuck was Niman Ranch. The cheese was a difficult match, but mild cheddar proved to be a shoo-in for American, and Clover’s organic was a perfect match. I admit, I did not make the buns, though they were locally baked and I painted on the sesame seeds with an egg wash.

Hosting a Big Mac party is substantially easier than a traditional dinner party. Set out the shredded lettuce, sliced pickles, special sauce, buns and ketchup, and let your guests build their own Big Macs. Use a mandolin to slice up some fries, and roast them at 500F instead of frying. Put out a salad too for some balance (try spinach, apples, toasted walnuts, goat cheese, homemade vinaigrette). Serve with cold Belgian beer.

The best part? You are 100% sure there is no beef in your fries. At least you should be…

Homemade Big Macs
Serves 8

2 pounds Niman Ranch ground chuck or other high-quality beef. (Or, go all the way and grind your own meat. Try using Brisket.)
1 head romaine lettuce, shredded
3 fresh pickles, sliced thin
8 hamburger buns
5 ounces organic mild cheddar, sliced thin

Special Sauce:
1 large shallot, minced
1 1/4 cups extra virgin olive oil, divided into 3/4 cup and 1/2 cup portions
2 tablespoons Champagne vinegar, separated
Organic ketchup (Happy Girl, if you can find it)
1/2 cup organic cane sugar
1 egg yolk
2 tablespoons sweet relish
2 teaspoons lemon juice
Seat salt
1 tablespoon Paprika

Homemade Aioli
In a large bowl, beat together egg yolk, 1 tablespoon vinegar, 1 teaspoon lemon juice and a pinch of salt. Take a kitchen towel roll it into the shape of an “O.” Place your bowl on top of the towel – this will prevent it from moving around when whisking the aioli. While whisking, add a few drops of olive oil. Keep whisking, and add a few more drops. And a few more. When your sauce begins to thicken, add olive oil in a very slow stream, whisking constantly. Your arm should hurt at this point. When all of the olive oil is incorporated, taste for salt, and add last teaspoon of lemon juice.
French Dressing
In a separate bowl, whisk together ketchup, sugar, minced shallots, 1 tablespoon sweet relish, 1 tablespoon vinegar, paprika and a pinch of salt. Whisk in ½ cup of olive oil in a slow stream.

Slowly add the French dressing to the aioli. Stir to combine, and taste as you add the dressing – you may need not all of it. I had about 2 tablespoons of the French dressing left over. Garnish with a pinch of paprika on top.

Season your chopped meat with salt, pepper and olive oil and separate into 8 patties. Cook them on the grill for a few minutes per side, adding the cheese at the last minute so it melts.
(disclaimer: I did not cook the burgers on the grill. Why? I turned the gas on, switched the on the ignitor, and my grill caught on fire. I screamed like the girl that I am while Alejandro sprayed it down with the extinguisher. Time for a new grill. I cooked them in a cast iron skillet on the stove.)

Assemble the burger

Start with the bottom bun, add special sauce, shredded romaine, a cheesy burger and a couple of pickles. Stop here or add the second layer… Take the bottom of a second bun and slice it down the middle. This thin piece will be your middle section. Add it to the burger, and again top with special sauce, lettuce and pickles.

Another note, I did not eat the double patty Big Mac, nor did I serve it like that at the party. It’s just too big. Though it looked nice in pictures.

Recipe: Korean-style Burger

2009-12-18T10:47:00.001-08:00

This certainly looks worth a try. found this at a site called userealbutter.com.

