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Bone marrow beef burgers
Serves 4 Starters and mains
Ingredients
- 800g braising steak
- 100g bone marrow (from approx. 250g beef bones cut lengthways)
- flaked sea salt and smoked sea salt, to taste
- 4 slices good melting cheese, such as Gouda
To serve
- 4 brioche burger buns
- tomato ketchup or gherkin relish, to taste
- mustard, to taste
- 4 large onion slices
- 4 large tomato slices
- 4 Little Gem lettuce leaves
- 4 grilled bacon rashers, preferably sugar-cured
- 8 large gherkin slices
Method
Preheat the barbecue or a large cast-iron grill pan. If you can, mince the meat yourself not too long before making the burgers. Use a mincing attachment on a food processor – choose the blade with the largest holes – mince it twice. It’s easier to do this when it’s fridge cold. Alternatively, ask your butcher to do this for you.
Remove the marrow from the bones with a spoon and dice into 1cm cubes. Mix into the minced beef, then form the mixture into 4 patties by hand (or use a burger press). If they are going to be cooked on the barbecue, give them an extra squeeze to ensure they don’t break apart.
Season the burgers heavily with sea salt and smoked sea salt just before putting on the hot barbecue or very hot cast-iron grill pan (no oil is necessary). Without squeezing the burgers, move them around frequently until cooked to your liking – around 4 minutes on each side for medium-rare, flipping halfway through and adding a slice of cheese to each burger. To aid the melting, add a cloche or old saucepan over the top of the burgers to keep the heat in, if you like.
Around 1 minute before the end of cooking time, add the buns, cut-side down, to toast and warm the bread throughout. Watch them closely as the sweetness in the bread means they can quickly go from cold to burnt.
Spread your sauce of choice over the top half of each bun and set aside – or, alternatively, leave it bare for each person to add as they like. Add mustard to each bottom bun, followed by a slice of onion and tomato, a lettuce leaf, then add the burger with its cheese, the bacon and gherkin. Add more relish or ketchup to the top, as you like, before adding the top bun.
Cook’s note The patties may seem big when you form them, but they will shrink a little when cooked. If you make a small indentation on both sides of the burger, it will stop them turning into a meatball when being cooked.
This recipe featured in the August/September 2022 issue of Food and Travel. To subscribe, click here.
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