Having a burger

A burger on open garden day, cooking notes and eating notes

Hello! My name is Rebecca May Johnson, I am a writer and cook and this is my Substack. This week’s newsletter is about having a burger on open garden day, with cooking notes and eating notes.

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Having a burger

On Sunday the residents in my coastal town opened their yards and gardens to the public. We left the house at 11am and walked to the pier where the tickets and programmes were being sold by members of the town’s ‘society’ – volunteers who maintain and staff sites of varying historical importance. The words ‘Another H––– Society Voluntary Project’ are hand painted on buildings and signs throughout the town. ‘Another’ adds a feeling of mild aggression or at least resentment to the signs which I am sure is not intended. The society’s volunteers always seem happy in their work.

As we made our way to the pier I realised I was hungry; I had eaten a good breakfast, but breastfeeding makes me especially animal in my appetites. I gnash my teeth and make a noise like a dog sometimes to describe my hunger to my partner. After buying tickets to the gardens I thought I would buy an ice cream, even though an ice cream was not really what I wanted – because it it was 11am and not time for lunch yet, and because it seemed practical to carry an ice cream as we walked around the gardens and I couldn’t think what other food was portable. But I had forgotten the white trailer serving rolls, burgers and sausages that is parked on the waterfront most days.

As we approached, I could smell frying meat and onions. I walked on past and went to see if the ice cream hatch attached to the cafe on the pier was open, but despite it being a sunny Sunday in July and despite the cafe itself being open and despite it being a key day in the town’s event calendar with far more people walking its streets than usual, it was closed. I asked an employee if it was opening today, and she said ‘no’. I complained about this to S, who told me to go to the ice cream trailer which is parked next to the trailer selling savoury food and is run by the same family. No one was manning the ice cream trailer when I got there but they had a sign up saying to order next door, which I then set out to do.

At the savoury trailer I quickly changed my mind in favour of something substantial that was reflective of my actual hunger and stood in the queue reading the cold rolls menu. Cheese, cheese salad, ham, ham salad, etc. I could ask for ham and cheese salad? I really enjoy cheese and /or ham salad rolls. Sliced tomato, sliced cucumber, lettuce, possibly cress, ham, grated cheese. But then as I stood waiting to order a cold roll, I could smell frying and felt the return of the desire that had been aroused a few weeks before when a fellow attendee of the town library baby group told me about eating a burger from the trailer.

I had been sitting in the moderately glitzy cafe on the pier which had recently taken over by the moderately glitzy hotel on the street behind the pier. Although average in the extreme and somewhat awkwardly served in takeaway boxes even if you eat ‘in’ – taking up an excessive amount of table space and making for a cramped eating experience – their pizzas are nonetheless an improvement on the food served by the previous operation, which served overpriced and – on the one occasion I went there – disgusting, breakfasts. When I arrived in the town a few years before, there was a different person running the pier cafe and you could get sandwiches filled with crab caught in the surrounding waters and good quality greasy spoon type dishes, and it was much better. You could also buy dressed crab and other cold seafood to take home from what is now the (closed) ice cream hatch.

I saw the woman from the baby group walk past us as we sat inside the cafe eating pizza and I fed our baby on my lap. I wasn’t sure if she’d seen me but a few minutes later she came back and said hello, and that she was getting a burger from the trailer. She sat with her mother on a bench on the pier eating the burger and feeding her son. I like his woman and I was intrigued by her choice. The burger was unexpected. She is a gardener and perhaps I thought she would only eat plants? The van’s most visible regular customers are motorbikers who zoom along the river road. Anyway, since she told me about eating the burgers they have appeared in my mind on a semi-regular basis. Her choice of the burger created a desire that would not be resolved until I too had eaten one.

There were three people working in the savoury trailer: the white-haired man who does the frying and is always there, his blonde wife making rolls, and his blonde daughter who was serving drinks and going back over to the ice cream trailer when required. The daughter asked if I wanted something from the refrigerator while I waited to order and I asked for a water and thought about rolls. But when the white-haired man asked me what I wanted I suddenly gave in to my fixation and ordered a cheeseburger. He man took a well-caramelised patty from the side of the plancha and put it in the middle with two slices of cheese on top. After about a minute he asked me if I wanted onions. I wasn’t sure and paused to think – in general I prefer raw onions in a burger and cooked ones in a hotdog, but they did smell very good – and I said ‘yes’ and he said ‘good girl’. He put the soft cooked onions on top of the cheese and then I also said ‘yes’ to ketchup and mustard. I said ‘no’ to having it wrapped up, and received the burger in napkins. I began eating it immediately. As I walked away I saw him peel the paper from pale pink uncooked patties and put them on the plancha. They were about 1.5 inches wider in diameter than the cooked burger in my hand; I guess they shrink when the fat renders out on the heat.

The burger was neither very delicious nor bad – but it was enjoyable. The caramelised meat was quite flavourful, though less seasoned than I had hoped. The cheese could have been more melted and I reflected that I might request one slice of cheese instead of two next time. Then again, requesting that kind of change might not really be the thing to do. After all, the man had not asked me how many cheese slices I wanted, but he had asked me if I wanted onions and sauces, indicating that those areas were up for discussion, but that the amount of cheese was not.