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Korean BBQ-Style Burgers
from The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook with permission to reprint courtesy of Jaden Hair of Steamy Kitchen

1.5 lbs ground beef
3 tbsps garlic, finely minced
3 tbsps ginger, freshly grated
2.5 tbsps soy sauce
2.5 tbsps brown sugar
3 tbsps green onion, finely minced
2 tsps sesame seeds
freshly ground black pepper to taste
2 tsps high-heat cooking oil (if grilling on stovetop)
burger buns

banchan burger bar
tomato slices
lettuce leaves
quick cucumber carrot pickle
kimchi
ketchup
Sriracha chili sauce
Sriracha mayonnaise (Jen’s addition)
hot mustard

quick cucumber carrot pickle
1 cup carrots, sliced into thin matchsticks
1 cup cucumber, sliced into thin matchsticks
1 cup yellow pickled radish (daan moo ji), slided into thin matchsticks (this was my addition)
1/2 tsp sesame seeds
4 tsps rice vinegar
1/2 tsp sugar

Mix together.

sriracha mayonnaise
3 tbsps mayonnaise
Sriracha chili sauce to taste (I used 1 tbsp)

Mix together.

Make the burgers: Mix the ground beef, garlic, ginger, soy sauce, brown sugar, green onion, sesame seeds, and black pepper together in a bowl. Jaden makes 4 patties out of the batch, but I prefer my burgers thinner, so I made 6 patties. I generally shape them wider than the bun diameter and fairly flat since the burger will shrink in diameter and get taller. Let rest for 15 minutes at room temperature. In the meantime, prepare the quick cucumber carrot pickle. I added the yellow pickled radish (daan moo ji) to mine. They are easy to find in most Asian grocers and some specialty sections in traditional grocery stores. Assemble the condiments and garnishes of your choice for the banchan burger bar. Grill or fry your hamburgers to desired doneness. I grill ours, but Jaden gives some nice instructions on frying them over the stove: Set a large grill pan or frying pan over high heat. When a bead of water sizzles upon contact and evaporates, add the cooking oil. Place the patties on the hot grill or frying pan, not touching each other. Cook the patties 5-7 minutes on each side for mediuam (internal temperature of 150°F/65°C). Serve with burger toppings. Makes 4-6 burgers depending on your preferences.

For as long as I have been aware of food blogs, Steamy Kitchen has always been one of my goto sites for rock-solid Chinese recipes. That and Jaden makes me laugh much like the way my sister made me laugh. But her book is more than just Chinese recipes. It has Thai, Viet, Korean and lots of great Asian fusion dishes like her Korean BBQ burgers.

look at all those goodies

they go *in* the burger

So I’m flipping through the book on a cold and snowy day. Kaweah was curled up next to me on the couch and I saw the burger recipe. I saw it and shouted to Jeremy, “Do you think it’s too cold to grill?” It was 0°F on the deck, but thankfully it wasn’t too windy. Sure, we could grill.

i added yellow pickled radish to the pickle dish

now that’s a brightly colored topper

Everything about the burger recipe appealed to me, although I have to admit that the two biggest draws were Sriracha chili sauce and kimchi. That’s my kind of comfort food. While Jeremy fired up the grill, I made a little Sriracha mayonnaise condiment for the burgers. Jeremy never takes Sriracha straight (white boy), but Sriracha mayonnaise can still deliver the great flavor of chilis without the kick to the gut.

sriracha mayo

grilling the patties

Kaweah could smell the aroma of grilled burgers on the air. She just circled the grill in the snow with her snout raised high, drunk on the odors. They smelled ten times better than a regular burger, that’s for sure. I thought it was just me, since I have grown up loving the combination of green onions, ginger, soy sauce. When Jeremy brought them in off the grill he said, “That smells AMAZING. I can’t wait for lunch!”

just like summer, except for the snow

tomatoes, lettuce, kimchi, pickled vegetables, sriracha mayo, sriracha, ketchup

The burgers were out-of-this-world-awesome and they were incredibly easy to throw together. The base burger alone is worth trying, but then you can customize it with toppings (I’m all about the toppings). I piled mine with kimchi and Sriracha because that’s True Love right there, folks. That’s probably why I like my burgers to be on the thin side to save space for the toppings. Have some burger with your kimchi?

