Category — Uncategorized

Chinese New Year is about to Culminate with The Lantern Festival this Thursday, February 21st.  You can read a lot more about Chinese New Year over in my articles section, thanks to my friend, Sophia, who wrote several articles about CNY for my cookbook and website.

To acknowledge The Latern Festival in our home, I decided we we would try out a recipe that was a recent finalist in the 2007 Southern Living Cook-Off in the Quick and Easy category.  The recipe was submitted by Deborah Biggs of Omaha, Nebraska, and is titled “Szechuan Burgers With Cilantro Slaw”.

I made this a week last week at lunch time for Hubby and I.  I’ve made it twice since then.  And, today, when I went shopping, I bought the stuff to make them again.  Yeah, they’re that good.  If there was one thing I would change about this recipe . . . hmm, let’s see.  Oh, I know, I’d double the slaw, because it’s really awesome and I always run out.

The contest is a brand name contest, so several of the ingredients are, of course, listed as name brand choices.  I’ve changed the recipe in that I’m not listing the name brands.  Also, the original recipe calls for cucumber ranch dressing, and I’ve just been using regular ranch, since I’m too cheap to I didn’t want to buy TWO bottles of salad dressing for one recipe.  Oh yeah, and they are shaped like burgers, and they go on buns, but beyond that - not really a burger here.  They’re made from ground chicken.  Don’t care if they’re burger imposters.  Love ‘em!

This recipe didn’t win the contest, and I’m sorry for that.  Deborah, if it were up to me, you’d have taken a big fat blue ribbon! 

Another bonus to this recipe is that I was forced to try a new salad dressing (oh, poor, poor me!) - Asian Toasted Sesame Dressing - which is a Kraft product.  Can I just say - YUM!  There’s a great Japanese Steak House a couple of towns over from here that offers an unbeatable ginger dressing on their salad, and while Kraft’s version isn’t as good as Genji’s, it is a close second and it’s definitely going to be a regular purchase here.  Well, at least until I figure out how to make my own version taste just as good (so far no luck).

Well, onto the recipe.  The pictures were taken with the old camera, and just don’t do these bad boys justice.  Please do yourself a favor and try these out!

Szechuan Burgers With Cilantro Slaw

For Slaw:
1/3 cup ranch dressing
2 tablespoons minced cilantro
2 teaspoons orange juice
1 teaspoon kosher salt, divided
1 1/2 cup shredded coleslaw mix
1/2 cup diced green onions
1 tablespoon black sesame seed

For Burgers:
1-1/2 pounds ground chicken breast
1/4 cup Asian toasted sesame dressing
2 teaspoon minced garlic
1 1/2 teaspoon szechwan seasoning (a bottled spice blend)
6 sesame seed buns

Whisk together the first three ingredients and 1/4 teaspoon of salt in a bowl.  Stir in coleslaw mix, green onions, and sesame seeds.  Cover and chill 30 minutes or up to two hours.  (Note:  I make this, and just let it refrigerate while I am making the burgers, this is long enough.)

Combine ground chicken, next 3 ingredients, and remaining salt in a large bowl until blended.  Shape into 6 (3/4 inch) patties.

Grill patties, covered with grill lid, over 300 to 350 degree medium heat for 5 minutes on each side or until done.  Grill hamburger buns, if desired.

Place one burger on top of each bun; top evenly with coleslaw mixture and bun tops.

I wanted to make sure and let you know about a new feature on the site.  Hubby helped me get a recipes and article section up and running.  Now, you can go here to get a listing of all of my recipes and the articles that appear on the site.  Of coures, the recipes will stay in my blog and continue to be added here, too.  Enjoy!