We headed to the first garden listed in the leaflet and I continued eating. We walked round the back of an apartment building following the signage and descended into a sunken garden that I had not known was there. My dad’s friend lived in this building until last year, when he died. I wondered if he came to this garden – he liked beautiful things. I ate my burger and smelled the pale pink roses, highly scented, heads dipped.

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Cooking Notes

All of these dishes were cooked in a low-effort way after putting the baby to bed.

Roast Chicken

In recent years S and I have alighted upon our absolute favourite way to roast a chicken. I cooked it this way this past Monday. I pre-heated the oven to its top temperature, around 220 C (fan). I rubbed a tablespoon of olive oil all over the chicken (which weighed 2kg). Then I rubbed it all over with a teaspoon of fine sea salt (or possibly more maldon). I put it in a roasting tray that was a bit bigger than the chicken so I could add some potatoes later in the cooking process. I cooked it in the high heat for 30 minutes, turning it around in the oven after 15 minutes. It was then very browned all over. I turned the heat down to around 180 C (fan) and covered the breast with a square of foil and cooked it for another hour. I added potatoes around the chicken after it had cooked for 45 minutes. I wiggled the legs to decide if it was cooked - when they were wobbly and relaxed I took it out.

I have realised that mostly, I just want a roast chicken to taste of chicken. When I make it I do not want it to be roasted with garlic or lemon or herbs which adulterate the chicken flavour and often burn. Cooked in this way it has (so far) never failed to be moist and delicious. We ate it with the potatoes which were half-squidgy with chicken juices and half crispy on top, cooking juices spooned over, and green salad of round lettuce with a dressing made from Dijon mustard, olive oil, red wine vinegar, salt and pepper. I first had salad and chicken together in this way – chicken juices and sharp dressing intermingling – in the early 2000s when the idea was suggested to my mother in one of Nigel Slater’s books. It quickly became established.

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Broad beans, peas, courgettes and spring onions

Last Friday I boiled a small courgette that had been halved lengthways then sliced half a cm thick, a few handfuls of broad beans, and a few handfuls of peas in salted water until tender. Then I tossed them with three spring onions that had been sliced then softened in butter and olive oil. I stirred through a tablespoon of parsley and served with grated parmesan, a drizzle of olive oil, salt and pepper. We ate it with a chicken Kyiv. S was in raptures about the vegetables.

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Courgette and bread salad with anchovy dressing

I cooked some small courgettes on the griddle pan – sliced lengthways, around 1/2 cm thick – until they had dark brown griddle lines on them. In a pestle and mortar I made a dressing by pounding up 6 anchovies, 1 large clove of garlic, olive oil, the juice of a lemon, salt and pepper, and abundant chopped parsley (3-4 tablespoons) stirred in at the end. I cooked some slices from the end of a sourdough loaf on the griddle pan until they had some colour, then tore them up into rough pieces of around 1inch cubed. I tossed everything together – the dressing, the courgettes, and the bread. We ate it with a steak shared between us, cut into slices.

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Lamb meatballs with currants in tomato sauce, with roasted peppers and skin-on wedges

I pre-heated the oven and put skin on wedge-cut potatoes in a little olive oil in a roasting tray in to cook. I put in two red peppers on the rack to roast at the same time.

I mixed 500g of lamb mince with 1 grated medium onion, 2 tablespoons of currants soaked in boiling water, a teaspoon of chilli flakes, 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, 1/2 tablespoon of toasted cumin seeds, generous salt and black pepper. I shaped them into balls of c.1.5-2 inches in diameter and left them to rest.

Then I started the tomato sauce of several garlic cloves sliced and fried in olive oil, then added a a tin of tomatoes, a bay leaf, a tablespoon of honey and a tablespoon of vinegar. I simmered it together for 5-6 minutes before adding the sealed meatballs (see next step).

In a separate pan I coloured the meatballs all over by frying them in a little oil then put them into the tomato sauce and let them finish cooking by gently simmering in there for around 15 minutes, turning occasionally. I adjusted the honey and vinegar to my taste for a sweet-sharp (but not overpowering) effect.

I peeled the roasted peppers and dressed with vinegar and olive oil. I removed the wedges from the oven when cooked and seasoned with salt.

We (me, S, and S’s brother) ate everything together with shop bought allioli.

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Eating notes

I went to see the writer Constance Debré speak at the London Review of Books a few weeks ago. Her book Love Me Tender was one of my favourites of 2023. I realised there was a 45 minute window when I could eat before the event (I would have to dash off afterwards to make the train back to Essex). It was barely 6pm so I thought I would chance Cafe Deco in Bloomsbury where I have eaten twice before and only once on my own dime. I had some pecorino and broad beans with a piece of bread, then a plate of artichokes with calves liver and fried sage, with a glass of chilled and slightly fizzy red wine. The next table began talking to me and suggested I offer my broad bean husks to their dog, which I did. He expressed interest but did not partake. Then I ran, actually ran, to the book event and arrived very sweaty, but it was worth it.

A container of chips from my local chipshop, Pieseas, who cook in beef dripping. One of my favourite foods.

Coq au vin and rice cooked by my friend’s mother in law, the night before my friend’s wedding.