2009-12-04T09:17:00.000-08:00

Ran across this interesting posting for those of you interested in creating your own burger from scratch. would love to try one day, but for now it's just fun reading... would love to hear from anyone that has tried to grind their own meat for burgers and how it turned out...

You can find this posting's origin at goodeater.org, posted by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt.

enjoy.

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CHEFFING WITH TONY MAWS: NOT JUST A CHEESEBURGER

I’ve had a dilemma recently. If you follow any of my work, you probably know that I’m somewhat (ok, insanely) obsessed with hamburgers. After having spent around 9 months averaging a dozen variations a week, I feel like I’ve finally perfected my own burger recipe (for the record, it’s a griddled, west-coast syle burger). To get the flavor of the patty right, I ended up using three different cuts of meat, all of them relatively fatty.

Here’s the dilemma: I live in Boston, and despite the fact that high quality, grass-fed local beef is readily available, it’s simply too inconsistent and too lean to make a decent burger out of. Even local short ribs have barely any marbling.

So about a year ago, when the Tony Maws, chef of Craigie Street Bistrot (now Craigie on Main), my favorite restaurant in the city, and one that has been a champion of local foodslong before it became cool contacted me claiming that he was in the process of developing a burger for his bar menu using locally sourced beef from Hardwick, MA, I was excited to see how he tackled the problem and watch the development, and even more excited to taste the end results. Today, Tony shares his secrets with us.

SECRET NUMBER 1: THE FAT

I’m going to give it up straight away. His solution to the inconsistent size and low fat content problem was one so intuitive that I’m surprised I’ve never seen it anywhere else: just add pure beef fat. By starting with three very flavorful and lean cuts of beef (he uses equal partsshort rib, flap meat, and brisket), and adding in as much fat as you want (he goes with a ratio of around 85/15), you can get all the flavor of grass-fed beef combined with the juicyfat content of grain-fed beef. Best of both worlds.

“I started off using 100% bone marrow as my fat,” Tony says with an elated grin. Anyone who’s tried roasted bone marrow knows that it’s easily the richest, beefiest part of the cow. Spread it on toast, sprinkle it with sea salt, knock it back, and it’s like afull-on stampede on your tongue. “It tasted awesome,” he continues, “up until the time that it cooled a little bit and started coagulating in your mouth. It was like eating a beef flavored candle.”

In the end, he settled on a 2:1 mixture ofsuet (fat taken from around the kidneys of the cow) and marrow, all of which get ground together with the beef a single time through a coarse die on the meat grinder.

SECRET NUMBER 2: UMAMI

I like to feel at least in a small part responsible for the sparking the second secret of the Craigie on Main burger. I’d been toying with grinding anchovies or sprinkling a bit ofmonosodium glutamate (which, contrary to popular belief, has never been linked to any health problems) into my own burger mix for a while – not enough to make the burgers taste fishy, but just enough to give them a little umami kick to ratchet up their meaty flavor. I mentioned this to Tony, and here was his response:

umami!!! great idea. A-1, etc are total umami bombs. I use anchovies in most of my braises, makes great sense. What about white soy, or kecap manis?

Well, after months of testing far more rigorous than my own, he came up with a novel solution: dehydrating miso paste.

Miso paste is already an intense “umami bomb” on its own. spreading it thin and leaving it overnightt in the dehydrator only intensifies this flavor.. “We were using a bit of A-1 for a while, but dehydrated miso was the only thing we found that wasconcentrated enough in glutamates to give the beef the amount of umami we wanted without adding its own flavor.”

Could this be the next big thing? Imagine having a shaker full of this next to your salt and pepper. Roasts, chops, stews, the number of things that could be improved with just a dash of umami is endless.

This 8-ounce patty holds more than a little promise.

SECRET NUMBER 3: KITCHEN TOYS

For any home cooks attempting to follow this recipe, here’s the part where you might get a little stuck. Though with the combinations of meats and the miso, this burger promises to deliver flavor no matter how you cook it,Chef Maws’ method of choice forgoes the griddle or the grill. Instead, he pops it inside a steam-injected, pressure and temperature-controlled C-Vap oven.

