Burgers and Onion Rings

While chowing down tonight SP said, "I know sometimes I push for us to go out to eat, but your cooking is so darn good I don't know why we bother." Awww...shucks. Thanks honey.



Tonight I made burgers and onion rings. I use Rachael Ray's recipe for Spicy O'Nuts. It's pretty simple. You just take 2 cups of pancake mix, add about 3/4 of a bottle of beer, 1 teaspoon each of chili powder, paprika and hot sauce. Mix it all together, add in a thickly sliced onion, stir to coat and fry the rings in a shallow frying pan in about an inch of oil (use a light oil like vegetable or canola).



Make sure that once you put the rings in you leave them alone until they get nice and dark or else the batter will fall off and you'll be left with a naked ring.



Once the rings are golden brown, remove them from the oil and drain them on paper towels. Make sure to salt them as soon as they come out of the oil.



I made the burgers using 80% lean ground beef mixed with minced shallot, a few dashes of Worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper. I topped my burger with cheddar cheese and SP's with Swiss. I used our electric grill and the burgers took about 3 minutes per side for medium rare.



I served the burgers with some thinly sliced red onion, tomatoes Mom gave me from her box o'veggies last week and some Romaine lettuce. I top my burger with ketchup, a squirt of yellow mustard and a thick slathering of mayo. SP built his with some Thousand Island dressing and some jalapeno hot sauce. He said it was a good combination.