Chellow Kabob

So its time I publish a recipe from my Persian heritage. This is one of the simpler Persian recipes, but its soooooo good. I just made this last night, and the best part: I HAVE LEFTOVERS FOR TONIGHT! This is kinda like a hamburger, xcept theres rice instead of a bun for your starch source.

1 pound ground beef
1 medium onion
2 cloves garlic
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp freshly-ground black pepper
3-6 tomatoes (according to your love for the fruit)

1. Crumble your ground beef into a mixing bowl. I suggest using lean ground beef over extra lean, as the fat adds to essential flavouring and juicyness to your kabob.
2. Peel your onion and grate it instead of dicing it. The reason for this is as you press the onion against the grater, more juices are extracted from the onion, creating sort of a mush. This results in two benefits: (1) The juices keep the meat together; (2) No onion chunks.
3. Mince your garlic and add it to the bowl along with your salt and pepper.
4. Wet your hands with cold water to prevent the meat from sticking to them. Mix all ingredients with your hands, but try not to handle it too much. The more you handle it, the tougher the meat becomes.
5. Cover a baking sheet with raised edges, as a border for the meat, with aluminum foil. Press the meat down to make a 1-2 cm thick "flat" of meat (keep in mind the meat will shrink in the oven, so make it a bit thicker than you want when its cooked). Don't worry if the meat doesn't cover the whole sheet, but the foil is necessary to keep the empty spots from burning.
6. Cook in the oven at 350*F. Cook for approximately 15 minutes, when meat is just fully cooked, but the surface still needs to brown.
7. Now comes the tomatoes. I prefer using Roma tomatoes, for their super juicy innards and weak skin. When picking these out, pick the soft ones. Slice your tomatoes in half, width-wise, and place them face-down on your meat. You can also use canned tomatoes, but add them to the meat after about 20 minutes, as they will need less time to soften (you don't need to slice these in half).
8. Cook until meat is browned along surface and edges and tomatoes are tender enough that they can be turned into paste, about 7-10 minutes (3-5 if you're using canned tomatoes). You can usually tell by the loose water having just evaporated from the pan.
9. Remove the tomatoes from the meat and place in a dish for serving. Slice your "flat" of meat into strips.
10. Serve with Basmati rice, and if you like, some plain, thick yogurt (I prefer Balkan's style yogurt - at least 6% MF). I like to mush my tomatoes into a paste and mix it in with my rice. I like every spoonful to have a bit of rice, tomato, yogurt and meat in it, enjoy all the flavours in one bite!