Happy Happy Blue Cheese

So on a whim the other day I decided to grab a little slab of local Roquefort (I think) from my favourite butcher. As you may or may not know, a little blue cheese goes a long way.

Wondering what to do with blue cheese that might be progressing toward blue-and-orange cheese I felt a hankering for a good ol' hamburger. So back to the butcher with me it was. Basically I took a few fresh items that I needed to use and put them in the hamburger mix.

Happy Blue Hamburger Mix

12 oz. fresh extra lean hamburger
a hunk o' blue cheese (I had a 100g or so remnant I guess) processed into bits
a handful of flat leaf parsley chopped
one egg is un oeof (but if you don't think so by all means use another)
half a small onion minced

Now, as it turns out this made a fair bit. I know I sometimes have a 6 oz hamburger at a restaurant but I could easily have fed 4 people. As it was I made myself a very fat extra lean hamburger.

Sadly I am currently BBQ deficient, so I seared my hand-patted patty in a hot olive oil prepped fry pan. Then I turned down the heat and covered it with a lid to let it cook. It is tricky to know done-ness with this method but basically a cooked hamburger is a great deal firmer than one that isn't cooked in the middle. If you press down with your spatula you can gauge if it is done (a little, don't squash the luscious juiciness out of it!!) .

Of course if you have a BBQ handy, then by all means.

I put mine on a whole wheat hamburg bun with some dijon, a couple tomato slices, and mesclun greens. Garnish as you deem appropriate. Sauteed onions would be bombdigitty but I was lazy on this occasion. Served up with a side of Old Dutch baked Ketchup chips (why not?).

 More simple simple for you. As in not elaborate. Which is a complicated way of saying 'what could be easier?'

Bonus ant's eye table view. Albeit I don't know what an ant would see. Face-to-face with this massive hamburger patty it might see a meaty cliff face.

Until next time. If you're feeling blue then do your best to be happy about it.

The Leftover Steak Sandwich


Leftovers are nothing to sneeze at. Especially when they're this good. Yes, after yet another hiatus The Philosopher's Stove is back with another chart topper. No food stylist strikes this time. No, the food will be looking better than ever thanks to the new mighty Olympus digital with the magic 'Food' setting.

After a lovely reunion of old souls (and a few new ones) and the usual procession of food abundance I was left with a steak no one wanted to take home with them. Or perhaps I looked like I needed feeding. Thanks go out to google and allrecipes.com cause all I did was type in 'best steak marinade' and low and behold I found this:

• 1/3 cup soy sauce
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 1/3 cup fresh lemon juice
• 1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
• 1 1/2 tablespoons garlic powder
• 3 tablespoons dried basil
• 1 1/2 tablespoons dried parsley flakes
• 1 teaspoon ground white pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon hot pepper sauce (optional)
• 1 teaspoon dried minced garlic (optional)

It was under the heading 'Best Steak Marinade in Existence'. Lofty claim to be sure, but I'll tell you, it was damn good. Much as a friend once said "Nirvana is a good foundation to build your house of jazz upon."; this steak marinade was certainly an excellent foundation upon which to construct a mighty fine steak sandwich.

Now I didn't follow this exactly. Lots of people seem to like white pepper. I have acquired it on a few occasions but I never seem to hang on to it. And I certainly didn't follow these amounts exactly. Don't think I went for the hot pepper sauce option either, and hot pepper sauces certainly do vary. I threw a version of this existential marinade on my donated cow and left it in the fridge for a day or three.

Somewhere in my credo I mentioned easy. There's really nothing to this. I had a monster steak donated so I made another fine mealo out of the first half. The second half I cut into strips tossed in a cast iron skillet with some carmelized onions, added a little Kraft brown sugar BBQ sauce and dished it up with some leftover grape tomatoes cut in half on a bun. Looks good don't it? :)

And that's all he wrote.