this recipe hails from our friend rachel, the covelo librarian, who made them w/ her friend juliana in Sao Paulo. lets just say we've planted extra mint around the yard to ensure an endless supply for this dish! for meat eaters, this is shear hedonistic pleasure! vegetarians may want to skip this one... or substitute tofu and fry in sesame oil?
5 cloves garlic -minced
1/4 cup spearmint -minced
1/2 lb ground buffalo (or meat of choice)
Tapatio
Garlic, spearmint and buffalo all go in a bowl and get mixed together (i squish em up w/ my fingers). massage them for 1-2 minutes (if your a bit squeamish in the raw meat arena, you can skip massaging and just mix w/ a fork). let rest 5 minutes (really the flavors are getting a little mingle time).
Heat up your pan to a med-high heat. while waiting, shape the meat into small oval-shaped patties, about 2” x 1 1/2” and a half inch or so thick. we eat our meat medium rare (only recommend if you are eating organic, grass fed meat) so slam your patties into the hot pan, put a lid on the situation and give em two minutes before flipping to side two. at this point i like to gently press down each patty w/ the spatula then put the lid back on & wait another two minutes before removing carefully w/ a spatula.
Put your fancy patties directly onto a serving platter and get everybody scrambling to the table (not a bad idea to give a little heads up when side two is happening). according to tradition, douse them in hot sauce (Tapatio, oh yeah!) and not according to tradition, serve w/ homemade pickles, plenty of 20$ mayonaise and a side of cook your own damn chips. lately, we can’t get enough of these little treasures!