Experiment: Hatch Chile Sausage Burgers

Cheese #1: smoked gruyere

Cheese #2: onion cheddar

The thawed patties.

Cooking

Cooking with the cheese added: Gruyere up top, onion cheddar below. Notably, the onion cheddar melted beautifully, with some coating the outside of the patty

Patties & condiments

A few months ago, I experimented with making a small batch of a new sausage recipe using fresh hatch chiles. But I never got a chance to do a true taste test- I had to store the results in the freezer. I used a Shape+Store silicone meat press/storage tray for that. (They’re brilliant!)

https://www.shapeandstore.com/products/burger-master?srsltid=AfmBOorifhIhd47mAUuAUOsGnYmGRiAJn_LS8-WmirZqhZpC6TmtQWxv

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=YFBiczC3OA4

Tonight, we got to try them out, as burgers, of course.

Mom’s was made with mayo, mustard, some dill relish, and some Dietz & Watson caramelized onion cheddar. Mine was basically the same, but I had smoked gruyere and tomatillo sauce on mine. They were served on lightly toasted, buttered buns.

Both burgers were good, but they were…underwhelming. The sausage meat was not seasoned well enough to really make an impression. It was only slightly more flavorful than a regular burger patty. It definitely needed more hatch chiles, for one. Maybe some cumin? Fresh green onion?

Regardless, it was still good enough to eat and consider actually improving on this first step.