Stuffed Burgers with Heirloom Tomato Ketchup
It’s pretty hard to decide who is the star of show when you’re looking at a swiss and bacon stuffed burger with heirloom tomato ketchup. I’ve been making variations of stuffed burgers for years and I have to say that swiss and bacon is my favorite because the firm texture of swiss cheese holds up really well through the cooking process and doesn’t completely melt and disappear into the burger.
I found a recipe for homemade ketchup years ago and tucked it away for a rainy day. We’ve had a lot of those lately so this weekend seemed like the perfect opportunity to play with some beautiful little heirloom cherry tomatoes that I found at the farmers market. The original recipe called for roma tomatoes and you could certainly use those but the colorful, sweet heirlooms made the sauce much more interesting and I took it one step further by roasting them first with a little olive oil and a touch of kosher salt. Yum!
This ketchup isn’t a full bright red because of the blend of red, yellow and orange tomatoes. To get a bright red ketchup just stick with a more traditional tomato and you will still have a delicious homemade ketchup. You will never want to top your burger with a bottled sauce ever again. Promise.
The burgers are simple, I use an 80/20 blend of ground chuck for lots of flavor. The stuffing is a quick blend of chopped bacon and red onion cooked until just done and then scooped on top of one thin patty that has a nice thick slice of Swiss cheese as a base. One more slice of Swiss to enclose the filling, then another thin patty of beef to seal the deal. A little salt and pepper, grill and serve on a toasted bun with the heirloom tomato ketchup.
I served with my Parmesan fries…so delicious!!!
Old Fat Guy
May 29, 2015
Talk about kicking burgers up a notch. Food is always better when you take care to use great ingredients. The ketchup sounds divine!
The Old Fat Guy
Chris
May 29, 2015
I hope you try the ketchup recipe soon, I really think you will love it!