A Tale of Two Burgers

Sunday morning found me at our local Farmers’ Market, shopping for nectarines and peaches and tomatoes…and who should I run into at the nectarine and grape stand, but my good friend Pat. Pat’s from working class Pennsylvania, but he’s got a certain savoir-faire sensibility about him, from time spent living in London and an apt. in Paris.  Deep down, though, Pat comes from his Italian roots, and has a deep respect for all things pasta and really fresh produce. We meandered over to the stand with the basil, and he said he was going to make some pesto for dinner. Mmm. Pesto.

We don’t have pesto much around here. It’s not Ted’s favorite, nor Maya’s. You could go so far as to say, they hate pesto. I don’t know what kind of commie freaks I live with, but no pesto for them. Between that and their hatred of beets, I sometimes wonder why I live here.

I came home on Sunday, and brightly told Ted that we were having pesto for dinner. “You hate me”, he replied. As if I had brought a big furry cat into the house. So, here I was, with a big bunch of basil in my hand, pine nuts given to me by Pat, and some mighty fine Parmigiano Reggiano in my fridge. What to do?

I started thinking about a blog post I read last year over at Bleeding Espresso, where she made a very yummy breakfast of pesto served on a big slice of tomato. Mmmm. Nothing like August tomatoes from the farmers’ market. So, I thought, so what if they don’t want pesto? They won’t care if I eat it. They don’t care when I eat beets, and I don’t care when they eat mangoes. So I decided that even if they don’t want pesto, I’m going to make it, and eat it however I choose.

Then, I came across a post on Michelle’s blog, about how to make an awesome burger. She suggests a burger with cheese, green chilis, and ham. Mmmm. Green chilis. I like green chilis.  Hmmm.  Burgers…there’s a thought…

Can you see where this is going? Sure you can, esp since I have a picture up there of my results. A burger, sliced in half….Half with a green chili and cheese (no ham, sorry, too weird), and half with pesto instead of ketchup and mustard. Both sides with a big slice of heirloom tomato and a toasty hamburger bun. 1 part green chili & cheese burger + 1 part pesto burger = 2 parts yummy.