Spinach and Feta Chicken Burgers (aka Spanakopita Burgers) with Grilled Halloumi, Roasted Red Peppers and a Spinach and Feta Sauce

Spanakopita is a tasty Greek phyllo spinach and feta pie and I was thinking that the flavours would also be amazing in burger form; just perfect for summer grilling! I kept the patties nice and simple and yet packed them with flavour starting out using chicken for the base, though turkey would also be good, and I mixed in plenty of spinach and feta, along with some dill and green onions. Now these spinach and feta patties are super tasty just like this and I could easily eat them alone, or in burgers with lettuce, tomato and red onion as I had planned but I could not resist kicking things up a bit.

First off, I feel that every good burger should have bacon but it did not really fit the theme of these burgers so I went for the next best thing, grilled halloumi, which is almost as good as bacon and also an ingredient commonly seen in Mediterranean cuisine. Up next was a no brainer, roasted red peppers; and with that I thought that I was done but something kept nagging me... where was the cheese sauce? <spookyvoice>This burger needs a cheese sauce...</spookyvoice> Alright so I added a cheese sauce, a spanakoptia themed cheese sauce, starting with a bechamel base adding plenty of melted feta along with spinach and dill. With that final component my spanakoptia themed burgers, aka my spinach and feta chicken burgers with grilled halloumi, roasted red peppers and a spinach and feta sauce, were complete!

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Roasted Broccoli, Ham and Cheddar Grilled Cheese

Up next for my leftover Easter ham is something nice and simple and yet oh so good, a grilled cheese sandwich; pure comfort food! Ham and cheese is a fabulous and broccoli and cheese is another, so why not combine the two? That's right a broccoli, ham and cheddar grilled cheese sandwich! I was not about to stop there either, I roasted the broccoli to bring out even more of it's flavour before adding it to the sandwich! I then finished the grilled cheese off with a touch of grainy mustard to give it some bite! Cheese, broccoli and ham is such a magical combination of flavours and it is perfect in grilled cheese form! If you are fresh out of leftover Easter ham you are going to have to run out and get some ham, along with the broccoli, but it is so worth it for these roasted broccoli, ham and cheddar grilled cheese sandwiches!

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Pineapple Char Siu Pulled Pork Sliders

Pulled pork is definitely up there as one of my favourite foods and the other day when I was enjoying some char siu, a Chinese BBQ or roast pork, I thought that the char siu flavours would be amazing on pulled pork! Char siu sauce is primarily hoisin sauce and Chinese five spice with some staples like soy sauce, honey, garlic and ginger thrown in. I wanted it to be a bit more like a BBQ sauce which needs some heat so sriracha was required! When I was thinking about what I was going to use the pulled pork in, sliders were the first thing that came to mind and pulled pork sliders just scream for some slaw. With the Asian flavours going on, my mind wandered to pineapple and I figured that the juicy, sweet and tangy pineapple would pair perfectly with the rich and spicy BBQ pork. Of course adding some pineapple juice to the char siu BBQ sauce would also help tenderize the meat! Next up was what kind of buns to use for the sliders and King's Hawaiian sweet rolls were a perfect fit as their sweetness would complement the char siu BBQ pork and the tangy pineapple nicely! I have to say the the char siu pulled pork works really well and these pineapple char siu pulled pork sliders were definitely a hit!

Throwing an Oscar's party this weekend? These would be perfect for it!

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Apple BBQ Pulled Chicken Sandwiches with Apple Slaw

After making the roasted apple bbq sauce I couldn't help but use it on something other than simple grilled pork tenderloin medallions and these tasty bbq pulled chicken sandwiches were up next! The idea for these bbq pulled chicken sandwiches came from one of my favourite slow cooker recipes the slow cooker bacon wrapped apple bbq chicken, I mean you really can't go wrong with tender chicken in a sweet and tangy bbq sauce along with apples and bacon and placing it all in a sandwich with a tasty apple slaw only makes it better! Although I used my roasted apple bbq sauce, any bbq sauce will work since additional apples go into the slow cooker along with the chicken and they melt into the sauce infusing it with apple-y goodness. The bbq pulled chicken filling is as easy to make as throwing everything into the slow cooker so the only real effort required for these sandwiches comes in making the apple slaw, but it is so worth it!

