Sluttishly Savoury: Thai Burgers

Whenever I visit the Asian supermarket I find myself completely unable to resist buying jars of various Thai chilli pastes. In fact if you remove all the jars of "must buy" pastes from my fridge there is actually very little left. A tablespoon of paste in soups/curries/dressings/rice is a really cheap way to get maximum flavour for minimum effort and expense.

You could of course make your own paste, we have LOADS of amazing Thai recipes to choose from but this method means you have your burgers in super speedy time and very little washing up. Red or green Thai curry paste will also be fine if you can't find the chilli ones but you probably won't need to add the fish sauce if you use them as they already contain it. I've used pork mince but chicken or turkey would be ace too and also a bit healthier - especially if you choose to grill rather than fry.

Thai Burgers (makes 2 burgers)

You'll need:

• 350g pork mince
• 2 teaspoons Thai red chilli paste
• 1 tablespoon sweet chilli sauce
• 1 teaspoon fish sauce

Make it!

1. Just put everything in a big bowl and mix really well with your hands. 
2. Form into burger shapes, try to keep the patties quite flat so they cook right through to the middle. You can chill them for 20 minutes to help the flavours develop and set into their burger patties if you like but not essential.
3. Shallow fry over medium heat for 3 minutes on each side before popping them into the oven at 180C for about 8-10 minutes.