From: The Simpler The Better by Leslie Revsin
Serves: 8
Difficulty: Way easy
People In The Kitchen: 2
Cost: Moderately expensive, around $10 for all ingredients
Prep Time: 5 minutes with helpers, 10 minutes by yourself
Cook Time: about 8 minutes
Sides: Pineapple chunks
Dessert: Chocolate chocolate chip cookies

Ingredients:

4 medium-large garlic cloves, minced
6 tbsp olive oil
2 loaves of Italian or French bread
2-2.5 lbs ground pork
4 tbsp chili powder
8 slices mozzarella cheese, each about 1/4 inch thick

1. Mix garlic with 4 tbsp olive oil in a small bowl. Cut bread into 3-inch sections. Split horizontally and turn cut sides up. Spread garlic oil over bread using the back of a spoon. Toast under a broiler and keep warm.

2. In a large bowl, sprinkle pork with chili powder, 1.5 tsp salt, and 1 tsp pepper. Combine with fork. Form into burgers.

3. Heat remaining oil in large skillet over medium high heat. Add burgers and brown bottoms until crusted, 3 minutes. Turn over and reduce heat to low. Lay cheese on burgers, cover skillet, and cook 4 more minutes. Set burgers on bread bottoms and drizzle with pan juices. Cover with tops and serve.

Reaction: This recipe got rave reviews from my community group, and they were still talking about it a week later. It is safe to say they’d give it a “11″ on a 1-10 scale.

Group Size: Works best for 5-10 people, depending on gender + appetite. It easily fed 7 hungry girls, with some leftovers, but you would have to double (or triple it) if there are a lot of guys in your group.

Group Involvement: I had 1 person slice the bread, and prep it with butter and garlic for broiling. I mixed up the meat and made the burgers.

Alterations: I used shredded mozzarella cheese instead of slices. And, instead of using the olive oil/garlic spread, I opted to spread butter on the bread, sprinkle on some garlic powder, and broil it in the oven. When the bread looked nice and brown, I took it out, sprinkled mozzarella cheese on it, and put it back into the oven until the cheese was melty and slightly bubbly.

If I made this again: I would use more pepper. I also wouldn’t use any olive oil in the pan when I fried the burgers–it made a drippy, oily mess, and didn’t taste all that great.

Leftovers: I froze the leftover pork burgers.  To reheat, I put them in the microwave and defrost on about 20% power for 2 minutes.  Then, I fry them in a pan, make some garlic bread, and yum! sandwich!