Whenever you have a bbq pulled meat sandwich it is always nice to throw something into the mix to help cut through all of the flavours and a crisp, fresh apple slaw is the perfect way to do it for these pulled apple/bacon bbq pulled chicken sandwiches! I kept the apple slaw really simple with apples and cabbage and instead of placing it in the more typical mayo based dressing I used a lighter maple dijon dressing which I made creamy with the addition of some Greek yogurt. This slaw is sure to please, and disappear quickly, no matter how you use it but the apple and maple dijon combo perfectly complements these apple bacon pulled chicken sandwiches!

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Moussaka Patty Melts

With the cooling weather I have been thinking about cold weather dishes more often like moussaka, a Mediterranean casserole consisting of layers of meat in a tomato sauce, eggplant and a bechamel sauce. During the summer I made some burgers inspired by moussaka and given my fascination with grilled cheese sandwiches I could not help but think that a moussaka patty melt would also be great! For this sandwich I start out with patties of ground lamb seasoned simply with a bit of garlic and cinnamon, topped with a layer of grilled eggplant, a simple and yet tasty tomato sauce and of course plenty of melted cheese! Speaking of cheese, I went with a Greek cheese, graviera, which melts well so it is perfect for grilled cheese sandwiches. When I made the moussaka burgers I used a bechamel sauce which is a bit to wet to go inside a grilled cheese sandwich but it does go great as a topping along with some extra tomato sauce!

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Texmex Hot and Brown

Up next for my roast turkey leftovers was a hot brown sandwich which I had been wanting to try for a while. The hot brown sandwich is a take on welsh rarebit where toast is served topped with roast turkey, tomato, bacon and a mornay sauce that is broiled until the mornay sauce is bubbling and golden brown. While I was researching the hot brown sandwich I came across the idea of a Texmex style hot brown sandwich on Homesick Texan which sounded much more interesting than the original and I just had to switch tracks and make it instead! This Texmex style hot brown uses a mornay sauce that is spiked with green chilies and it is topped with tomatoes, bacon, guacamole and crumbled cotija cheese and it makes for one really tasty meal! If you are looking for a way to enjoy some of your roast turkey leftovers you really cannot go wrong with this Texmex style hot brown sandwich!

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Roast Turkey Cobb Sandwich

Although planning the Thanksgiving dinner is always fun I have even more fun planning on how to enjoy all of the leftovers! I usually start with the turkey breast which is perfect for sandwiches and up first this year is this monstrous roast turkey sandwich inspired by the cobb salad with layers of lettuce, tomato, bacon, avocado, blue cheese, roast turkey and an egg. A cobb salad normally uses hard boiled eggs but I really could not resist going for a fried egg, sunny side up, for that amazing runny egg yolk! I have to say that this is one of the tastiest roast turkey sandwiches that I have had in a while! The only problem is how to get your mouth around it! :)

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Pesto Guacamole BLT

This has to be one of my favourite times of the year with all of the fresh field ripened tomatoes around and my favourite way to enjoy them has to be in a BLT or a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich. BLT sandwiches never get boring and I like to experiment with them adding different things. Two of the best ways to go are with a BLT with basil mayo or a BLT with avocado or guacamole and so when I made the pesto guacamole I knew that I would have to use it in a BLT! You just cannot go wrong combining fresh rip tomatoes, basil pesto and avocados with bacon in a sandwich! I will definitely be enjoying a lot of theses pesto guacamole sandwiches over the next few days!

