The Philosophy of Food, Issue #028: Moroccan Turkey Burgers

I let the folks pick the recipe this time.  Or, rather, I volunteered to make what they had decided on anyway.  The recipe was Moroccan Turkey Burgers from page 122 of Cooking Light.  (July/August 1999).

The Ingredients
-1 cup chopped onions
-1/3 cup ketchup
-1/4 cup pitted green olives, chopped
-1/4 cup dried currants or raisins
-1 tsp. grated lemon rind
-1 tsp. cumin seeds
-1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
-1/8 tsp. black pepper.
-1 pound ground turkey

The Process
First off, the recipe makes four burgers.  I doubled the recipe (still only made four) but there's leftover meat enough for at least four more (maybe five or six).

The process for making this are. . . very simple.  Essentially, mix all the ingredients in a big bowl, form the mixture into patties, and cook them in a skillet that has been lightly coated with olive oil.

Just a pile of delicious ingredients, minding its own business, when suddenly. . .

BLOODY KETCHUP!

It smells lovely, but looks like dogfood.

Sizzle, sazzle.

The problem with ground turkey is that there is pretty much no visual cue that it's fully cooked. . .

The Results
I don't care for ground turkey.  I like neither the flavor nor the texture.  As such, I wasn't really thrilled with this dish.  It might, however, be fantastic with, say, ground lamb.

The folks reported that I made it well and made it right, so there's that.

One thing to note is that the patties are very. . . fragile.  Ground turkey is not very stable to begin with, and adding all the stuff to it just adds to its tendency to fall apart.  The folks regard it a splendid success that none of my patties disintegrated.
 

And we're done.

A cut away view. . .

The chef revealed!