METHOD

The tomato sauce

• Gently heat the oil in a non-stick pan. Add the garlic and then the tomatoes, oregano, basil and salt and pepper.
• Bring to the boil, then remove from the heat. Strain the sauce through a sieve, squeezing through as much juice as possible, into a non-stick saucepan.
• Bring the sauce back to the boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook for 20 minutes.
• Remove from the heat and cover.

The burgers

Before we begin:

Many people who fancy themselves as expert on burgers would recommend mince with a higher fat content. Practically, we have found that supermarket mince with a high fat content also has a high gristle content, and we therefore seek to avoid it. If you have a local butcher for whom this doesn't apply, fat yourself out. For everyone else, this concoction has plenty of things to keep it moist, so please don't fret about this.

Burger patties should be flat, not round. Anyone who thinks otherwise is a lunatic. A burger press is not critical, but they are not expensive and do guarantee a good shape and texture.

The burgers in this recipe are deliberately small, as we think this suits the crumpet format well.          


• Mix the beef, egg yolk and horseradish sauce together in a large bowl, and divide into patties.
• Season really well. Again, you'll hear from others that you don't want to do this until you've cooked the burgers. This is probably true of the pepper, but it's difficult to add this later, and it works just fine adding at the start. On salt, people just don't know what they are talking about: the salt massively enhances the flavour during cooking and is an absolute must.
• Get the barbeque piping hot before putting the burgers on.
• The bacon will take less time than the burgers, but will happily keep in tinfoil for a little while.
• Add the cheese to the burgers as they finish cooking. Melting the cheese makes it much nicer.

The toppings

• Melt the butter in a non-stick pan, add the mushrooms, salt and pepper, and cook on a medium heat for 3 or 4 minutes, tossing frequently.
• Add the onion and pepper and cook for 1 minute more.

The crumpets




• Toast the crumpets on a hot barbeque until they look like this.
• Add the tomato sauce, the bacon, the burger, and then the toppings, pressing them into the cheese to help them stick.
• You might want to add some more black pepper at this point.




 

OTHER NOTES

As ever, don't forget to use bacon from happy pigs (and eggs from happy hens) or karma might come to bite you on the arse.