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Moussaka Burgers

With the long weekend coming up I have been thinking about grilling and in particular about these moussaka burgers. Moussaka is a tasty Mediterranean dish that is typically made with layers of eggplant, meat, a tomato sauce and a cheese bechamel sauce and I have been wanting to try making burgers with these flavours for a while now. I started the burgers off by making a tomato sauce with the hints of cinnamon and allspice that moussaka often has and then I moved on to make a simple bechamel sauce with plenty of melted melted cheese. Up next were the patties which I kept nice and simple, once again seasoning with hints of cinnamon and allspice, and the last component was slices of eggplant that I grilled along with the patties.

All said and done these burgers are amazingly good and they definitely taste like moussaka, only better! These burgers take a bit of time to make but you can easily make the sauces and patties a day ahead and then just warm the sauces and grill the patties and eggplant of the day of your get together with minimal effort. I served the moussaka burgers with a fresh Greek salad.

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Moroccan Chicken Manchego Melt

I must be going through withdrawal, everywhere I look I see grilled cheese sandwiches including in the moroccan grilled chicken sandwich with preserved lemon tapenade and harissa mayo! Luckily I had some of everything from the sandwiches leftover and I was just itching to turn them into a grilled cheese sandwich! With the filling already decided, the moroccan grilled chicken, green olive tapenade with preserved lemon, pickled onions and harissa, that left only the cheese and I figured that I would go with a Mediterranean cheese, manchego. As you might guess just from reading the ingredients, this is one tasty grilled cheese sandwich that is just packed with flavour and it is sure to satisfy your grilled cheese cravings!

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Moroccan Grilled Chicken Sandwich with Preserved Lemon Tapenade and Harissa Mayo

When I made the Moroccan grilled chicken the other day I made a double batch because I wanted to ensure leftovers so that I could make some sandwiches. I am sure that some of you saw something like this coming when I wrote about the green olive tapenade with preserved lemon and pickled red onions since I always use ingredient recipes in another recipe shortly after. This sandwich has been on my mind for a while and it is just packed with flavour from the Moroccan grilled chicken, lemony and salty tapenade, creamy and spicy harissa mayo and tangy pickled red onions all of which is on a bed of tender baby spinach leaves in whole grain bread. This is definitely one tasty sandwich and it is well worth the effort of making the ingredients!

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Teriyaki Shrimp Burgers with Grilled Pineapple Salsa, Bacon and Blue Cheese

I have been completely enamored by homemade shrimp burgers ever since I first tried them a short while ago and since they have been on my mind a lot I had to make some more! One combo that I particularly enjoy is juicy shrimp and a sweet and salty teriyaki sauce which goes fantastically well when wrapped in bacon and grilled on skewers along with some sweet and tangy pineapple and I was thinking that a burger version would be amazing! I kept the shrimp patties pretty simple with large chunks of shrimp, a few seasoning including garlic, ginger, sesame oil and teriyaki sauce, in addition to some breadcrumbs to help hold things together. Although you could easily use a store bought teriyaki sauce it is so easy to make your own and doing so gives you the opportunity to customize it for the dish that you are using it in like in this case where you use pineapple juice. I filled the burgers out with some bacon and instead of using slices of grilled pineapple I kicked things up a bit and went with a grilled pineapple salsa. I often like to include a cheese in my burgers and after thinking about it for a while I came to the conclusion that a touch of creamy blue cheese would go perfectly well with all of the other flavours going on in these burgers! I might just have found my new all time favourite burgers in these teriyaki shrimp burgers with pineapple salsa, bacon and blue cheese and I have to admit that I made them two times last week!

