Dziadziu's Hamburgers

Tastes and smells can bring back memories faster than anything else. My grandmother was a good cook, but I most remember the one thing, the only think I've ever seen my grandfather, my dziadziu, cook: hamburgers.

These were not the flame grilled burgers from a box you might see on a grill today. These were griddle cooked patties reminiscent of what you'd find in a diner. The stove my grandparents had included a built in griddle between the two sets of burners. Whenever we came for a visit and saw the white cover plate removed, revealing the steel surface with six circular brown stains where the burgers always cooked, we knew we were in for a treat. That griddle was only ever used for hamburgers!

The burgers were simplicity themselves.

ground beef (don't get fancy with this. Plain old ground beef is best)
yellow onions
salt & pepper
hamburger buns

Peel the onions, and slice them into disks. Do not separate the rings. Form beef into golf ball sized chunks. A little bigger is OK, but don't make them too big. Place the onion slices on a flat surface so that the rings nest inside each other like stacked bowls. Yes, this does make a difference: upside down and the onions will fall apart. Salt and pepper the onion slices.

Place a ball of meat on each slice, and press into the onion, forming a flat patty. The meat should just reach past the edge of the onion slice. Salt and pepper the top of each burger.

Onto a heated griddle or frying pan (cast iron is always best) place the burgers onion side down. Now you wait. Don't fiddle wit them or try and flip then too soon. You want that onion to cook through and brown, a good 5-7 minutes. If the first one you flip isn't quite there, hold of on the rest and give them a couple of minutes more. Once all burgers have been flipped onion side up, cover each with the top of a bun and let the burgers cook and the buns steam in the juices for another 4-5 minutes.

Remove each burger/bun from the griddle and place on lower half of bun.

You can dress these as you see fit, but they don't need anything. Try them plain. The flavor of the simply season beef infused with the onion is delicious enough. We would devour these as kids (yes, even with onions, which usually turns kids off) and the memories stick with me still.

Submitted by Rich, from The Northwoods Notebook

Tobblin's fish chowder

I like a nice fish chowder.
My Recipe is not traditional though.
What you'll need for this, is;
2 16oz cans of cocoa nut milk.
2 16oz cans of low sodium or no sodium chicken broth.
one medium onion, diced fine.
five clean, large fine diced celery stalks.
half lb of crab meat, ( fresh, or imitation crab, but no canned crab )
1 lb of nice medium or large cleaned and shelled shrimp.
about half cup of freshly smoked salmon thats been flaked.
2 tablespoons of Thai green curry paste.
6 red unpeeled, but cleaned potatoes, diced in about half inch chunks.
teaspoon of garlic powder.
Dill weed.
Lemon.

This recipe is so simple it does all the work.
Saute the onion in butter or olive oil with the garlic powder added, add in the celery, when onions start to caramelize, add in taters and lightly brown them.
While you are lightly browning your potatoes,( you want your taters cooked done )
put into a soup kettle, ( big ) your other ingredients, starting with the cocoa nut milk, and the green curry, let simmer until this milk and the green curry is blended smoothly. add in your chicken broth, the salmon flakes, then when your potatoes are finished, drain any extra oil away from them, and put them into the soup.
next, bring to a boil, ( add water when needed ) you want your potatoes to break down slightly.
once they have began to break down, add in the shrimp, and crab meat, and add enough water to cover the added ingredients. Let this come to a slow heat and make sure you are not scorching the bottom of the pan, by keeping it stirred.
When the shrimp are done, the soup is done.
when the soup is done, give it a taste for needed salt, if it needs some, carefully add in more, you don't want to over power it with salt. If it has too much salt, sprinkle a tiny bit of sugar in it, to try and balance your flavour.
before serving, sprinkle in fresh dill weed, and a drop or two of lemon juice to taste.

Additionally, this soup can have corn added in it, which does okay, but I prefer it without.
You can garnish with fresh spinach leaves, or a sprig of fresh dill.
This soup serves well with garlic bread, and a green salad.