food on friday

A couple of weeks ago, we had a family over for dinner on a last minute basis, and ended up serving pizza. The topic of "which local pizzeria has the best pizza" came up, and they admitted that they rarely eat pizza out as she makes her own.

I am feeling like a slacker all over the place! I used to be one of those people who made her own pizza, including the dough. I decided that I really need to get back to that model. I will try to share my efforts on a weekly basis on Friday, just because I am a sucker for alliteration.

One of my least-favorite chores (and it's a long list) is deciding what to have for dinner every night. I beg my family to give me ideas, just tell me what they want -- within reason -- and I will cook it for them. Most times they are content to remain mum until I put dinner on the table, and then either complain bitterly that they don't like what I made, or point out that we had the same dish about ten days ago. 

Yes, my children do need some education in gratefulness.

Joan, my husband's office manager, is lucky enough to have a son that is a professionally-trained chef. When I am really devoid of inspiration, I will pick her brain about what Josh has made recently. Chances are I have the same ingredients at hand because we shop at the same supermarket and tend to pick up the same bargains.

Like this week. I had a package of sliced mushrooms left over from last week's sale, that I had forgotten to use last week. They needed to be used pronto, and Joan shared this recipe that Josh had made over the weekend.

Mushroom Turkey Burgers
ground turkey (my package was 1.3 lb)
package of mushrooms chopped in food processor
light sour cream (2/3 C or appropriate amount for meat quantity)
seasoned breadcrumbs (1.5 C or appropriate amount for meat quantity)
chopped shallots
chopped celery (1-2 stalks)
salt and pepper to taste

(I have to explain here that I didn't have shallots, because we are not inclined to such fancy food at my house, so I used a small onion. I wouldn't recommend this substitute because the onion overwhelmed the subtle flavor of the mushrooms.)

The mixture smelled heavenly going together.

Because of the addition of the extra ingredients, I ended up getting ten patties out of that amount of meat. Per Josh's recommendation, I froze the extra five.

The burgers smelled even more heavenly on the grill and looked lovely on their little healthy whole wheat buns.

The thought that mushrooms were hiding in those burgers and I didn't have to hear my kids complain about the presence of mushroooms made them even more attractive. I thought they tasted delicious, too. With one exception, my family didn't agree, and helped me remember why cooking for these boys can be such a pain:


Primo (unenthusiastically): “Hmmm, tastes like meatloaf.”

Secondo: “Tastes OK, I guess." (Seeing the look on my face): "Well, pretty good. I guess."

Terzo (my favorite child at the moment): “This is the best burger I’ve ever tasted!"

It would serve them right if I made them Hamburger Helper next time.