FLOWER POT KITCHEN: JUICY LUCY LUCIFER CHUCK STEAK BURGERS

5 Nov 2021

JUICY LUCY LUCIFER CHUCK STEAK BURGERS

I like to use three cuts of grass feed steak to make the best burgers ever, a good level of fat to steak ratio is crucial for a really tasty and juicy burger, I like a 80 / 20 ratio but sometimes I do go as far as 70 / 30 on occasion! My favourite cuts of beef are short ribs, ribeye and whole chuck steak which I mince in equal quantities. I always mince my steak twice and with fresh or pickled jalapeños sprinkled in on the second mincing and sometimes I also run crispy sweetcure bacon and soften onions through the mince too! For these Juicy Lucy’s well Lucifer’s I stuff a great burger melting cheese in the centre along with a generous amount of my favourite hot hot pain habanero sauce!

WARNING: THE CHEESE IN THE CENTRE CAN BE EXTREMELY HOT !

Serve these juicy Lucy’s in a toasted buttered brioche bun with your choice of fixings, I like more cheese on top of my burger along with crispy iceberg lettuce, red onion, sliced tomatoes, more buffalo hot sauce maybe some mayonnaise and crispy fried onion strings.

Super Easy

Prep time 15 minutes / Grilling time 7 minutes / Resting 5 minutes

Ingredients

(makes 6 burgers)

The Burgers

500g diced chuck steak

500g diced fore rib

500g short ribs off the bone

Optional

6 rashers of sweetcure streaky bacon chopped

3 fresh or 1 cup pickled jalapeños rough diced

1 Spanish onion sliced and lightly fried

1 tsp Himalayan sea salt

1 tsp ground black pepper

6 slices of melting cheese for stuffing

1/2 bottle of habanero buffalo hot sauce

Fixings

6 slices of melting cheese

3 large tomatoes sliced

1/2 iceberg lettuce sliced

1 red onion sliced

1/2 bottle of buffalo hot sauce

1 bottle mayonnaise

2 cups crispy fried onions

6 brioche buns

1 stick butter

Light your BBQ coals 30 minutes before your ready to cook or a griddle in the kitchen 5 minutes before.

Mince your steak twice and on the second mincing run the jalapeños through and if using the bacon and softened onions run through with the jalapeños, season with salt and pepper and mix throughly, divide the minced steak in to 6 and form in to balls, press your thumb down in the centre to make a well, fill the well half with hot sauce then place the cheese slice, fold or squish the cheese slices so they are the compact enough to fit in the centre of the pattie, bring up the sides of the pattie and mould over the top of the cheese, press slightly flat so the pattie in a even thickness.

Grill, griddle to your likin, I like just medium so I grill for 2-3 minutes on each side turning only once, a great tip is to move the patties once cooked to the warm area of the grill to rest for 5 minutes this will ensure that cheese centre is fully melted and a rested juicy burger. Again Warning: The Cheese Centre Can Be Burning Hot this I can greedily confirm!

I had a anaphylactic shock to wheat last year! So for me I have to stuff my burgers in a iceberg wrap, still great but I do miss the days when I did have a toasted buttered brioche bun!

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LIFE MY PASSION

Welcome to my daily life of cooking, one winters day many years ago my family and I were all inspired by a back to back rainy day of River Cottage this got us to stop talking about and start actually doing, suddenly three weeks later eight vegetable beds were dug, greenhouse erected and our first vegetables were propagating, this was the start to raising and growing our own food, our fabulous son Oscar changed our path in life which lead us to sell our small thriving restaurant of 10 yrs and to start our new life (Terrifying!) a life of the self sufficient in touch with nature and seasons, taking a step back and looking forward to a slower change of pace and making the most of every moment.

My passion for cooking was stronger than ever and having time at home with Oscar I found I had a new direction and I was no longer striving for perfection, I was suddenly very passionate for the enjoyment of the other side of food, something I had not realised, being the Chef/Cook and every other duty of your own small restaurant made me see that I never actually took time to cook what I wanted!

So there I was muddy boots and hands digging deep in more than one sense and I found myself transported back in time to where everyone grew some of their own food, it is a wonderful world with a real sense of achievement and loss, Slugs Snails and Caterpillars! But thats another story! Childhood memories of summers when I lived with my grand parents reminded me of so much that I had learnt about the make do and mend generation that I had forgotten.

Now as a family we love our free wild food days where we gather what nature has provided, have gone from being mini mini garden urban small holders, who did raised pigs at home because we could not wait to find land and supporting ourselves from our garden to now owning a very small farm that allows us to grow more vegetables for the whole of our family and neighbours, raise our own gorgeous Gloucestershire Old Spot pigs, (Sausages!) and pets! Dorset Down sheep, chickens for eggs and pet goats! Suddenly having large quantities of produce started to wake up the Cook in me!

The Cook was awake that part of me that wants to cook for the masses and I found myself setting up Flowerpot Kitchen, a Farmers Market Stall, I wanted to use our honest raised meats and make old fashioned pork pies, rabbit pies and game pies from the local game keeper along with old fashioned techniques and the best hot water crust pastry. This in turn grew to a small cottage industry from home weekly supplying three farm shops and a deli along with also attending three farmers markets A few years later there came a time when my son Oscar's health changed and it was an easy decision to stop.

I still hold the occasional pop up 40 seater restaurant or gourmet lunch which we do for local charities for the love of sharing food and to remind that Cook in me why I love our go slower self sufficient life!

So here I am sitting amoung the vegetables watching the chickens loving that every season nature teaches me something new and that nature is in charge! She has taught me to just go with it and grow. Give it a try from a tray of salad on your windowsill to a few tomato plants it all counts.