Most who have read this have heard of the garbage plate. If not, read here. I promised Scot, that after I had an authentic garbage plate, I'd try again to make one for him. That day's coming and I thought I'd get the sauce worked out before we make them. I found a few more garbage plate recipes. So, with my experience of making a garbage plate "blind," and eating the real thing, and with five different recipes, I'm ready to try again to make something that will transport Scot back to his retrobate* youth. This recipe is adapted from a few others and it was certainly closer to the real thing than my first effort.

The main problem with my first one was the texture. My sauce was MUCH thicker - almost like thick sloppy joe. Authentic sauce is much thinner and the hamburger is triple ground so it has a very fine texture. I bought regular 80% lean ground chuck and ran it though my meat grinder twice more to get the finer consistency. Much better. I think I could serve this and Scot would be sated. But, I have a few tweaks to do with the seasoning before I'll be satisfied.

Here's a refresher on the cheeseburger garbage plate.
A pile each of macaroni salad and hash browns
Two cheeseburgers (no buns)
Yellow mustard
Chopped raw onions
Garbage plate sauce over everything
Serve with bread and butter and liberal amounts of Franks Red Hot Sauce

Instead of cheeseburgers you can use various substitutes. Here's Nick's menu.

Hots & Potatoes
Hamburger
Cheeseburger
Sausage
Chicken
Fried Ham
Fish (yes, fish!)
Egg (Garbage Plate breakfast?)
Veggie (I have no idea what kind)
Grilled Cheese

Tonight, I made these with white hots instead of cheeseburgers. White hots are pork and veal hot dogs. And, since this was only a test-run, and I don't want to have an early heart attack, these garbage plates were exactly half-size. Alex even ate all of it. He was pretty skeptical but he thought it was really good.

More developments are to come.


* Of course, "retrobate" is not a word. I did not catch my error - Steve did. He pointed out that it was a "nice portmanteau" and I shouldn't correct it. How could I disagree?