Middle Eastern Spiced Lamb Burger

My husband and I didn’t have children, we had a restaurant. For twelve and a half years we poured body and soul into Cleonice Mediterranean Bistro in Ellsworth, Maine. We worked closely with local farmers, fishermen, and food artisans, doing our best to support our local community. We made great friends, beautiful food, and had a lot of fun.
 
As Rich and I rediscover ourselves as our own beings outside of the all-consuming restaurant, we have time to share our recipes and reminisce about Cleonice.
 
Our passion for great cooking and support local foods is as strong as ever. What we have always loved about Mediterranean cuisine is the simple expression of the flavors of the region, the concept of terrior if you want to get fancy. The way the food of a region expresses the place. The recipes are bold and full flavored, but not too intricate or involved. Bringing this philosophy home, using local ingredients to create our own versions of the cuisine is a fun, healthful, and delicious experience. One I’m happy to share with you. 
 

The Lore of the Lamb Burger at Cleonice

 
Many a customer has said “I always want to try something else for lunch, but can’t say no to the lamb burger.” While we certainly also had customers who said the same about the spinach salad, our lamb burger was our number one seller at lunch through the years. The flavorful Maine-raised lamb mixed with garlic and spices, grilled to a juicy medium rare and served in a slightly sweet pita with tzatziki and feta sauces only came off of our menu once, very early in our years and the outrage was instantaneous. We would change-up our lunch menu seasonally, trying to keep things exciting and fresh for us and our customers, but the lamb burger was a staple (or an addiction) that couldn’t be denied. After that first time, year two I think it was, it never came off of the menu.
 
So for Angie, for Mona, for you
 

Grilled Middle-eastern Spiced Lamb Burger

 
 
 
1 pound of ground lamb (preferably locally raised)
2 tsp Aleppo pepper
1 tsp cinnamon
3 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 Tablespoon finely minced fresh mint (preferably Egyptian)
1 Tablespoon of olive oil (pomace) for cooking
sea salt and pepper to taste
 
 
 
Pound garlic with a pinch of coarse salt in a mortar and pestle to release the flavors and create a paste. 
 
 
 Add mint, Aleppo, cinnamon, garlic, pinch of sea salt, and pepper. Aleppo pepper is the heat in this recipe, if you are sensitive to hot, dial it back. Don’t add too much if you like things hot, you want to heighten the flavors, not mask them. 
 
 
Mix the ingredients well with clean hands. Rich would taste the mix raw, we trusted our farmers. You might want to make a small taster to make sure you’ve got the spices right, it’s also a special treat for the chef! Take a small piece off, make a mini patty with about half an ounce of mix and fry it off. Once you’ve tasted it, you can adjust your seasoning. After adjusting your seasoning, separate the lamb into four even size balls and form into patties. 
 
 
Lamb burgers are best on a grill, but it’s the dead of winter now and my grill pan will have to do. Always start with a hot pan to avoid sticking  — or if you’re grilling make sure your grill is hot and the grate clean of debris. Add olive oil (for frying like this don’t use your fancy extra virgin olive oil, use the pomace oil). Put your burger patties in the pan, and allow to cook for about four minutes.
 
 
After you have a good crust on the first side, flip the burgers. You will likely need to press down on the patties with your spatula to make sure the interior of your burgers cook. The cooking lamb tends to shrink, and the burgers become more spherical as they cook, pressing down on them makes sure they don’t become too round. Often, at the restaurant we would cut the burgers in half towards the end of cooking in order to get the centers closer to medium rare, plus, the half burgers fit better into the pita. 
 
The burgers will take about four minutes on each side to cook. 
 
Serve your lamb burger with some crunchy romaine lettuce on a pita of your liking with tzatziki and feta sauces to add as you eat. Enjoy.
 

Notes: 

 
Pita: At Cleonice, one of the few things we did not make from scratch was the pita. It was even more of a tender place for Rich and I, because the pita we brought in was so non-traditional. It is sweet and a little cakey, thick and flavorful. Our customers loved it, we like a more traditional pita, but the sweetness is delicious with this savory burger. Father Sam’s Pita, we used the 8 inch pita are available online. 
 
For this burger I made my own flatbread at home. The recipe is simple and close to pizza dough. I chose one with some yogurt in it to ensure a chewy consistency and a little tang.  I used this Recipe but used regular yogurt and all white flour. 
 
I experimented with other pita recipes and have yet to be successful making pocket pitas at home, but I love the taste of these, and like wrapping my sandwiches instead of stuffing them. The dough also keeps well in the fridge for a couple of days so you can tear off a chunk, let it rest, form it, and then cook it in a cast iron skillet so you have fresh flat bread at will. 
 
Lamb: In sourcing lamb locally during winter I was shocked at the prices. At the restaurant we had watched the price inch it’s way up over the years and struggled to keep our lamb burger price in the customer acceptable range. When I started looking around for this post, the first local ground lamb I found was $17 a pound. Finally we found some at $12 for this recipe. I don’t know if it’s the time of year but I would suggest going direct to farmer for your lamb during spring and summer and putting some in your freezer for the winter. 
 
 
 
 
Cary Hanson

About Cary Hanson

My husband and I didn't have children, we had a restaurant. For twelve and a half years we poured body and soul into Cleonice Mediterranean Bistro. We worked closely with local farmers, fishermen, and food artisans, doing our best to support our local community. We made great friends, beautiful food, and had a lot of fun. As Rich and I rediscover ourselves as our own beings outside of the all-consuming restaurant we have time to share our recipes and reminisce about Cleonice.