Great Burgers [antikvár]

RODUCTION ABOUT THE BURGER There are several charming stories about the birth of the burger. AH of them are true. Or none. It hardly matters. Any story of the burger's origin does little to enhance what each of us knows empirically At some time in our lives, after taking a bite of a juicy perfectly cooked burger, we've said, either aloud or to ourselves, something to the effect of, "This burger is as good as anything I've ever tasted." Its sublime simplicity makes the burger one of the elemental tastes—what other tastes are compared to. Burgers are also one of those foods for which we have almost wanton cravings, a kind of burger mania—"I so feel like having a burger now"—that unique confluence of longing and himgei whose locus is the burger. This is not the same as wanting to dine at a certain restaurant or thinking you should probably eat fish tonight. Burger lust is not casual, but a deeper, more visceral desire, like the need to play a quick nine holes or listen to some early Miles Davis. The burger is working class, a solid citizen—a humble and unpretentious marriage of meat and heat. In an age of flash and Baroque excess, the burger maintains its Romanesque simplicity, understated, bold, and sturdy Gussy up a burger too much and it looks out of place, like a farmer in a tux. So then how come a cookbook with so many different burgers? Because as Mae West was wont to say "You can never get too much of a good thing." These recipes find ways to enhance the essential burger, without seeking to replace it. Though they require more preparation than the basic burger's simple "shape and flip," they are not overly labor intensive. I would never be so brazen as to suggest you might tire of the basic burger, but rather that you may want to try exploiting the burger as a vehicle for some killer preparations that go beyond it. COOKING Burgers are forgiving. When the butcher grinds the meat, fat and muscle are so intertwined that the burger becomes self-basting. All you have to do is not overcook it. For me, the perfect burger is medium-rare. When sliced in half, it is a frame of charred meat surrounding a roseate middle section that at its center is a deep claret. Decide for yourself what the perfect burger is and try to cook it the same way each time. Figure on an extra minute for each increment, i.e., 9 minutes total cooking time for medium-rare, 10 minutes for introduction 7