Often described as being “sous-vide without the bags,” items placed in the cabinet are cooked slowly under positive pressure. What does this mean? It means you get a perfectly medium-rare burger all the way from edge to edge, with barely any lost moisture

The one thing it doesn’t do: brown the meat. Tony pulls out a sad, pale-gray, patty from the cabinet and shows it to me. “Doesn’t look very good, does it?” he asks. He heads over to another one of his new toys: a steel plancha set into his state-of-the-art Molteni range. This puppy reaches over 900 degrees, which is hotter than any grill on the market. All of this translates into: instant char with no chance of overcooking the interior; The patty spends no more than 30 seconds on each side.

SECRET NUMBER 4: THE TOPPINGS

I’m generally a purist when it comes to burger toppings. I don’t want anything interfering with the flavor of the carefully selected beef. Enhancing, sure, but interfering, no thanks. Some thin sliced onion to play up its savoriness, a bit of mild-flavored cheese only for its goo-factor, a pickle or some tangy sauce to add a bit of sugar and acid to cut through the richness, and on the rare occasion that I find a perfect tomato, a single slice will do.

But, as the blue-cheese coated burger at the Spotted Pig showed me, there are exceptions to every rule. Thus far, the Craigie on Main burger looks like it may be one of them.

The cheese is a 3-year old cheddar from Vermont, which melts into a gooey, salty, piquant veil with a brief stint under the salamander. Chef Maws simultaneously checks on the cheese as he carefully toasts the house-made bun.

The bun is slightly giving, with a light dairy sweetness, and a sprinkle of sesame seeds. Like my toppings, I tend to prefer my buns a little less conspicuous – soft and squishy is the way to my heart – but again, in this case, it’s robustness seems appropriate given the intensity of the beef.

Next he grabs a handful of watercress and places it on the warm sizzle platter he’d just pulled the patty from. “Hamburger vinaigrette,” he says, as he swirls the watercress around to sop up the few juices that managed to escape from the patty. Along with the dehydrated miso, I now have two things I need to add to my must-have-on-hand-at-all-times list.

Finally, a handful of crispy fried onions(Boston chefs seem to have a thing for onion rings on burgers), and a smear of house made mace-scented ketchup complete the “cheffiest” burger (and I mean that in a good way) I’ve ever seen. Boston’s been slow to join in on the custom meat blend game, but we’ve beat NY to the punch with the bone marrw. Find me a NY chef doing it. I dare you.

SO AFTER ALL THAT WORK, HOW DID IT TASTE?

I’m a bit biased, because as I’ve said, I’m a thin, griddled, simple burger man myself. At the same time, I also feel at least a tiny bit personally vested in this particular burger, having been a close observer from the start.

Here’s my assessment: In the running for the most expensive burger in town at $18, the patty itself is spot-on and worth every penny. The meat and fat blend makes it thebeefiest burger I’ve ever had, the novel cooking technique ensures that it’s perfectly coooked every time with a nice crusty sear, and the ingenious use of powdered miso gives it that extra push over the top.

The toppings, on the other hand (and I know there are those who disagree, but hey – I’m about as opinionated as it gets when it comes to burgers), are where I have a couple problems. The cheddar works well, but the watercress loses a little too much structure – I find myself wanting something with a little more crunch in there to add texture to the otherwise tender sandwich.

And finally, while some burger-eaters may like the overload of richness and sweetness from the combination of the sweet fried onions, the sweet ketchup and the rich beef and cheese, I feel that a bit of acid crunch from a pickle would do wonders.

When I express my opinions to Chef Maws, he gives a reason that I can’t possibly argue with. “You know, I want to try pickles on it, but I didn’t plan ahead from last summer, so I don’t have any pickles in the walk-in. As soon as the first cucumbers of the summer become available, we’re going to start experimenting again.”

