Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Cheater Turkey Burgers with a Mexican Twist!

My sister called yesterday and in her best baby sister voice asked, "will you make burgers tomorrow?".  That's Spanish for, "I'm busy and don't have time to cook, so can my fiance and I come over for dinner tomorrow? PS, we're craving burgers!".  Of course, I said yes since I love having them over...so that's what we did.  Since we all tend to live a pretty healthy lifestyle, we decided to make turkey burgers.  Now, I've committed to training a seeing eye dog for the time being, so this recipe has a few shortcuts that are easily adapted to fresh alternatives...we simply didn't have the time after our 1.5 hr walk to the grocery store training this pup (the store is normally a 10 minute walk but with training, it takes a wee bit longer).

Turkey Burger Recipe (with a cheater Mexican twist because of the pre-made toppings!):

Ingredients (makes 4 burgers):
1lb lean ground turkey (we used 99% fat free)
1/4 cup chopped vidalia onion
3 cloves minced garlic
2 tbsp Worcestershire Sauce
Freshly cracked sea salt and pepper to taste
Desired toppings: we used heirloom tomatoes, guacamole and salsa

*We also had two random bison patties sitting around in the freezer, so we decided to make those, too...separately from the turkey burgers.  Did you know that bison is incredibly lean?  We added freshly cracked salt, pepper and 1tbsp of reduced-fat mayonnaise to that mixture.  I know it sounds weird, but the mayonnaise adds serious moisture without a lot of fat and without actually tasting like mayonnaise...the only picture we snapped of a cooked burger (below) is the bison one but it looks yummy!

Toppings:
Sliced heirloom tomatoes


Prepackaged all-natural guacamole (normally, I make my own, but there were no ripe avocados today...so, we made a sacrifice in homemade-ness for the greater good of the recipe working out)


Fresh salsa (we also bought this but it is SO easy to make with some minced tomato, onion, jalapeno, vinegar, garlic and cilantro)


Directions:
- Mix ground turkey, onion, garlic, Worcestershire Sauce, salt and pepper in a mixing bowl


Form the mixture into 4 patties


Grill until cooked through
Top with desired toppings and ENJOY!  Boy, were they big and juicy and all charred up from the grill!  The burger below is actually one of the bison burgers but we topped them the same way.


SOMEBODY even cheated and added a little cheese...kind of ruins the healthy idea but it is sooooo good on a hot burger!






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