Irene's Salmon Bacon Burgers

Irene whipped these up with some provisions we had in an otherwise bare pantry from frozen salmon filet, bacon, and some burger buns I'd made. The smokey bacon worked really well with the salmon which is frequently smoke-cured too. A rustic salad of arugula from the garden rounded out the al fresco dinner.

Ingredients

6 ounces Salmon filet, frozen
6 ounces Bacon, smokey
1 whole Shallot, cut into a few pieces

Procedure

If you don't chill the Bacon first it will schmear so cut into cubes and freeze for about 30 minutes to firm up.
Process the Bacon until it looks like ground beef.
Cut the thawed Salmon into chunks and process it and the Shallot with the ground Bacon as little as possible, so it too looks like coarse burger meat.
Gently form into 2 patties pressing just enough that they come together.

Grill on ripping hot cast iron sizzle pans (fajita pans): these release a lot of fat from the bacon and you don't want that dripping onto the flames and incinerating your burgers. Flip when browned on the first side to brown the second. Repeat until it's cooked through. Lightly toast the split buns.

Results 

The texture was great, the smokey aroma immediately enticing, and texture quite good -- toothsome, burger-like with a slight crust. The proportions of salmon to bacon were good, nothing dominated. We were concerned that the fish would feel dried out, but the combined meat was moist. As it cooled, it felt a bit more dry and we thought it could use a garlic-tartar sauce or something.

Next time

I'd whip up an aioli tartar sauce to slather on the buns as soon as they came off the heat.

The buns I made were designed for big beef burgers and they may have been a bit substantial for the more delicate fish/bacon; somewhat more delicate buns would work, but certainly not something as insubstantial and nugatory as commercial burger buns.