I love a good meaty hamburger from time to time, but we try to limit our red meat consumption. Enter: the veggie burger. Veggie burgers can be made from all sorts of non-meat ingredients. I've seen everything from chopped carrots to lentils to black beans to zucchini. For my own version of a veggie burger, I decided to use baked sweet potatoes and chickpeas as the bulk of the burger. Though I've never bought frozen veggie burger patties from the grocery store, I am quite certain that the taste and the texture of these are far superior. For starters, you can season them any way you fancy. I decided to go with curry powder, which provides enough flavor that little else is needed.
Cooked over the stovetop, these firmed up and held together nicely...you don't have to cook anything in them so you just want to keep them on the skillet long enough to stay together. Ours probably took 5-7 minutes each side. We ate the leftovers the next day, which required only a 45 second reheat in the microwave. Placed on buns and eaten with your favorite toppings (in our case spinach and tomatoes), these were a good meatless alternative to burgers. Next time I'll make some sort of yogurt sauce to accompany them!
Do any of you have a favorite veggie burger recipe to share?
Curried Sweet Potato Chickpea Burgers
A Sweets Life Original
*makes 6 burgers
Ingredients:
-2 small sweet potatoes, baked and peeled
-1 can chickpeas (15 oz), drained
-1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped
-1 tsp curry powder
-1 cup old-fashioned oats
-salt and pepper, to taste
-buns, tomatoes, and spinach, for serving
Directions:
1. In the bowl of a food processor, add sweet potatoes and chickpeas. Pulse to combine. (Could also do this in a bowl and mash with your hands)
2. Stir in parsley, curry powder, oats, salt, and pepper, mixing well to evenly disperse ingredients.
3. Using your hands, form mixture into 6 equal patties, approximately 3-4 inches in diameter.
4. Spray a skillet with cooking spray and cook patties over medium high heat, until lightly browned. Flip and cook remaining side.
5. Remove from skillet and place on buns. Top with tomatoes and spinach.
