Long time no see, as usual. I’m guilty. I didn’t have time for Kitchen Impromptu, and I didn’t care because I wasn’t in my writing mood after all. Yet, I think that’s OK because 1) I’m not a full-time blogger, 2) I don’t have to write in predetermined frequencies and 3) I don’t believe in forced blogging, because I do it for fun. But I really like to talk, so  for me, blogging is simply not talking out loud, but talking to my keyboard. That’s how I managed to write 30+ posts over the past 1.5 years. But let’s face the facts: keyboards aren’t human, and since I don’t have thousands of readers who leave 200 comments per post, I don’t feel the pressure to write. Is it good to be by yourself, being free to write anything anytime, or is it good to have thousands of readers and feeling pressure? I can discuss this for hours and come up with no solution..

No, we are off-topic right now. Today I want to talk about my latest obsession: mini veggie burgers, or MVBs. Now, I have to indicate that I’m a burger lover,  I like to look at AHT during my office breaks, which makes me think about burgers everyday. So I get burger cravings very often. However, eating blobs of animal fat doesn’t always seem appealing all the time. Veggie burgers rescue me in those times. They are little, heavenly patties made of chickpeas, kidney beans, lentils or more. Moreover, veggie burger has a very simple base recipe, which leads to millions of variations.

Here’s a mini lentil burger I made for work.

And here’s my previous Saturday&Sunday lunch:

I ate my mini burger with oven fries, a lot of ketchup (I’m a Heinz addict) and a glass of kefir. Yes, kefir. If you don’t know what kefir is, it’s a fermented drink made of milk, and it’s both delicious and healthy for you. You can either buy it, or ferment your own. It’s like the milk version of kombucha. Since I can easily find kefir in Turkey, I didn’t bother making my own. By the way, I really want to try kombucha, but I don’t want to make it at home, because apparently it’s a very time-consuming job! But I couldn’t find any brand in Turkey that sells kombucha, although a lot of people sell the mushroom for home-fermenting. It’s really sad not to have a brand like Synergy Drinks in Turkey:(

Veggie Burger Recipe:

Ingredients:

• 3 cups desired legume (kidney beans, lentils, chickpeas, black beans, peas, etc.), cooked
• 1/2 cup desired nuts (hazelnuts, walnuts, almonds, flax seeds, sunflower seeds, etc.)
• 1/2 cup oats
• 1 egg (or 1 tablespoon ground flaxseed, soaked 15 minutes in water)
• desired spices (curry, dried thyme, pepper, chilli, etc.)
• salt
• optional: 1-2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil (use if you don’t like the burgers dry)

Directions:

Process everything in a blender. If you don’t have a blender, use your food processor, process the nuts first, then oats, and then the other ingredients.

Form 5 cm (2 inch) patties. Store in the freezer or eat immediately by cooking in the oven or in a lightly greased pan.

Assemble your burgers in any way you want to. I highly recommend using Smitten Kitchen’s Light Brioche Burger Buns (I changed the recipe and used honey instead of sugar, reduced the amount of butter and used whole-wheat flour). Also, I like to make mini burger buns for my mini burgers.

For oven fries, I simply drizzle 6 potatoes (cut into strips) with 2 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil and spices (salt, pepper, dried thyme and chilli). This time, I also sprinkled some grated parmesan cheese. Yum yum yum! Bake the potatoes for 30-40 minutes in the oven at 200 degrees C (390 degrees F).

I used to be a total carnivore, eating meat two times a day, and considering a meal without meat not a “true meal”. But those days are over now, and I have been eating healthier things for a couple of years. And I really love playing with legumes and creating new recipes. One of my favorites is this lentil chickpea patties recipe, and I make veggie burgers with them. Yummy! They’re easily stored in the freezer, and whenever you need them, just cook in a pan or grill for few minutes and prepare your burger. Yummy!

Lentil Chickpea Patties

makes 25 patties

Ingredients:

• 1 cup lentils
• 2 cups chickpeas
• 1 large onion
• 1 clove garlic
• 75 gr. (2,65 oz. or 3 slices) bread (use just the soft inner part of the bread)
• 1/2 cup walnuts
• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste* (optional)
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
• 2 teaspoons allspice
• 1 teaspoon ground red pepper
• 2 teaspoons cumin
• 5 teaspoons ground thyme
• pepper
• salt

* Tomato paste (“salca” in Turkish) is a commonly used ingredient in Turkish cuisine. It is basically concentrated tomato puree. Follow this link for more information, or buy from Amazon.com.

Directions:

Boil the lentils and chickpeas. Process them in a food processor (You don’t have to process them well. I like some texture!)

Wash (yeah, wash!) the bread with water, and squeeze it (It should be moist but not wet).

Process the onion, garlic and walnuts together in a food processor.

Mix all the parts and knead the mixture well. Form 5 cm (~2-inch) patties.

Grill the patties or cook them on a lightly greased pan. You can dip them in flour before cooking.