Like all the food at his restaurant, this burger is a work in progress, changing as dynamically as the seasons (Just last week I caught him chatting casually at the bar with the baker from the fabulous Iggy’s Bakery about ways to improve the texture of the bun). You can’t help but respect a chef who spells it out to his guests by printing right on the menu, “sorry, no tomatoes until August!”

Well, Tony, see you August 1st.

UPDATE: I recently ate the burger at Craigie on Main which now comes complete with house-made red wine vinegar pickles, celery root cole slaw, and shoestring potatoes fries in place of the sweet potato. The pickle is just what the burger needed. Excellent!

Available for $18 at Craigie on Main
853 Main Street, Cambridge MA, (617)497-5511
Open Tuesday through Sunday
Dining room: 5:30-10 (10:30 Friday, Saturday)
Bar: 5:30-1am
Bar Food: 5:30-midnight
Brunch: Sunday 11am-2pm

Thomas Keller's Buttermilk Fried Chicken

2009-12-04T05:24:00.000-08:00

Thomas Keller of famed The French Laundry has a "home comfort food" cookbook out. I was able to snag this "fried chicken" recipe from the internet and though i'd share. the book is called: "ad hoc at home".

anyone that can't think of a good christmas gift for me... (hint, hint....) : )

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Buttermilk Fried Chicken

If there's a better fried chicken, I haven't tasted it. First, and critically, the chicken is brined for 12 hours in a herb-lemon brine, which seasons the meat and helps it stay juicy. The flour is seasoned with garlic and onion powders, paprika, cayenne, salt, and pepper. The chicken is dredged in the seasoned flour, dipped in buttermilk, and then dredged again in the flour. The crust becomes almost feathered and is very crisp. Fried chicken is a great American tradition that’s fallen out of favor. A taste of this, and you will want it back in your weekly routine. --Thomas Keller

Ingredients
(Serves 4-6)

Two 2 1/2- to 3-pound chickens (see Note on Chicken Size)
Chicken Brine (recipe follows), cold

For Dredging and Frying

Peanut or canola oil for deep-frying
1 quart buttermilk
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

Coating

6 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup garlic powder
1/4 cup onion powder
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon paprika
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon cayenne
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Ground fleur de sel or fine sea salt
Rosemary and thyme sprigs for garnish

Directions

Cut each chicken into 10 pieces: 2 legs, 2 thighs, 4 breast quarters, and 2 wings. Pour the brine into a container large enough to hold the chicken pieces, add in the chicken, and refrigerate for 12 hours (no longer, or the chicken may become too salty).

Remove the chicken from the brine (discard the brine) and rinse under cold water, removing any herbs or spices sticking to the skin. Pat dry with paper towels, or let air-dry. Let rest at room temperature for 1-1/2 hours, or until it comes to room temperature.

If you have two large pots (about 6 inches deep) and a lot of oil, you can cook the dark and white meat at the same time; if not, cook the dark meat first, then turn up the heat and cook the white meat. No matter what size pot you have, the oil should not come more than one-third of the way up the sides of the pot. Fill the pot with at least 2 inches of peanut oil and heat to 320°F. Set a cooling rack over a baking sheet. Line a second baking sheet with parchment paper.

Meanwhile, combine all the coating ingredients in a large bowl. Transfer half the coating to a second large bowl. Pour the buttermilk into a third bowl and season with salt and pepper. Set up a dipping station: the chicken pieces, one bowl of coating, the bowl of buttermilk, the second bowl of coating, and the parchment-lined baking sheet.

Just before frying, dip the chicken thighs into the first bowl of coating, turning to coat and patting off the excess; dip them into the buttermilk, allowing the excess to run back into the bowl; then dip them into the second bowl of coating. Transfer to the parchment-lined pan.

