February 25th, 2011: Whipped Red Potatoes and Bison Burgers!

Bison Burger Friday! YAY! I have NO idea what possessed me to do this. Honestly? Bison burgers? Why not? It's an odd meat, it's supposed to be leaner than standard ground chuck and Ted Turner owns a restaurant chain that specializes in it. We have one in the town I grew up in, never been there. I heard it's expensive, but good. So, that first qualifier pretty much means I won't be eating their anytime soon, too bad.

So, I bought a pound and a quarter of ground Bison and decided: it's burger time. A couple of days before I prepared the burgers I had eaten a Burger King Stuffed Jalapeño & Cheddar Steakhouse Burger. That burger honestly had far too short of a life, as did the Buck Double, but now they offer the Stackers, which are cool. But I still prefer the $1 Wopper Junior. Wait, no, this isn't about Burger King, but now I think that's what I'll have for dinner.

I decided that I was going to stuff the bison with a mixture of mild cheddar cubes and torn swiss slices, mostly out of necessity. Not wanting to mask the flavor of a new meat, I simply sprinkled some paprika, black pepper and kosher salt on the meat with the cheese. I really wanted to appreciate the meat, rather than the spicing, since I'd never had it before.

To top the burger I sliced some Spanish Onion and Mushrooms and sauted them in some oil... or roast them... or caramelize. I'm still iffy on all those differences. The side is going to be whipped red potatoes with a white gravy, made using a similar method as prescribed by Alton Brown when I made the CFS.

So, while I worked on the onions and mushrooms I boiled the potatoes and soon whipped them. The potatoes contained some heavy whipping cream, butter, salt, garlic and sour cream to taste. Next I cooked the burgers up and when I did I cooked the vegetable topping with the burgers in order to cross contaminate the flavors a little. When I cook I often feel that it's important for all of the pieces of a meal to have some sort of connection, but it a complimentary flavor it just a shared cooking oil, so I often do this. I cooked up two of the patties and put them under foil to keep them warm while I prepared a gravy.

The gravy was literally just a roux of flour and milk, chicken broth, salt and pepper. I brought it to a boil and within five minutes it was totally ready for serving. What a fast gravy. So, I plated the meal for my girlfriend and was started a gastronomical journey into bison. We weren't too impressed with it. It didn't taste all that different than beef, the only thing that was really different was its texture. It definitely felt a little leaner and didn't give off as much grease. To me, it wasn't worth the price jump. The potatoes were great, though. Extremely fluffy and creamy. The gravy was a bit heavy feeling and cooled down into a rather thick concoction, in retrospect, a bit too much flour. All in all, a good meal.