Turkey and Sage Burgers

Turkey and Sage Burgers
Home Cooking

As unlikely as it sounds, I 'accidentally' picked up a bunch of sage while grocery shopping on the weekend. It's not a herb I often use and I could have very well been stuck pondering over what to do with it, before following my usual strategy of spending $xxx to use up something that cost a lot less. Luckily, inspiration struck and I ended up pulling together a mishmash of what I had available.

I'd been meaning to make turkey burgers for a while, inspired by Donald Trump's version that was featured on Oprah. I never got around to following that particular recipe because I couldn't find pear chutney but I figured there's no reason why I couldn't develop my own pattie mixture.

I ended up combining turkey mince with grated Granny Smith apples and chopped sage and garlic (along with a few other indredients to bind the mixture) to make some little patties. This post will show them used as burger patties, inside mini turkey sliders. Because I made so many patties, I used them in a variety of ways, including as wrap fillings and as a protein base to simple turkey bolognese sauce. The pasta sauce recipe will be posted later.

Turkey and Sage Burgers
Makes 16 mini patties

Ingredients:

• 500g lean turkey mince
• 1 egg
• approx 1/3 cup fresh sage, roughly chopped
• 2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
• 1/3 cup breadcrumbs
• 1/4 cup wholemeal flour
• salt and black pepper to season
• burger bun, fresh salad and cheese to serve

Procedure:

1. Using your hands, combine the turkey mince, egg, sage, garlic, breadcrumbs and flour in a large bowl. If the mixture is too wet, add some more breadcrumbs. Season with salt and pepper.

2. Form the mixture into small patties about 5-6cm across and not too thick (less than 1cm).

3. Heat up some olive oil in a frying pan on medium heat.
4. Cook the patties on one side for about 5 minutes (when golden on one side) before flipping to cook the other side.
5. Serve with preferred burger fillings on a bun.

I ended up frying all my patties in one big batch (I had 2 large frying pans simultaneously on the go), freezing what I wasn't going to eat this week and refrigerating the rest. As I mentioned above, I used some of them for making turkey bolognese. I microwaved them as needed.

Oozy cheesy goodness

For my turkey burgers, I opted for mixed salad leaves, sliced tomato, sliced red onion and a sprinkling of alfalfa sprouts. To jazz up the burger patty, I layered on some vintage cheddar cheese and microwaved it to melt the cheese before placing the patty in the burger.

I don't often eat turkey mince so I admit the flavor was a bit strange to me. Once I got used to it, it wasn't half bad! Besides, don't they always go on about how turkey is meant to be leaner than other meats? If I'm going to be eating burgers during the week, a health perk is always welcome for easing the conscience.