Burgs in the Big City

I wish I could say that I created this. A tuna tartare burger with a side of sweet potato tots. It was excellent.

Relocating to a new state, a new city, makes cooking in the home kitchen tough. Especially when home is a temporary, cramped apartment. And not the best of appliances to work with. The stove top gets way too hot, and the oven does too ... and the oven thermometer seems to be lying about that fact. So the baked goods have been a little on the dry side, and there's a lot of boiling-over on the stove top going on.

Maybe it's just another lesson for a beginner cook. Appliances are all different, with their own quirks and nuances.

By the way, I miss Earth Fare (a bit better than Whole Foods, in my opinion), Clean Catch (Charlotte is truly lucky to have such a high quality fish market), The Secret Chocolatier, Great Harvest Bread, Dilworth Coffee (especially the people behind the counter), Daphne's Bakery (in Mint Hill), and especially the Matthews Farmer's Market (again, Charlotte/Matthews is lucky to have such a high quality, year-round farmer's market).

That said, I have gained an abundance of new restaurants to choose from. One of the specialties/obsessions here seems to be the all-mighty burger. There's Flip Burger Boutique for one, where I went pescatarian with the tuna burg above. And there are a lot of really good veggie burgers, too. Farm Burger and the World Peace Cafe both have delicious, non-soy (watching the soy intake; there's too much soy in everything these days) veggie burgers that are just as hearty and tasty as the all-American beef kind (yes, really, Steve!).

Also, aren't those great names ... Farm Burger, Flip Burger?

And, lastly for this post, here's a veggie burger I made in my own lowly apartment kitchen. It's a concoction of whatever was on hand ... pinto and cannellini beans, mushrooms, onions, etc. Pretty good in a pinch, but not as good as a Peace Burger by any means.