Carefully lower the thighs into the hot oil. Adjust the heat as necessary to return the oil to the proper temperature. Fry for 2 minutes, then carefully move the chicken pieces around in the oil and continue to fry, monitoring the oil temperature and turning the pieces as necessary for even cooking, for 11 to 12 minutes, until the chicken is a deep golden brown, cooked through, and very crisp. Meanwhile, coat the chicken drumsticks and transfer to the parchment-lined baking sheet.

Transfer the cooked thighs to the cooling rack skin-side-up and let rest while you fry the remaining chicken. (Putting the pieces skin-side-up will allow excess fat to drain, whereas leaving them skin-side-down could trap some of the fat.) Make sure that the oil is at the correct temperature, and cook the chicken drumsticks. When the drumsticks are done, lean them meat-side-up against the thighs to drain, then sprinkle the chicken with fine sea salt.

Turn up the heat and heat the oil to 340°F. Meanwhile, coat the chicken breasts and wings. Carefully lower the chicken breasts into the hot oil and fry for 7 minutes, or until golden brown, cooked through, and crisp. Transfer to the rack, sprinkle with salt, and turn skin side up. Cook the wings for 6 minutes, or until golden brown and cooked through. Transfer the wings to the rack and turn off the heat. Arrange the chicken on a serving platter. Add the herb sprigs to the oil (which will still be hot) and let them cook and crisp for a few seconds, then arrange them over the chicken.

Note on Chicken Size: You may need to go to a farmers' market to get these small chickens. Grocery store chickens often run 3 to 4 pounds. They can, of course, be used in this recipe but if chickens in the 2-1/2- to 3-pound range are available to you, they're worth seeking out. They’re a little easier to cook properly at the temperatures we recommend here and, most important, pieces this size result in the optimal meat-to-crust proportion, which is such an important part of the pleasure of fried chicken.

Note: We let the chicken rest for 7 to 10 minutes after it comes out of the fryer so that it has a chance to cool down. If the chicken has rested for longer than 10 minutes, put the tray of chicken in a 400°F oven for a minute or two to ensure that the crust is crisp and the chicken is hot.

Chicken Brine
Makes 2 gallons

5 lemons, halved
24 bay leaves
1 bunch (4 ounces) flat-leaf parsley
1 bunch (1 ounce) thyme
1/2 cup clover honey
1 head garlic, halved through the equator
3/4 cup black peppercorns
2 cups (10 ounces) kosher salt, preferably Diamond Crystal
2 gallons water

The key ingredient here is the lemon, which goes wonderfully with chicken, as do the herbs: bay leaf, parsley, and thyme. This amount of brine will be enough for 10 pounds.

Combine all the ingredients in a large pot, cover, and bring to a boil. Boil for 1 minute, stirring to dissolve the salt. Remove from the heat and cool completely, then chill before using. The brine can be refrigerated for up to 3 days.

THE FOOD LAB: TURKEY BRINING BASICS

2009-11-28T12:11:00.000-08:00

in the spirit of the thanksgiving season (and christmas to come)... thought i'd share this interesting post on "brining" turkey from The Good Eater blog by way of "SeriousEats.com".

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THE FOOD LAB: TURKEY BRINING BASICS

Note: This column is syndicated from SeriousEats.com, where I write regularly about the role of science in the kitchen. Please visit their wonderful site! Have a question that needs answering? Email me here, and I’ll do my best to respond in a future post.

[Photographs: J. Kenji Lopez-Alt]

If my mom’s roasting skills are representative of the nation’s, then I’ll assume we’ve all experienced dry turkey. I’m not talking the kind that frays around the edges as soon as a carving knife comes close to it or that instantly turns to sawdust when it hits your tongue—I’m talking the kind that is just good enough that you can still smile and say nice things during dinner, but just bad enough that you wonder why the pilgrims couldn’t have eaten prime rib during that first fall.

The problem, as we all know, is with overcooking. So first, a quick look at what happens to turkey (and other meats) as it cooks.

