Getting Creative With Hamburgers

The ground beef is thawing, the charcoal is lit, but the kids take one glance and say blah! So let's get a little creative with our hamburgers.

1. Add some chopped up garlic cloves or garlic powder
2. Have croutons? Crush, make crumbs and mix into ground beef
3. Ever tried adding Lipton Onion Soup or powdered Ranch seasoning, taco seasoning?
4. Leave squares of cheese inside and pinch off the meat around it
5. Onion powder
6. Worcestershire sauce (not as a topping but as an ingredient) or Soy Sauce
7. Mustard
8. Green onions, or any kind of chopped-up onion
9. Bits of bacon or pepperoni, parsley and a little pepper

10. Soy sauce, Quick Oatmeal, Italian seasoning, an egg, Parmesan cheese, a squirt of BBQ sauce, salt and pepper. Fifteen minutes or so to rest and absorb flavors, make patties and grill 'em. Add cheese to desired taste. Use the Quick Oats for an extender, and for a flavor saver. Instead of losing all of the fluids to the grill, the oats retain fluids and keep the patties moist even if they are cooked through and through.

11. Make your patties 1/2 as thick as usual...then put some pizza sauce and mozzarella cheese on 1/2 of the patties. Take the plain ones and place on top of the decorated ones. Seal off the edges. Voila . . . Pizza Burger.

12. Add onions, mushrooms and cheese. Saute. Flatten the ground beef and drop in onions, mushrooms and shredded cheese. Take another flattened-out hamburger patty and lay on top. Press the edges closed. It's best to do this in a cold skillet so that they don't have to be moved till you flip them, or you can put on a baking sheet with aluminum foil and no flipping involved.

13. Hamburgers: Dinner Party Style . . . Brown the ground beef, season to desire. Roll out a few crescent dough rolls and place cooked, cooled meat in middle. Wrap crescent rolls around, brush with butter/garlic mixture and put back into pan until crescent is lightly browned- DELICIOUS!