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Pad Thai Shrimp Burgers

My next tasty new burger this grilling season is inspired by the flavours of shrimp pad Thai, aka shrimp pad Thai burgers. As many of you know, I am a huge fan of pad Thai and I always enjoy using pad Thsi flavours in different dishes and with burgers being on my mind a lot lately it struck me to combine the two. Pad Thai, a stir-fried noodle dish, can be made with any meat but my favourite has to be shrimp and a shrimp burger patty sounded like a fabulous idea. When I think of a shrimp burger I think of large chunks of juicy succulent shrimp bursting in your mouth with every bite and not some kind of texture-less shrimp patty so I decided to start with some fairly large shrimp and to cut them into a few big pieces. The only question was how to hold those large chunks of shrimp together and the obvious solution seemed to be to grind up a small portion of the shrimp in a food processor and to use shrimp to hold the shrimp chunks together. I do not really like to use 'fillers' like egg and breadcrumbs in burger patties so these shrimp burgers are simply large chunks of shrimp held together by some shrimp paste along with a few pad Thai flavours including garlic, shallots, fish sauce, lime zest and cilantro.

Up next was the condiments for the pad Thai burgers and I had to start with the sauce. Pad Thai is normally made with a tasty sauce consisting of sour tamarind, sweet sugar, salty fish sauce and spicy chilies so that is where I started but this sauce is a little too thick for what I wanted so I thinned it down a bit with the addition of some coconut milk. I could have stopped there with the sauce but I could not resist adding some peanut butter, which is not commonly used in pad Thai, but since pad Thai is often topped with chopped peanuts I figured adding some more peanut flavour could only make things better. I filled the pad Thai burgers out with some of the vegetables in pad Thai including bean sprouts and shredded carrots along with plenty of fresh cilantro and I finished them off with some chopped peanuts and crispy fried shallots.

I have to say that these tasty shrimp pad Thai burgers exceeded all of my expectations and that the pad Thai flavours work really well in burger form! I was also really pleased by how well the shrimp patties tuned out! The texture of the large chunks of shrimp was quite amazing and I am looking forward to making many more shrimp burgers in the future!

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Buffalo Chicken Burgers

With the warmer weather here I have been thinking about grilling more and burgers definitely come to mind! When I went over all of my burger recipes I noticed a glaring omission; where were the buffalo chicken burgers? I am a huge fan of all things buffalo chicken and it is always a treat to grill up some buffalo chicken burgers in the summer. I like to start my buffalo chicken burgers off by grinding some boneless and skinless chicken in the food processor to which I add some buffalo chicken flavours including carrots, celery, onions and blue cheese in addition to the buffalo hot sauce. In general I like to avoid fillers like egg and breadcrumbs in burgers which means that the patties are a little more delicate but as long as you flip them gently they still hold together quite well. Once the patties are assembled all that is left is to grill them until cooked and slightly charred before serving them up in a bun with your favourite condiments. For buffalo chicken burgers I like to keep the condiments simple and my faourite topping is a blue cheese slaw whether it be a cabbage slaw or as in this case a broccoli slaw. These tasty buffalo chicken burgers are all set to impress at your barbecues this summer!

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Strawberry BBQ Chicken Club Sandwich with Bacon, Avocado and Goat Cheese

Armed with my shiny new roasted strawberry BBQ sauce I was ready to use it on something grilled! Before I had even made the strawberry BBQ sauce I was already thinking about using it in a grilled chicken club sandwich with lettuce, tomato and bacon in addition to the grilled chicken and the BBQ sauce. Even though the sandwich would be great just like that I really could not resist kicking it up a bit! I find that a creamy and tangy goat cheese tends to go really well with fruity sweet and spicy sauces like this strawberry BBQ sauce so I had to include some and a chicken club sandwich always benefits from some cool and creamy avocado! The flavours in this grilled chicken sandwich meld together magically and you will definitely be licking you fingers clean after eating one! With grilling season about to begin these strawberry BBQ chicken club sandwiches are a great way to kick things off this upcoming long weekend!

