A burger layered with blueberry reaper bacon jam, with a bottle of Blueberry Carolina Reaper hot sauce behind

Blueberry Reaper Bacon Jam Burger

This is the one to make when you want to show someone what the Dark Bloom actually does. Half a cup of it goes into a pan with bacon and shallot and a little brown sugar, and over about ten minutes the blueberry reduces into a thick, dark, spoonable jam. The fruit gets deeper and rounder as the water cooks off, and the reaper mellows out with it.

Spread on a smash burger under melted cheese, it behaves like the best steak sauce you have had, sweet and savoury at once, blueberry still leading, the heat turning up slowly somewhere after you swallow.

The jam keeps two weeks in the fridge. Put it on a cheese board once and you will make a second batch.

Time 35 min · Serves 4 · Sauce Blueberry Carolina Reaper · How it is used 1/2 cup simmered down with bacon and shallot into a jam

Ingredients

For The Jam

  • 6 slices thick-cut bacon, chopped
  • 1 shallot, diced fine
  • 1/2 cup Blueberry Carolina Reaper Hot Sauce
  • 2 tbsp dark brown sugar
  • 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
  • 2 tbsp water

For The Burgers

  • 1 lb ground beef, 80/20
  • 4 brioche buns
  • 4 slices American cheese
  • Crisp lettuce
  • 2 tbsp butter, softened
  • Kosher salt and black pepper

Method

  1. Render the bacon in a cold skillet over medium heat until crisp, 8 to 10 minutes. Lift it out and pour off all but a tablespoon of the fat.
  2. Cook the shallot in that tablespoon of fat for 2 minutes until soft and translucent.
  3. Add the hot sauce, brown sugar, vinegar and water. Bring it to a simmer and cook 8 to 10 minutes, stirring now and then, until it coats the back of a spoon and a line drawn through it holds for a second.
  4. Stir the bacon back in, take it off the heat and let it cool. It thickens further as it sits.
  5. Butter the cut sides of the buns and toast face down in a skillet until golden.
  6. Get a cast iron skillet ripping hot. Put down a loose ball of beef, press it flat and hard for a full 10 seconds, leave it 2 minutes.
  7. Season, scrape under the crust, flip, add cheese, 45 seconds more.
  8. Build: bottom bun, lettuce, patty, a heavy spoon of the jam, top bun.

One more thing

Double the jam. It disappears faster than you expect and it is very good on a grilled cheese.

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