Insane In The Brain: Jamie Oliver’s Insanity Burger

I’ve been reading The BBQ Book by Christian Stevenson AKA DJ BBQ, one of Jamie Oliver’s pals from across the pond.  His enthusiasm for BBQ is infectious and I’ve already trialled a couple of recipes like the grilled pineapple salsa.  Anyhow, more on that book in a later post.

Last week surfing the tubes I noticed DJ BBQ was cooking on Jamie’s new comfort food show as they made a dish Jamie refers to as his Insanity Burger, featured in his most recent publication Comfort Food. 

I love the return to simplicity that burgers are experiencing at the moment as it makes the focus about the meat rather than the toppings.

There’s no need for me to re-write the entire recipe, you can find that here, I’ll just write about anything I did a bit differently.

The meat is the absolute most important part – treat your burger with respect, either mince your own beef or pick a cut that you have your butcher mince for you.  Do not use store bought mince.

I went with some beef brisket as the butcher was out of chuck, this has a fairly similar profile to chuck – for burger patties you want a roughly 80/20 meat/fat ratio to ensure sufficient moistness.

Cook on charcoal if at all possible.  This recipe can be done in your kitchen, but it will make me happy if you cook on charcoal plus your burger will taste better so it’s win-win.

The mustard and chipotle mix that is brushed on during the cook is something I haven’t come across before but will certainly use for future burgers as it added some killer crust and bark to the patties.

I had just made my first smoked cheddar the day prior so I used that rather than the red leicester recommended.

Brioche buns are clearly all the rage at the moment as the shop had sold out of them, but when I was at the markets I spotted these awesome looking pretzel rolls so gave them a run instead.

For your burger build you’ll want to use a ladder to optimise your Jamie Oliver dropping from a height technique.

These burgers were killer – so freakin juicy.  If you don’t own a dog, borrow one for the night or you’ll likely be mopping burger sauce of your floor.  Dogface Grillah scored some sweet floor treasure as a result of this recipe.

In fact, these burgers were so good I’m going to just repost that same goddamn photo from the top again so you can marvel in its beauty.

Give it a try and send me photos if you do.

Holler if you need to borrow Dogface Grillah for the evening.