Mint tea revisited

Whoa...that tea was way too strong. I think I used to much tea relative to the Stevia and Mint. I'm also pretty sure I have no idea what I'm doing with Stevia. I'm going to have to research it before I use it again.

To save my tea I made a mint flavored simple syrup. This may be the easiest thing I have done all month and one of the best. I picked 8 leaves of mint and crushed them in my hand. I put them in a pot of water (around 3 cups) with some sugar. I have no idea how much, I just dumped some in. I stirred and cooked over medium heat for about 15 minutes and then let sit for another 15 minutes. When I took a taste, it was like drinking Christmas. I then combined this with my tea from yesterday and now had the mint tea I was looking for. It isn't lo cal anymore (though I didn't use too much sugar, maybe around a half cup)

Afterwards I had some of my mint syrup left over, so I made a mint julep. I through the syrup and some bourbon in a glass with ice. So refreshing. Full disclosure, I used whiskey not bourbon and it came from Tennessee not Indiana. I did just google Indiana Whiskey and it turns out Seagrams has a plant in Lawrenceburg, IN where they make Seagrams 7 Crown and Bulleit Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey. I was also amused that the website describing these products is only available in Deutsch.

I also wanted to share a simple recipe I put together for pork burgers tonight. They were fantastic! I usually cook for two, which is the number of burgers this made:

• 1/2 pound ground pork
• 2 hand fulls of fresh basil leaves
• 2 cloves of garlic
• 2 slices of your choice of cheese (I used a low fat cheddar from Swissland Cheese in Berne)

Mince the garlic cloves and cut the basil into small pieces (for the basil I typically ball it up and then do small slices with a knife to make thin ribbons, I then do a few perpendicular cuts in the ribbons to simulate a mince). Mix with the ground pork and make 4 equal size balls.

Flatten each ball into similar sizes patties, they should be pretty thin. Place a slice of cheese on two of the patties. You don't want the cheese to hang over the edge, so trim it down and save the leftover cheese. Place a second patty (that doesn't have cheese on it) on top of the cheese. Press them together. Now you will have some nice warm cheese in your burger. Repeat with the other patty. Cook your burger how ever you like to cook burgers. When you are a minute from being done cooking the patties put your extra cheese on top.