Martha Stewart's Secret For Light Fluffy Fish Burgers

While you may know Martha Stewart for her well-rounded knowledge regarding all aspects of entertaining, gardening, and healthy living, she has also become renowned for her innovative recipes. Martha Stewart has a knack for taking simple ingredients and adjusting them ever so slightly to add her own unique element of flair to make her recipes truly distinct.

If you're a fan of fish burgers, you may want to give your usual salmon burger with dill cream cheese topping a rest and give Martha Stewart's signature fish burger recipe a try. Apart from using a different variety of fish other than salmon, the award-winning cook takes extra attention when handling her chosen pieces of hake or cod. 

For perfectly tender burgers, Stewart recommends first cutting the hake by hand into small chunks and then chopping the raw sections into extra small pieces before mixing the fish together with the other ingredients. In finely cutting your fish with a knife, you maintain the structural integrity of the raw filets, leading to perfectly tender and flaky fish burgers each and every time. Apart from hand cutting, how else are Martha Stewart's fish burgers unique in comparison to other traditional fish burger recipes?

You might want to replace your usual spicy fish and slaw sandwich with Martha Stewart's fish burger recipe. Given the fact that these simple patties only require a handful of basic, yet flavorful ingredients, they may be your new preferred way to enjoy fresh seafood. In order to make Stewart's fish burgers, you need hand-chopped hake filets, eggs for binding, mayonnaise, bread crumbs, capers, chives, and olive oil.

Before you mix all of these ingredients together and add salt and pepper, you need a bit of time to prep the necessary condiment: pickled red onions. Not only do they add a definitive level of zest to these delicately flavored burgers, but the vinegar brine provides a nice contrasting bite. Pickled red onions take at least two hours to successfully cure — but they last up to a month in the fridge — and are made simply with red onion, rice wine vinegar, sugar, and salt. 

Once your onions have been successfully pickled, and your hake burgers cooked, Stewart suggests building an epic fish burger by lathering toasted brioche buns with pre-mixed mayo and Dijon mustard and topping your warm fish burgers with a bit of raw watercress and pickled red onions. Now that you know the basic components of Martha Stewart's fluffy fish burgers, apart from cutting your chosen fish by hand, what are some general tips to keep in mind when making any fish burger at home?

One of the beneficial elements of making burgers with fish — as opposed to beef — is that there is plenty of room for variance when it comes to the type of fish you use and the extra flavor components you may want to add. If hake (which is a softer, more delicate member of the cod family) isn't available at your supermarket, you can choose another variety of white fish like traditional cod, tilapia, or pollock. 

Halibut and swordfish should be avoided since the former's fat content may affect the structure of your burgers and swordfish tends to have a dry texture if overcooked. Also, since fish burgers usually contain a variety of smaller ingredients, before pan-frying, refrigerate your formed patties for at least 30 minutes so they don't easily break apart during the cooking process.

When cooking whole filets, you might typically use the simple skewer trick to tell if fish is done, but for fish burgers, you may want to follow the USDA's recommended temperature for cooked fish by using an actual thermometer. Once you think your burgers are cooked, insert a quick-read thermometer to make sure the internal temperature reads 145 degrees Fahrenheit. Next to gentle handling in the preparation process, try your best to avoid overcooking your fish burgers so they finish with an extra tender and flaky texture.