Bean and lentil burgers

My weekly cooking plan didn't go exactly as planned. I was keeping up pretty well during the week, but on the weekend I started slipping. I want to thank everyone for the comments throughout the week how organised I am, but now I have to admit that I didn't quite keep to the plan. On Friday I had a lovely pub meal as planned. I had a wonderful char-grilled pepper and halloumi ciabatta with thin chips and coleslaw on the side washed down with local ciders. On Saturday however I didn't make the veggie burgers, as originally planned. We decided to go to New Forest for a relaxing stroll and I didn't have any time for cooking. I will post photos from this walk later as well, but I'm making the veggie burgers today. This means the vegetarian Sunday roast won't be made at this occasion, but I don't mind that much, as it's quite warm today and I don't want to spend all day roasting vegetables and having the hot oven on. 

I was contemplating long and hard what kind of burger patties I would make this time and decided for a mix of different beans and lentils. That kind of veggie burgers tend to work always. Here is my recipe for today's burgers.

Ingredients

½ cup dried bean mix (Black eyed beans, black turtle beans, butter beans, haricot beans, lima beans, pinto beans, red kidney beans, rose cocoa beans, alubia beans, mung beans)

½ cup red lentils

¼ cup puy lentils

1 large shallot

3 garlic cloves

1 tsp chilli flakes

Ground black pepper

Salt

Ground cumin

Smoked paprika

2 eggs

1 cup breadcrumbs

Vegetable oil for frying

Served with: homemade spelt and carrot rolls, char-grilled bell peppers, fried red onions, smoked cheese, pea shoots, fresh peas and plum tomatoes.

Method

Soak the dried beans overnight. Then boil them for about one hour until done. Also boil the lentils until done. Actually I cooked the lentils extra mushy so that they are better binding agents for the burger batter. Drain well and let them cool down.

Chop the shallot and garlic finely and mix them with the lentils and beans. Season the mix with chilli flakes, ground black pepper, salt, ground cumin and smoked paprika.

Add the eggs and breadcrumbs (monitor the amount of the breadcrumbs while adding, as you might need less or slightly more than given in the ingredients) and mix into an even batter.

Heat vegetable oil in a pan, shape burgers from the batter and fry them on both sides until golden brown.

Serve with your favourite veggie burger fittings and enjoy!

Your VegHog