Kefta Burgers – Middle Eastern Juicy Burgers

Kefta or Kafta is a very famous minced meat dish around the Mediterranean and the middle east it is basically minced lamb and veal mixed with parsley and onions, usually kefta has a bigger ratio of parsley than Kabab (Kabob), they contain the same ingredients though.

Kefta is cooked in three main dishes:

Dawood Basha: Small sized kefta meatballs cooked in a tomato sauce and served with Arabic rice.

Kefta belsonyeh: kefta baked in the oven with either a tomato sauce or a mix of tomato and tahini sauce.

Kefta burgers: this is a fairly new invention in middle eastern cuisine, but equally delicious and easy!

Usually in the middle east if you go to any butcher and ask for Kefta he will prepare it for you, mincing the meat, parsley, onions and season everything, however we like to season our kefta with the home made bharat (arabic spices so we always ask our butcher to leave the kefta unseasoned).

Kefta mix:

1. 1 Kg Minced meat (equal parts lamb and veal)
2. 1 Medium onion finely minced
3. 1 cup of chopped parsley
4. Salt and Bharat to taste

Mix well and prepare your Kefta burger patties, make sure that you make a small indentation in the middle of the burger with your finger.

Bharat: Middle Eastern spice mix, I will talk more about it in future posts.

For the Tahini paste:

1. 3 tbs Tahini (Sesame paste)
2. 1 tbs Lemon juice
3. 1 clove of Garlic
4. Salt
5. 1 tbs Yogurt

Mix all of the tahini paste ingredients together and  adjust seasoning to your liking, I found my tahini to be a little bit thick so I diluted it with a couple of drops of water.

You can use any type of Arabic bread (Khoubez), or burger buns but for this recipe we made our own home made Khoubez, the recipe for the khoubez will be posted as soon as possible!

Burger Toppings:

1. Arugula
2. Tomato
3. Red onion
4. Tahini sauce we made 🙂 yumm

Assemble your sandwiches:put yhe tahini paste inside the khoubez pockets (Pita Bread), add the kefta, arugula, tomato and red onions, serve with french fries and a glass of cold soft drink or a beer even.

If you or anyone in your family have sesame allergies you can substitute it with yogurt and cucumber sauce (khyar bi laban).

Nom nom nom!

W Sahtain!!

Related articles

• Kefta Burgers – Middle Eastern Juicy Burgers (procrastinatorcook.wordpress.com)
• Vegetarian Food Focus: What Is Tahini? (vegetarian.answers.com)
• Italian Spiced Beef Kefta with Avocado Cream Sauce (happyhealthnut918.wordpress.com)