Independence Day At Almost Heaven South

Our original plan, to celebrate America’s Birthday on the dock, got changed due to rain and I was happy to move to the house considering an alternative now being experienced in the American West.  We decided on a very traditional meal of burgers, beans, and potato salad and, as usual, I went to your blogs for our meal recipes and had two that were recently posted. 

For the beans, I used the recipe posted by Mary at Deep South Dish for Baked Bean Medley  except I used her crockpot instructions rather than heat up the house with the oven.  I followed her recipe as written so just click on the link to view it - in addition to the Bush's Baked Beans, we used the canned beans we had on hand: kidney, black, cannellini.

When Chris at Nibble Me This posted his recipe for Pimento Cheese Burgers, it really spoke to me – I love homemade pimento cheese.  Please click on the link for the recipe, which we followed as written, except we used all cheddar cheese.

For the burgers, I adapted Chris' recipe for the ingredients we had on hand, added one, and up sized for our crowd.

Independence Day Burgers – Adapted from Nibble Me This

4 lbs. ground beef

1¾ tsp. salt

7/8 tsp. black pepper

1/3 tsp. onion powder

1/3 tsp. garlic powder

½ tsp. Worsey Sauce

Mix all ingredients and shape into eight half pound burgers (it was a celebration you know).

Being the anal guy that I am, I made a little menu (spreadsheet) for everyone to fill out with their burger options (it had the gridlines showing):

Burger Orders Grilled  Toasted Doneness Cheese Bacon Onion Bun R, MR, M Below Y/N Y/N Y/N Bonnie Laurie Beverly Pat Madison Bill David Larry None Cheddar Provolone Pimento

As usual, I got the burgers about one level more done than requested.  I need to use the charcoal grill with it's hotter fire to be able to get an outside crust quick enough to not cook the inside as much then move to indirect to finish cooking.  Rounding out the meal was delicious potato salad provided by our guests.  Check Chris' site for a good burger shot.

We also had some chips with queso and guacamole dips, several adult beverages, and peach cobbler with ice cream for dessert.  The cobbler, made with a recipe from Allrecipes, seemed to be a big hit.

As expected, I thought everything was very good and thank Chris and Mary for their fine recipes and Bonnie for the potato salad.  Good food and good company made for a fine way to spend our Independence Day.  

Perhaps we should have offered a Publix Italian sausage dog as a burger alternative - it was awesome a few days earlier.

Photos best if enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

Larry

7/4/2013 meal date