St. Patrick's Day Burgers with Irish Whiskey Onions & Cheddar

Get out that green shirt and the Kiss Me I'm Irish Today button because we're getting ready to celebrate one of the most hallowed days on the Burp! calendar -- St. Patrick's Day.

In some ways, we're all about (Irish-American) tradition. St. Patrick's Day is the perfect time to pull out all the stops when it comes to dinner. First, you need a slab of Corned Beef Brisket, accompanied by some delicious cabbage and a pile of potatoes (boiled, roasted, or smashed). A nice Irish Stout is usually the beverage of choice. And it would be a shame to end our St. Patrick's Day feast without a slice or two of Irish Whiskey Cake.

But, we also find ourselves longing to change things up a little bit every  now and again.  And that's when we come up with delicious experiments like Cheesy Colcannon with Leeks and Reuben Risotto.

This year, our imaginations got the best of us.  Peef was craving burgers.  And he'd read something somewhere about braising onions in Irish Whiskey.  Needless to say, we decided it sounded like a pretty winning combination.  So, we got to work.

First, it only seemed right that an Irish burger, similar to a Reuben, would be served on rye bread. So, we mixed up a batch of our favorite focaccia dough (yeah, yeah, I know -- Italian dough for an Irish sandwich...) -- only we subbed out all of the all-purpose flour with rye flour.  And we kneaded a small handful of caraway seeds into the dough.

While the bread baked, I set to work caramelizing a nice big batch of onions. When the onions were just about finished, I swirled in a nice splash of Power's Irish Whiskey, which functioned to deglaze the pan and impart a nice, smooth malty flavor to the sweet onions.

Since I figured it wouldn't hurt to tie in a little bit of "corned beef" action, I also hauled out some classic corning spices like juniper berries, allspice, mustard, coriander and cinnamon and ground them up in our spice grinder. These got mixed in with the better part of pound of fresh ground beef.  We grilled the burgers to medium-rare on our stove-top grill pan and then topped them with slices of Irish Dubliner cheese, cooking them just long enough for the cheese to melt & begin drooping down the sides.

By the time the focaccia was finished baking, we were both drooling like maniacs. Almost didn't get pictures of the burgers, we were so hungry...

And so, I present:  The Irish Burger.  This deliciously spiced grass-fed ground beef burger sits atop a slice of sourdough rye foccaccia. It's enrobed with the slightly sweet, nutty tang of the cheese and topped off with the impeccably sweet and flavorful Irish Whiskey-infused onions.

Messy to eat, but extremely satisfying, these burgers were a perfectly unconventional way to begin our pre-St. Patrick's Day celebration.

Irish Burgers with Whiskey-Caramelized Onions
Sourdough Rye Focaccia



©BURP! Where Food Happens
Want more? Read Lo's latest ruminations at FOODCrush, her Milwaukee Magazine blog.

Sourdough Focaccia with Olives & Rosemary

I killed them both in one fell swoop.
Both were tragic deaths. Unfair. And sudden. And utterly inelegant. And I mourned them both privately and on Facebook.

I now maintain that it was a matter of simple cross-contamination -- yeast meets beast --but I spent weeks wondering about the untimely fate of both my sourdough starter (of 7+ years) and my kombucha scoby (which I'd maintained without fail since early last spring).  I also acted quickly to find replacements.

The scoby was easy enough to replace, since I've given out quite a number of baby scobies to friends & neighbors all over town (and I seem to have developed a waiting list of others who are still awaiting the chance to own a 'booch baby of their own).  But the sourdough...

Fortunately for me, R from Cakewalk was passionately working on one of her latest obsessions -- sourdough culture derived from the fermentation of grapes (a la Nancy Silverton). And she was kind enough to offer me a bit of her brand new starter.

It was gorgeous stuff -- smelling of yeast and ferment and the ever-so-slight perfume of grapes (or was that my consistently overactive imagination?). In any case, it was a wonder of a living food. And I couldn't wait to take it for a test drive.

Interestingly enough, Peef was craving foccacia.  So, we planned a lovely casual weekend dinner of cheese, wine, fruit... and a lovely sourdough experiment.

The dough mixed together beautifully.  I used a mixture of bread flour and a half and half blend of all purpose and white whole wheat flour.  And I gave the loaf a nice long rise (nearly 8 hours total) -- to ensure that the wild yeast had an opportunity to thoroughly develop.

When the dough was finished rising, I hand shaped it on a piece of parchment paper, allowed it to rest, and then put together the toppings. Olives... rosemary...thinly sliced garlic... I hoped that this would be the focaccia of my (sometimes easy to please of late) dreams.

I watched the loaf in the oven as it slowly lifted -- as if levitating -- air flowing through every bubbly crevice. And, as a crust formed along the outer edges of the dough, I saw the bread take form and color beautifully.

The final product was crisp & airy, with a beautifully tender exterior pleasantly dappled with air tunnels.  Although it would have been perfect for sandwiches, we sliced it simply and ate it in big, manly chunks -- spread with tomato basil jam and followed with sheep's milk cheese and a swig of wine.

It was love at first bite - which is exactly why I feel the need to share.  If you can manage to get your hands on a bit of sourdough starter, you must try this recipe.


Sourdough focaccia with olives & rosemary

Oh!  And before I forget -- stay tuned later this week as we write about our adventures with locally made spice blends... I don't think I'd be giving too much away if I suggested there might be a giveaway involved...

Want more? Read Lo's latest ruminations at FOODCrush, her Milwaukee Magazine blog.


©BURP! Where Food Happens