Spanakopita Burgers

Submitted by raisdbywolvz

"This is THE best recipe in my collection. Whenever I make this, the house smells so good, everyone wants to stay for dinner. When I take leftovers to work and heat them in the microwave, the lunch room smells delicious and everybody wants what I have. Sometimes I smell this dish when it's been over a week since I've made it, which means I must drop everything and make it! Sometimes I can smell this when I'm making something else. It's a curse, but one I'll happily bear. :) Adapted from a Rachael Ray recipe. Prep time does not include the time to drain the yogurt."

 

• Ready In: 30mins
• Ingredients: 15
• Serves: 4

ingredients

• Burgers

• 453.59 g ground chicken breast
• 1 small onion, finely chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, minced
• 566.99 g frozen chopped spinach, defrosted and wrung out (2 boxes)
• 170.09 g feta cheese, crumbled
• 118.29 ml breadcrumbs
• 1 egg
• 14.79 ml steak seasoning (I use Grill Seasoning)
• 29.58 ml olive oil, divided
• 4.92 ml salt

• Tzatziki Sauce

• 453.59 g plain low-fat yogurt
• 1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and finely chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, pasted
• 1 lemon, juice of
• 4.92 ml salt

directions

1. Make the tzatziki sauce first so the flavors have a chance to meld. If you drain the yogurt first, your sauce will be super thick and delicious. Combine all sauce ingredients, stir well and refrigerate.
2. You can either buy drained yogurt (known as Greek, Hungarian or Bulgarian yogurt, and maybe you can find it under other names, it's all the same, and it's very thick) or drain your own. I drain mine by putting it into a coffee filter over a deep container and popping it into the refrigerator for about 24 hours. All of the liquid will drain out and the yogurt will be super thick. I start with 16 ounces and it drains down to about 8 or 10 ounces, which is perfect for the 4 patties the recipe makes. Discard the liquid.
3. To paste the garlic, mince it finely then add a bit of salt to the pile. Lay your blade flat on top of the pile and, with the heel of your hand, apply pressure and push down and away. The salt will act as an abrasive and break the bits of garlic down. After a couple of minutes of this, the garlic will be a paste. Once the garlic is a paste, it will go all through the yogurt smoothly without leaving chunks.
4. Now, to the patties. In a large mixing bowl, combine ground chicken, onion, and garlic. Squeeze all the water out of the spinach and separate it as you add it to the bowl. Crumble the feta cheese into the bowl. Add the breadcrumbs, egg, steak seasoning, salt and 1 tbsp of olive oil. Mix it all together so that all the ingredients are evenly distributed, but don't overwork it.
5. Form the mixture into 4 patties and drizzle each with the remaining olive oil, turning to coat both sides.
6. Brown the patties in a medium hot skillet, about 6 minutes on the first side, and about 4 minutes on the 2nd side. You're looking for a nice brown color on each side. To get the best color, once you put them in the skillet, don't move them until you're ready to flip. Your nose will tell you when they're ready.
7. If you use a non-stick skillet, the olive oil you've drizzled over the patties will be sufficient and there will be no need to add more oil to the skillet.
8. Warning! Your house will smell phenomenal!
9. Serve the patties with a Greek salad, some warm pita bread, and the tzatziki on the side.

Reviews

[Santi Zilcan]

I just made this very very tasty and healthy recipe for dinner. It is amazing, it really will be a <br/>regular in my cooking from now on. Great for dinner or snack or lunch. The only different thing I had to do is to use parmesan cheese instead of feta bc I did not have it today.<br/>The aroma in the house makes me eat more, it is soo nice.<br/>Thanks for a great recipe.

 

[Silent Whispers]

These were tasty. I wished I had not listened to the other review and put in all of the spinach. I LOVE spinach. Next time I will. I served with pita bread brushed with olive oil and heated up in a skillet. The sauce was excellent.

 

[gnome woman]

the reason I gave this 3 stars is that there was too much spinach, and I am a spinach fan, I would only use 10 oz of spinach next time.....the taste of the meat was not there. also, we did them on the BBQ and it worked out well....the sauce was great.