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30 Amazing Grilled Cheese Sandwiches

April is the National Grilled Cheese Month and it has been full of tasty grilled cheese sandwiches but unfortunately it is coming to an end. During the last month 10 all new tasty grilled cheese sandwiches were added to Closet Cookings already rather large collection bringing the total to almost 60! With this being the last day of April I thought that it would be a great opportunity to roundup the best of those grilled cheese sandwiches and it only seemed appropriate to gather the top 30, one for every day in the National Grilled Cheese Month. It was difficult choosing only 30 but here you have them!

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Taco Grilled Cheese Sandwich

This will be the last new grilled cheese for the National Grilled Cheese Month and it is possibly the tastiest, the taco grilled cheese. The basic idea is to take all of the flavours of taco night and stuff them into one rather large grilled cheese sandwich! This sandwich starts with some taco seasoned ground beef made with a homemade taco seasoning and then it continues with the classic taco toppings including salsa, lettuce, tomato, sour cream, guacamole and it is of course finished with plenty of melted cheese! With all of those ingredients this is one large sandwich and with the salsa, sour cream and guacamole in there it can be one messy sandwich. Feel free to omit the salsa and sour cream from the sandwich and serve them on the side for dipping and it is also fun to serve this grilled cheese topped with them along with the guacamole and eating it with a knife and fork. This sandwich is definitely a nice way to celebrate the upcoming Cinco de Mayo in grilled cheese style!

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BBQ Pulled Pork Grilled Cheese

The National Grilled Cheese Month is coming to an end soon but I still have a few grilled cheese sandwiches up my sleeves including this tasty BBQ pulled pork grilled cheese! In my opinion it is hard to go wrong combining succulent pulled pork in a sweet, tangy and spicy BBQ sauce and then smothering it in ooey gooey melted cheese! BBQ pulled pork sandwiches are often served with the addition of a cool and creamy coleslaw right in the sandwich and I see nothing wrong with adding some to the grilled cheese version either, though it does make for a slightly messier sandwich. The next time you make some pulled pork, make a lot to ensure that you have some leftovers for these BBQ pulled pork grilled cheese sandwiches!

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Chicken Fajita Grilled Cheese

Up next for National Grilled Cheese Month is a sandwich that is inspired by both a bar room staple and plain old family fun meal, chicken fajitas! Chicken fajitas are seasoned, grilled chicken, sauteed peppers and onions served with fresh tortillas and condiments like shredded cheese, salsa, guacamole, and sour cream. The ingredients for chicken fajitas are typically served separate at the table so that you can construct your own, the way you like it, and who doesn't like to make their own meal at the table? These fajitas grilled cheese are not served to construct 'as you like' at the table but you can certainly make them 'as you like' by filling them with what you want from just the seasoned grilled chicken and sauteed peppers and onions to fully loaded with the salsa, guacamole and sour cream. I like to fill the sandwich with just the seasoned grilled chicken and sauteed peppers and onions and serve it with the with the salsa, guacamole and sour cream on the side for dipping but loading them all up into the grilled cheese is also good! The next time you make chicken fajitas, make a double batch so that you can make these chicken fajita grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch the next day or forget waiting and just make a batch for these grilled cheese sandwiches!

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Sloppy Joe Grilled Cheese Sandwich

My next grilled cheese sandwich for National Grilled Cheese Month combines two childhood favourites, sloppy joes and grilled cheese, for one really sloppy sandwich that is kid approved! Sloppy Joes are a quick and easy meal consisting of a ground meat in a sauce that is served in a bun and as its name suggests it can be a little messy to eat. I figured that you really could not go wrong taking the filling of one already tasty sandwich and throwing it into a grilled cheese sandwich with plenty of ooey gooey melted cheese and golden brown, toasty and buttery bread! This is one of those cases where taking two things results in something that is greater than the sum of its part and this is one truly tasty grilled cheese sandwich! Like the sloppy joe, this grilled cheese can be a bit messy but it is definitely worth it! The next time you make sloppy joes, make extra for sloppy joe grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch the next day!

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