Pulled Beef Burger with Sweet Potato Fries

Preparation: 8h

Cooking time: 6-13h

Level: Easy if you have patience

I have lived in the U.S before, currently I live in Helsinki. One of the things I miss the most, is good American food. Unfortunately this is very hard to find here. So a lot of my cooking right now is influenced by American food and ingredients.

The other day I had friends over for dinner, and decided to make them a pulled beef burger with sweet potato fries. I wanted to make pulled pork, but they only had beef shoulder at Stockmann. I had never made pulled beef before, I decided to give it a shot and it turned out amazing!

My inspiration for the pulled beef recipe, came from Kevin & Amandas blog (pulled pork), however I made some changes to it. That's basically how I always do it. Find inspiration from several sources, then make my own twist. 

Now we were only three people for dinner, so it didn't make a lot of sense to by a huge piece of meat. I counted about 200grams/person --> 600grams of beef. The shoulder (lapa) I bought didn't have the bone attached, so I asked for separate pieces of bone to put in the marinade + in the oven.

Preparation

The evening before dinner I make the Dry rub and the Marinade. The dry rub is basically made by mixing all ingredients together and putting them in a container. Now most BBQ fans would have a freak attack seeing I use Cajun spices. Personally I love it, Tony Cachere is the best, since they don't sell it in Helsinki (only Stockholm) you can use any Cajun spice available in the stores. Check if they add salt. If there's no salt in your Cajun spice, add a little.

Dry Rub

1 tbsp ground Jeera (juustokumina)
1 tbsp cajun/creole spice (Tony Cachere)
1 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp chili powder
1 tbsp cayenne pepper
1 tbsp ground pepper
1 tbsp paprika
1/2 cup brown sugar

Marinade
1dl coarse sea salt
1dl brown sugar
2l cold water
3 tbsp dry rub mix
2 bay leaves (laakerinlehti)

Put the entire piece of meat, with the bones, in a bowl and cover it with the Marinade. Let it sit over night in the fridge (at least 8h). The next morning, take it out, dry it and let it sit for a while (2h). Save the marinade. Meat shouldn't be put in the oven cold, so let it become room temperature first. Once the meat is about room temp and dry, rub it, cover it, massage it with the dry rub. Really get the spices working. 

Cooking the meat to perfection

Heat the oven to about 110C. Be careful not to make the oven too hot. Sometimes the temp. scale is inexact at low temperatures. Put the meat and the bones in a pan (with edges) and in the oven. The meat will start to give away liquid. When you make pork there's so much fat that protects the pork you don't really need any liquid. However with beef, the meat is much leaner. See that about half the piece of meat is covered in liquid at any given time. I turn the meat around every 2h, and if it seems like the liquid is drying away , add some of the marinade. 

Continue this process until the meat is about 93C (at least 6h, the bigger the piece the more time it takes). Check the meat to make sure it feels soft, if it still feels rubbery, leave it a while longer. Finally let it cool to 72C, and then pull the meat apart to shreds with two forks.

Add some additional dry rub to it, mix it, put it in a bowl ready to serve.

Sweet potatoes

Now sweet potato fries are the best and simplest thing in the world. All you have to do is, peel the sweet potato, cut it in sticks, and fry them. I don't use a frier, I just use a large skillet/pan and fill it with about 2-3cm oil. Vegetable or "rypsiöljy" is best. Then fry the sweet potato sticks (it goes pretty fast) until they are golden brown and soft on the inside. If you want a healthier version, put them in the oven instead. Works just as wonderfully. When they are go cooked, sprinkle sea salt, and my secret; cayenne pepper on them. Ready to serve hot!

  Making the final touch

What to serve on the burger? Pickles (buy the good kind! Myrttinen is best here), Jalapenos, lettuce, onions if you like. As cheese I feel the best to go with pulled beef is Gruyère. I also make a very simple burger sauce to cut the heat and saltiness. Recipe is below.

Start by mixing greek yoghurt and about 2tbs of olive oil. The oil just helps with the acidity and consistency of greek yoghurt. Add the spices, chop thyme and add that last. Let the sauce sit for 10-15min and it's ready to serve.

Burger Sauce

2dl Greek Yoghurt
Salt & Pepper
1-2tsp BBQ sauce
1/2 garlic clove (or 1 small)
Olive oil
Fresh thyme

And the bun? In this case the meal was gluten free, so I bought some frozen ones. I still haven't managed to bake good gluten free buns. Working on it... You can obviously make your own, or buy buns. Just don't buy those disgusting dry classic burger buns every store carries. Think out of the box and buy a really fresh good quality bun to roast.

Enjoy a fantastic burger!