Under 120°F (48.9°C): The meat is still considered raw. Muscle cells are bundled up and aligned in long, straight cable-like fibrils wrapped in a sheath of elastic connective tissues, which is what gives meat it’s “grain.”
At 120°F: The protein myosin, begins to coagulate, forcing some liquid out of the muscle cells, which then collects within the protein sheath.
At 140°F (60°C): The remaining proteins within the muscle cells coagulate, forcing all of the liquid out of the cells, and into the protein sheath. The coagulated proteins turn the meat firm and opaque.
At 150°F (65.6 °C): The proteins in the sheath itself (mainly collagen) rapidly coagulate and contract. Like squeezing a tube of toothpaste, all the water what was forced out of the cells and has collected within the sheath, is now squeezed out of the meat completely.Congratulations, your turkey is overcooked.

Thanks to all those who pointed out that I should include temperature conversions in the future

Although the government will have you believe that 165°F is the minimum temperature to cook your turkey to, clearly you need your turkey to be within the 140 to 150°F range to ensure juiciness.

Below this range, and the moisture is still locked within the muscle cells. This is why raw meat tastes slippery instead of juicy—your teeth aren’t sharp enough to liberate the moisture from inside the cells. Above this range, and the liquid has already gone and found a new home. But even with an accurate thermometer, you run into a problem. It may seem obvious to say it, but roasting cooks meats from the outside in. So at normal roasting temperatures—say 300°F—by the time the center of the bird is at 145°F, the exterior layers of your bird will be much higher, closer to 180 or 190°F. the result is slices that are perfectly moist and tender in the center, but overcooked and dry around the edges.

Enter brining, the process in which a lean cut of meat (like turkey, chicken breast, or pork) is soaked in a salt water solution to help it retain moisture during cooking. Sure, sure—this is nothing new. The Scandinavians and Chinese have been extolling the virtues of brining for millennia, and Cook’s Illustrated has for at least a decade. But the thing that is odd to me is that people can’t seem to agree on how it works—even the experts.

Brining Basics

Let’s start with what it actually accomplishes.

Spoiler Alert: One of these breasts is not like that other. In a few moments, I’m going to throw all three into a 300°F oven, roast them until they are 145°F in the very center, then quickly sear them in a hot skillet until their skin is a beautifully crisp, burnished golden brown. Only one of them will emerge fully tender and moist. The other two will end up dry and stringy around the edges.

For this experiment, I started with three nearly identical fresh, non-kosher (kosher breasts come pre-salted), non-enhanced (turkeys that come injected with a saline solution, I.E. Butterball’s and Jenny-O’s) turkey breasts (I admit, two were right breasts, and one was left).

One of them I left totally untreated before roasting. The second, I soaked overnight in a 6% solution of salt water (about 1/2 a cup of kosher salt, or 1/4 cup of table salt per quart of water). The third breast was a control that was soaked in pure water, just to ensure that it’s actually the salt in the solution that is affecting the quality of the meat.

In order to gauge moisture loss, I weighed each breast at all stages of the process—straight from the butcher, just before roasting, just after emerging from the oven, and just before slicing, making sure to subtract the weight of the fat deposited in the roasting pan from each breast to compensate for any differences in fat loss.

Here’s what happened:

The blue line represents the untreated turkey breast, which ends up losing around 24% of its weight in moisture-loss during cooking. The brined turkey, on the other hand, lost only about 15% of its weight, while the water-soaked turkey lost around 20%. Clearly, brining works, and it’s specifically the salt in the soak that helps the turkey retain moisture while its cooking.

And the best part? Since a brine works from the outside in, it affects precisely those areas of the turkey breast that are most prone to drying out—the exterior layers.

Let me demonstrate:

This is a macro shot of two slices taken off of the roasted, unbrined turkey breast. Now, don’t get me wrong—if someone served this to me at a Thanksgiving meal, I’d be more than happy to eat it. In fact, the very center of the slice is absolutely perfect. But as you can clearly see, it’s the last half-centimeter around the edge that starts to dry out.

