Recently I found myself home alone and bored out of my mind, so I decided to make patty melts and homemade chips. Why? It happened to be the first recipes I came across that seemed fun, and I do love a good patty melt.
So both of these recipes are coming from the September 2014 Bon Appetit. (which just happened to be the first thing I picked up to look for interesting recipes)
The BA Patty Melt
Caramelized Onions
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
2 large onions, thinly sliced
Patties and such
1/4 small onion finely chopped
1 lb ground beef chuck (20% fat)….I'm pretty sure the meat I bought was leaner but whatever
1 Tbsp ketchup
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp kosher salt
1/4 tsp ground black pepper
1 Tbsp vegetable oil
8 slices of rye bread
4 oz aged sharp cheddar, thinly sliced
4 oz Swiss cheese, thinly sliced
8 tsp mayonnaise
First you need to caramelize the onions. Heat the oil in a skillet over medium heat and cook the onions. Constantly stir and add water when necessary to avoid burning the onions. Cook until they are nice and golden, it probably took 20 minutes or so. I'd like to mention at this point that I am cooking without my favorite skillet…..I miss it, but it is in a box somewhere.
If you can grow a few extra hands, than while the onions are cooking you can mix the beef, onion (the other onion) ketchup, garlic powder, salt and pepper in a bowl. I did not grow extra hands, so I just waited until I was done with the onions. Separate the meat mixture into 4 separate patties. Make the patties roughly the same shape/size as the bread you are using, it gives you the proper bread to meat ratio, which is key. The recipe says to use two pieces of wax paper to squish the patties between when you are shaping them, which I did, not entirely sure what I accomplished with that. Heat the oil in a large skillet (cast iron worked well) and cook the patties (you can work one or two at a time….I did). Press the patties gently while cooking. When the patties are browned but still pink in the middle transfer to a plate. You might wonder how you will know if the middle is still pink without cutting it open. Well if your meat mixture is anything like mine then there is a good chance the patty will completely fall apart when you flip it over, which will give you a good look at the middle.
Wipe out the skillet and reduce the heat to medium. Top 4 slices of bread with cheddar, beef patty, caramelized onions, and swiss cheese in that order. Close the sandwich and spread each top with a little mayo, (1 tsp if we are being precise about these things). Place in the pan mayo side down. I know the mayo thing as opposed to butter may seem a little weird to people but actually it was good.
Now the recipe says that you should place a foil covered heavy pan on top of the sandwich to weight it down while it cooks. I chose to just push on it VERY HARD and often with my spatula. It seemed to work out for me. Let the patty cook for a few minutes until the bottom slice is a nice golden brown. Spread some may on the top and flip it and repeat for another few minutes. And that's it.
Homemade Potato Chips
1.5 lbs russet potatoes
1/2 cup distilled white vinegar
vegetable oil (for frying. The recipe says 8 cups, I got this done with about 6 cups or so, it was fine, nothing tragic happened…..I promise….seriously though it was fine)
Kosher salt
So I got to use a mandolin for the first time, and I didn't cut my fingers off or anything! I recommend using one in order to get thin enough slices of the potato to make chips. Once you have cut them all (recipe suggest roughly 1/8 inch thick…sure I used the mandolin…it cut it really thing…good enough for me)
Put the potatoes in a large bowl and add water to cover. Stir to release starch and drain. Repeat this process until the water runs clear. Then cover the potatoes with the vinegar and 6 cups of water. Let that sit for at least 30 minutes and up to 2 hours. Drain the bowl and pat the potatoes dry.Put the vegetable oil in a heavy pot and heat over medium- high heat until the frying thermometer registers 300. Now I do not have a fry thermometer. So here is how I figured this out: I let the oil heat up for a while, then I took a turkey/meat thermometer and stuck it in the oil. This thermometer only went up to 220, so basically when the needle fired up towards 220 and looked like it was going to keep going I figured it was hot enough.
Working in batches (and letting the oil heat back up in between) fry the potatoes, turning them occasionally to cook evenly. When they are golden brown use a slotted spoon to put them on a paper towel lined wire rack and season with salt.
