Hello again everyone! I’m back, and last week, I tried out another recipe: hamburgers. During an interview, one of my best friends (who is a competitive swimmer) told me that his favorite food was the Wendy’s Baconator. Just from the name, I could tell that the nutrition facts for the “Wendy’s Baconator” were going to be abysmally unhealthy. I began to look into the sandwich the next day, and I was appalled at what I found.
According to Wendy’s nutrition facts and calorieking.com, the Baconator contains about 950 calories per sandwich, as well as 95% of the total fat one needs in a day, and 120% of the saturated fat (menu.wendys.com). While there were some positives—such as the high iron and protein levels—the majority of the nutrition facts were atrocious.
This inspired me to attempt a Baconator transformation. The only problem with this was that this was the week of Passover.. During Passover week, the dietary law is that I may not eat or use yeast or leavening agents. I have written another post all about cooking during Passover, but the bottom line is no yeast means no bread.
"You made healthy hamburgers? No way. How?" - Member of the Senior Class
Since I could not use bread, I decided to let people try the patties only with some cheese. There are alternatives to bread (such as lettuce wraps), but I decided that tasting only the meat would help people to focus on only that flavor.
In my new patties, I used ground flank steak. The normal cut of beef used for burgers is chuck steak. However, during my research, I discovered that chuck steak has about twice the fat and saturated fat, and 100 more calories than flank steak. Also, there was less protein in chuck steak than flank steak.
Into my patties, I also added egg, flaxseed, honey, chopped scallions, lemon juice, sea salt, pepper, and gochujang sauce. Gochujang sauce is a Korean hot sauce, and goes into almost every single savory food cooked in my house hold. I then cooked my patties on a stovetop, in olive oil.
I also changed regular bacon out for turkey bacon. One good reason for doing this is that my family does not eat or use pork, but another good reason for doing this is that turkey bacon is (obviously) healthier than regular bacon. It is much less fatty than pork and lessens the risk for any food-borne illnesses.
The response to my burger patties was amazing. You can get hungry high school seniors to eat virtually anything, but my classmates really enjoyed the burger patties. Again, many of the comments consisted of ones such as “Miriam, these burgers taste better than anything at Wendy’s or McDonald’s”. The turkey bacon added another even more flavor, a crunchiness and saltiness that added another dimension to the burger’s flavor.
All in all, I believe that these burgers were a huge success. It is also a bit mind-blowing to me that there is a way to make burgers healthier that they are at fast food restaurants. I believe that, the next time I make these burgers, I may try bison. Bison is also a lean and flavorful meat, and its smokiness would pair well with the spices I use. Although, for now, I will move on to my next food endeavor: fried rice.
Image Citation (Baconator): Jackson, Erin. “Reality Check: Wendy's Son of Baconator.” Serious Eats , aht.seriouseats.com/assets_c/2012/07/07072011-214271-wendys-son-of-baconator-beauty-shot-1-thumb-625xauto-256278.jpg.
Recipe:
2 lbs. ground flank steak
1 tbsp. Gochujang
1 tbsp. Pepper
2 tbsp. Salt
4 tbsp. Chopped Scallions
1 tsp. Honey
1 egg
2 tsp. flaxseed
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