America's Weekend

This weekend has been centered around America's pastimes. We have had a grill out, attended a baseball game and celebrated with others as they officially became barristers. Yes, that's right, in one weekend we had lawyers, burgers and baseball. What could be better (please no lawyer jokes)?

The grill out was jam packed with great food. We had hot dogs, salsa (see previous post), guacamole, mac & cheese, hot dogs, brats, beans, burgers, and queso fundido.

I am going to write specifically about two dishes: the burgers and the queso. I would write about the mac & cheese, but alas it is my friend Cole's intellectual property - plus I don't have it!). It was spectacular, though.

Burgers
Some people prefer a ground patty plain and grilled to perfection. Perhaps it is because my dad always mixed burgers with a wide array of ingredients (never twice the same), but my burger is a bit more complex...

• 1 pound of 80/20 ground meat (you can use leaner meat, but I think this is the perfect ratio for burgers)
• 1 cup bread crumbs
• 1 egg
• salt & pepper
• parsley
  
• chives
• ancho chili powder (or cayenne for a spicier burger)
• garlic salt

Mix the ingredients in a bowl, shape into patties and grill! Also, don't be afraid to mix and match ingredients and insert your favorite pantry staples. The only ingredients that I think are necessary are the bread crumbs, salt and pepper, and egg (as a binding agent). Everything else is optional and dependent on your personal taste.

Queso Fundido
One of the most underrated cooking skills an individual can possess is the ability to make dishes out of leftovers and limit waste. Queso fundido is a cheese sauce in which you dip chips - similar to a salsa. This queso dish was the bastard child of Cole's aforementioned mac & cheese. He was wondering what to do with the extra cheese that he had prepared, and Rachael and he decided that it would be perfect for a queso.

That is where I came in...

We diced sweet baby peppers, flour (to thicken the cheese sauce), beer (nothing goes better with cheese than beer), some cayenne pepper, more cheese, garlic salt, salt and chipotle chili in adobo sauce (an important ingredient in Mexican cuisine -- chipotle chilies are smoked jalapenos and the adobo is the sauce that it is marinated in. This does not provide a spicy taste, but rather a smokey flavor).

Once again, these ingredients are optional and there is certainly an opportunity to be creative when making queso. Try it the next time you have leftover cheese.