Our Holiday Weekend – Indoor BBQs & Fantastic Chicken Burger Recipe

Christian Delbert – Fotolia.com

I love to cook, but this time of year I hate turning on the oven or stovetop and heating up the house. As much as I don’t want to be outside I also don’t want to heat things up indoors. My solution? Late dinners cooked on the BBQ and eaten indoors.  We wait until 7pm or so, when things start to cool down and send one victim volunteer out to do the cooking while the rest of us hide out in the A.C.

My husband had to work on the civic holiday, so the girls and I headed over to my parents for a little BBQ. We tried out one of the summer-time recipes from the Canadian Living site — Zesty Chicken Burgers. YUM. They were fantastic.  We had them with dijonaise and homemade guac. So tasty!

Here’s the recipe as taken from the Canadian Living site:
Ingredients:
1 egg
1/4 cup (50 mL) dry breadcrumbs
1 small onion, grated
2 tbsp (25 mL) chopped fresh chives or green onions
1 tbsp (15 mL) grated lemon rind
1 tbsp (15 mL) lemon juice
2 tsp (10 mL) Dijon mustard
1/2 tsp (2 mL) salt
1/4 tsp (1 mL) pepper
1 lb (454 g) lean ground chicken 
Wonder+ SimplyFree hamburger buns

Preparation:
In large bowl, beat egg with fork. Mix in bread crumbs, onion, chives or green onions, lemon rind and juice, mustard and 1 tbsp (15 mL) water. Season with salt and pepper, as desired. Mix in chicken until combined. Shape into six 3/4-inch (2 cm) thick patties.

Place on greased grill over medium-high heat. Close lid and cook approximately for 6 to 7 minutes per side. 

My notes:
I used a generous amount of chopped fresh chives. I hate grating onion, so I just finely diced it. I doubled the Dijon mustard, because I love Dijon! I skipped the lemon rind. I also omitted the salt to make these friendly to my dad’s low-sodium diet.

The recipe suggested topping them with leaf lettuce leaf ranch dressing and cucumber slices.  We opted instead for Dijon mustard, mayo and fresh guacamole.

Raw patties with “thumb indents” in them, waiting to go out on the grill.

Since I was BBQing at her place, my mom taught me a trick.  She told me to make thumb indents in the centre of each burger, to help them cook evenly.  I tried it and it did seem to work. The thumb prints disappeared as they were cooking, and the burgers were quickly and evenly cooked throughout.

I have tried making turkey or chicken burgers in the past, never with any success. They are always dry and flavourless. I’ve finally found a recipe that works. These were moist juicy chicken burgers, that didn’t fall apart on the grill. I think next time I might try the same recipe but with ground turkey.  The kids loved it. I had set aside one patty to split between the two of them and it wasn’t enough, both girls were clamouring for more.

My dad volunteered to tough it out outside and he BBQ’d up the yummy patties I created.

The chicken burgers were perfect on the new Wonder+ SimplyFree buns.  I tried these for the first time this spring, and I’m hooked.  I love the taste. They taste just like classic Wonder Buns, which to me always means BBQ, hamburgers and sloopy joes.  They are the same Wonder Bread hotdog and hamburger buns that you know and love, but now made with unbleached wheat flour and free of high fructose corn syrup, artificial preservatives, flavors and colours. Totally yummy and a huge hit with everyone in my family.  I love giving them to my kids, knowing they are a healthy choice, and I love that my dad who is on a low-sodium diabetic diet can eat them.

Super yummy chicken burgers. Can’t wait to have them again!

I’ve been enjoying the Wonder+ SimplyFree buns so much, I certainly can’t see shelving them at the end of BBQ season.  These are definitely going to be my bun of choice when making sloppy joes, or tuna melts.  Speaking of which, they have a pretty tasty looking tuna melt recipe on the Canadian Living site, along with the Chicken Burgers I made, and a few others. You can check out their “Simply Better with BBqs” recipe collection here.

How are you guys beating the heat?   Sitting in the kids wadding pool, or hiding out indoors? Are you still barbecuing in this weather?

Disclosure – I am participating in the WONDER+ SimplyFree program by Mom Central Canada on behalf of Weston Bakeries.  I received a gift card and free product coupons as a thank you for my participation.  The opinions on this blog are my own.