The Lobster Burger

By Michel Richard of Citronelle

4 lobsters (1 pound each)

1 large tomato, cut into 4 slices

1 clove garlic, sliced

1/2 teaspoon sugar

3 tablespoons olive oil

1/4 pound scallops

2 tablespoons milk

4 teaspoons mayonnaise

1/4 teaspoon soy sauce

1/2 teaspoon peeled and grated ginger

Salt and pepper to taste

4 brioche buns

Fill a large stockpot with water and bring to a boil.

Preheat the oven to 250 degrees. Set the tomato slices on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Sprinkle with garlic and sugar, season with salt and pepper, and drizzle with 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Cook for 8 to 10 minutes and cool.

When the water is boiling, cook the lobsters for 5 minutes. Transfer to cold water. When the lobsters are cool, remove meat from the claws, legs, knuckles, and tail. Cut the meat into large pieces. Set aside in a bowl.

In a food processor, puree the scallops for a few seconds until smooth. Stir in 2 tablespoons of milk. Fold the scallop mixture into the lobster meat. Season with salt and pepper. Mold into 4 lightly packed patties and keep cold.

In a bowl, combine the mayonnaise, soy sauce, and ginger.

In a pan over medium heat, sautee the patties in 1 tablespoon of olive oil until golden, about 5 minutes on each side.

Split the buns and sprinkle with the remaining olive oil. Lightly toast. Serve the burgers with a slice of tomato and the ginger mayonnaise.

Like his restaurant, Fabio Trabocchi’s extravagant headcheese burger with Osetra caviar is worthy of a celebration. Photograph by Allison Dinner

The Decadent Burger

By Fabio Trabocchi of Maestro

Headcheese terrine:

1 pig head (about 6 pounds)

3 tablespoons white-wine vinegar

1 small onion, skin removed

1 celery heart

1 rosemary sprig

3 garlic cloves

3 bay leaves

3 tablespoons rock salt

2 tablespoons crushed white peppercorns

5 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

4 tablespoons Osetra caviar (for topping)

Set the pig’s head under cold, running water for 6 hours. Cover the head in a stockpot with salted water, ice, and the white-wine vinegar. Refrigerate overnight.

Drain the water from the stockpot and set it aside. Set the head under cold running water as you prepare the rest of the ingredients or about 1 hour.

Place the head and reserved water in a pot just big enough to hold it. Set the pot over medium-low heat. Skimming the surface frequently, simmer for 20 minutes, until water is slightly cloudy. Add the onion, celery, rosemary, garlic, bay leaves, rock salt, and white pepper.

Simmer very slowly for 8 hours, skimming occasionally and making sure the water stays above the head.

When the head is cooked (its flesh falls off the bone), remove the pot from the heat and let cool to room temperature.

Drain the liquid and place the head on a sheet pan. Pull all the meat from the bone and set aside.

Pull flat a piece of plastic wrap 1 foot by 2 feet across a countertop. Arrange the pieces of meat along the side of the plastic closest to you. Sprinkle with chopped parsley. Pull the edge of the plastic over the meat and roll into a tightly packed cylinder until all the plastic is used. Tie each end of the cylinder with kitchen string. Refrigerate overnight.

Cut the terrine into 1/2-inch slices and drizzle with olive oil. Let the slices rest at room temperature for 30 minutes. Split a bun and toast lightly. Place 2 tablespoons of potato salad (recipe follows) on the bottom of the bun, then top with a slice of headcheese terrine. Finish with a quenelle of Osetra caviar. Serve immediately.

Potato salad:

3 cups canola oil

11/2 pounds small red-skin potatoes, diced

1/2 pound bacon, diced

1 small onion, diced

1 bunch of dill, leaves only

4 egg yolks

1/2 small shallot

Juice of 1 lemon

2 tablespoons white-wine vinegar

2 eggs, hard-boiled and diced

Salt and pepper to taste

Place 2 cups of canola oil in a sautee pan over high heat. Heat the oil to 350 degrees temperature. Working in small batches, shallow fry the potatoes until golden brown, about 4 to 5 minutes each batch. Drain the potatoes on a paper towel and season with salt and pepper.

Set a sautee pan over low heat and render the fat from the bacon. Once the bacon is crispy, discard it and add the diced onion to the fat. Sauteethe onion until soft and translucent. Strain, cool, and set aside.

In a food processor, puree the dill, egg yolks, shallot, half of the lemon juice, and the white-wine vinegar until smooth. While the processor is running, slowly add the remaining cup of canola oil. Once the mixture is blended into a smooth green mayonnaise, season to taste.

In a bowl, fold together the potatoes, sauteed onions, diced egg, and vinaigrette. Season to taste.

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The Wall Street Journal’s Raymond Sokolov comes up with a list of the country’s best burgers. Says Sokolov:

Patties of ground beef weighing from 1 ounce to 15 pounds, often not seasoned and cooked until gray, then served as a sandwich, usually between two halves of a compressible, flavorless untoasted bun, are this nation’s leading contribution to world cuisine. In their fast-food form, burgers provide quantitative evidence for the charge, more widespread than ever, that Americans are a bunch of insensitive louts.

But all across the country there are places, almost all of them locally owned operations, that cook and sell my idea of a first-rate burger. And I’ve been on a hunt to find the best of them. …

His list includes but is not limited to the following:

Primanti Bros.
Address: 46 18th Street, Pittsburgh PA 15222
Phone: 412-263-2142
URL: primantibros.com
The Skinny: They put fries on the burger here.