Now, take a look at this:

These are two slices taken from the brined turkey breast. Even the outermost layers, which rose to temperatures well in excess of 150°F, are still moist and juicy, forming perfectly smooth, even slices.*

*I apologize for the slight blurriness of the focus on the front of the slices—this is a photographer error, and not a poorly executed airbrushing job.

How it Works

So the salt solution is somehow helping the turkey retain more moisture as it cooks. But how?

One common explanation is that it is pure osmosis, the movement of water across a semi-permeable membrane. Cell walls are designed to allow water and small molecules to move in and out of them freely, while preventing larger molecules from entering or leaving—this is how it gets the raw materials it needs to live without losing any of its “guts.”

This movement of water and small soluble compounds is controlled by osmotic pressure. Essentially, whenever there is an imbalance of the concentration of solutes across two sides of a permeable membrane, water will pass through the membrane until the concentration is equalized.

So how does this explain brining? Well, unfortunately, it doesn’t, and we can prove this without even knowing the concentration of solutes inside the cells to begin with. Let’s look at three possible scenarios.

Scenario 1: There is a higher concentration of solutes within the cells.
In this case, in order to equalize the concentration, water should flow from the brine into the cells. Seems to make sense—except that as we’ve already seen, soaking in pure water is less effective than soaking in salt water (see graph above). If osmotic pressure was the only thing bringing water into the meat, then a soak in pure water (which creates a higher differential in solute concentration between the interior and exterior of the cells) should force more water into the cells than a soak in salt water.
Scenario 2: There is an equal concentration of solutes within the cells.
In this case, osmosis does not even enter into it. There may be an exchange of solutes as sodium ions change places with small molecules inside the cells through diffusion, but this should have no effect on the amount of water taken up by the meat
Scenario 3: There is a lower concentration of solutes within the cells.
In this case, the laws of osmosis state that water would migrate from within the cells to the outside. Your turkey meat should actually dry-out even more if your salt solution is too concentrated.

In a bid to demonstrate that osmosis is not the key factor in brining, I conducted an experiment based on scenario three: I brined a turkey breast in a fully saturated salt water solution (I.E., a solution with as much salt as I could possibly dissolve in it)—around 35% salt by weight—and compared it to a turkey breast in a 6% brine solution.

While the fully-saturated-brined turkey on the left had outer layers that were inedibly salty (remember—diffusion), both turkeys lost about the same amount of weight during cooking, indicating that rather than effecting osmosis, the salt must be doing something entirely different.*

The Answer

Turns out that the real answer has to do with the shape of proteins. In their natural state, the muscle cells are tightly bound within their protein sheaths—this doesn’t leave much room for excess water to collect in the meat.

But as anyone who has ever made sausages or cured meats knows, salt has a powerful effect on muscles. A 6% solution of salt will effectively denature (read: unravel) the proteins that make up the sheath around the muscle bundles. In this loosened, denatured state, you can now fit more water into those muscles than in their natural state. Even better, the denatured proteins in the sheaths contract far less as they cook, therefore squeezing out much less moisture.

Now, given that most of you food nerds have probably been brining for years, is knowing all this really going to make your turkey taste better this Thanksgiving?

Nope. But at least it gives you something to talk to your relatives about besides gluten formation in laminate pastry pie crusts.

*Disclaimer: I know I’m going to eventually get beat up in the comments section for not mentioning this, so I will say now that yes, osmosis does actually enter into the equation in a minor way: as salt diffuses into the actual muscle cells, they break down some of the cells internal structure, releasing solutes into it. Provided your brine concentration is low enough, this can create a difference in osmotic pressure that will cause some water to actually migrate into the cells themselves instead of just into the protein sheaths surrounding them.

That said, once the turkey is cooked and the liquid is squeezed out from within the cells, it is the moisture trapped in the protein sheaths that gives the sensation of juiciness—not the liquid that was inside the cells before it was even cooked, as is clearly demonstrated by the last experiment using a fully-saturated brine solution.