Rosebud Steakhouse
Address: 192 East Walton Street, Chicago IL 60611
Phone: 312-397-1000
URL: http://www.rosebudrestaurants.com/rest4.php
The Skinny: Thick 12-ounce burger served on a grilled-pretzel roll. Sokolov finds the bun an “eccentric distraction.”

Louis’ Lunch
Address: 261-263 Crown Street, New Haven CT 06510
Phone: 203-562-5507
URL: louislunch.com
The Skinny: Claims to be the birthplace of the burger. The fact that its sandwich is served between two slices of toasted bread provokes endless debate among hamburger semanticists. Don’t ask for ketchup here!

Dirty Martin’s Kum-Bak Place
Address: 2808 Guadalupe Street, Austin TX 78705
Phone: 512-477-3173
URL: dirtymartins.com
The Skinny: Didn’t rate high from Mr. Sokolov (he called it “thin and lackluster”), but friend of AHT and New York magazine online food editor Josh “Mr. Cutlets” Ozersky says “The burger, broader and thinner than the Shake Shack’s, gives you more salty surface area and just as much juicy beef goodness.”

The Shake Shack
Address: Located in New York City’s Madison Square Park, 23rd Street and Madison Avenue
Phone: N/A
URL: shakeshacknyc.com
The Skinny: Open from the first day of spring to the last day of fall, the Shake Shack has become a beloved burger institution in New York in the handful of years it’s been open. Unpretentious and delicious burgers with a crunchy, salty outer crust and superb blend of meats. (More on the Shack from A Hamburger Today.)

In-N-Out Burger
Address: Various locations throughout California, Nevada, and Arizona
Phone: N/A
URL: in-n-out.com
The Skinny: Arguably the nation’s best chain hamburger, albeit a chain whose reach is cruelly limited to three Western states. High-quality meat that’s fresh, never-frozen along with hand-cut fries. The chain is deservedly famous for its cleanliness, efficiency, and friendly customer service. Mr. Sokolov, however, does not particularly like In-N-Out: “unspectacular — fairly thin, cautiously seasoned”

Miller’s Bar
Address: 23700 Michigan Avenue, Dearborn MI 48124
Phone: 313-565-2577
URL: millersbar.com
The Skinny: Serving one of Sokolov’s choice burgers, Miller’s sandwiches are hefty, no-nonsense affairs.

Ann’s Snack Bar
Address: 1615 Memorial Drive, Atlanta GA 30317
Phone: 404-687-9207
URL: N/A
The Skinny: A tiny diner on a grim stretch of highway, go for the Ghetto Burger, Sokolov says.

There are more tasty burgers in Mr. Sokolov’s article: The Best Burger, along with a PDF map of his cross-country adventure.

‘New York’ Magazine’s Top New York Burgers

New York magazine just dumped its “Best of New York 2007″ issue, and in it the weekly’s food critics name their favorite high-, mid-, and low-end burgers in the Big Apple.

Here are their picks, in descending order from high to low. Oh, and Gael Greene just managed to shoot up even more in our estimation with her low-end fave.

Adam Platt
Waverly Inn: 16 Bank Street, New York NY 10014.
BLT Burger: 470 Sixth Avenue, New York NY 10011. Here’s A Hamburger Today’s take on BLT Burger.
Shake Shack: Southwest corner of Madison Square Park. Here’s all AHT’s posts on the Shake Shack.

Rob Patronite
Blue Smoke: 16 East 27th Street, New York NY 10016. Psst: Wanna know a super cool secret about Blue Smoke’s burger?
Stoned Crow: 85 Washington Place, New York NY 10011.
Shake Shack: Southwest corner of Madison Square Park. Here’s all AHT’s posts on the Shake Shack.

Robin Raisfeld
Nicole’s: 10 East 60th Street, New York NY 10022.
Prune: 54 East 1st Street, New York NY 10003. OMG: Prune’s lamburger is insane.
P. J. Clarke’s: 915 Third Avenue, New York NY 10022.

Gael Greene
Brooklyn Diner: 212 West 57th Street, New York NY 10019.
Fairway Café: 2127 Broadway, New York NY 10023.
White Castle: Various locations citywide. We love you, Gael Greene—almost as much as we love White Castle.

Best Burgers - Best of New York Food 2007 [New York magazine]

Cooked: The Juicy Loosey

Entry by Adam Kuban| Link |

Follow along, step-by-step, in mind-numbing detail. If that’s your bag. After the jump.

The takeaway: Since I’ve not had a true Jucy Lucy from Matt’s Bar, I can’t say for sure, but making this burger at home is almost more trouble than it’s worth. I mean, does it matter if the cheese is on the inside as opposed to above and below the patty? (I think a slice on the top and bottom is awesome.) Furthermore, I always end up overcooking this thing in the interest of getting a good molten core. This is the second time I’ve made a round of Juicy Looseys, and I always end up cooking them beyond medium-rare. The Flickr pix of the Matt’s Bar Jucy Lucys look much better than mine, so perhaps this is a burger best left to the pros.

Also: I’ve found that my initial adaptation of John T. Edge’s recipe worked better for me. In his book, the recipe uses an intact slice of American cheese. In my version, which is based on George “Hamburger America” Motz’s observations during a visit to Matt’s Bar, I fold the cheese in half twice to make a compact little stack that’s easier to sandwich between the dual patties.

OK. As promised, the results.

For last night’s experiment, I tried two methods of cooking the Juicy Loosey. Here, I left the cheese whole and made the patties larger to accommodate it, as per John T. Edge’s recipe in his book Hamburgers & Fries.

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