Bean and carrot burgers

We started eating 'burgers' often. This means burger buns filled with all sorts of tasty things: fried or baked halloumi, marinated tofu slices, mushrooms, peppers, onions; fresh lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers; chutney or ketchup etc etc. Sometimes also some kind of veggie burger. But bought ones are rarely delicious, and homemade a little bit faffy, and I hadn't really figured out a good recipe. This one caught my eye, just after I cooked a somewhat excessive amount of white beans, so I gave it a try. 

olive oil 

1/2 cup breadcrumbs 

1 small onion, finely chopped 

1 tbsp tomato puree 

1 1/2 tsp sea salt 

1 cup packed grated carrot (from 2 medium carrots) 

1 1/2 tbsp cider vinegar 

3 1/2 cups cooked beans (white or haricot - should be quite squishy) 

1 large egg, beaten pepper 

Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a large frying pan over low heat. Add the breadcrumbs and cook, stirring often, until lightly browned and crisp, 3 to 5 min. Put crumbs in a large bowl, then return the pan to the heat.

Add 2 tbsp olive oil to the pan, followed by the onion. Cook until softened and lightly golden, 8 to 10 min. Stir in the tomato puree, salt, and carrots and stir frequently until the carrots are soft and a bit blistered, another 8 to 10 min. Add the vinegar, scraping up all the browned bits until the pan is dry. Remove from heat and add the bowl with the toasted breadcrumbs. Add beans and use a wooden spoon or spatula to very coarsely mash the mixture until a bit pasty and sticking together - there should still be plenty of beans intact. Add pepper, and more salt if needed, to taste. Stir in the egg. Shape into 6-8 burgers.

To cook the veggie burgers, heat a thin layer of olive oil in the frying pan over medium heat and carefully cook until browned and slightly firm to the touch, 3 to 4 min per side. Serve hot or at room temperature, with whatever you like on or with veggie burgers.

 

The first time I tried these they fell apart. The second time I used squishier beans (haricot not white), and they were great - tasty and texturally interesting and good for fitting in a bun. So make sure the beans are on the squishy side.

Updated muhammara

I hadn't made muhammara for a while, but S bought some in the supermarket and it was really sweet and didn't have any walnuts in it and just made me pine for the real thing. And then I remembered it was an excellent use for walnuts - am always looking for excellent uses for walnuts, since we have a big old walnut tree in the garden. I have been testing out a few different combinations and textures for muhammara, here is my old version, and here is my latest:

3 red peppers
1/2 cup breadcrumbs
1/2 cup walnuts, toasted
1 clove garlic
1 tsp dried red chilli flakes
1 tbsp pomegranate molasses
juice of 1/2 lime (or lemon)
1 tsp ground cumin
1-2 tbsp olive oil

Roast red peppers at high heat, c. 220C, until collapsed and with blackened spots. Cover and let cool, then remove peel and seeds. Can be kept in the fridge for a day or so until ready to make the muhammara.

When ready to make the muhammara, first toast the walnuts. Then put the peppers, breadcrumbs, garlic, chilli, pomegranate molasses, citrus juice, cumin and olive oil in a blender and blend until smooth. Crush the walnuts with a pestle and mortar, and then mix in a bowl with the pepper mixture. Check consistency and taste for seasoning.

Christmas: Nut loaf

Turns out S had never eaten a nut roast. So, almost as a joke, I made one for our Christmas lunch. I liked the idea of incorporating parsnips (double the Christmassiness) and when I came across this recipe I decided it was the one. I interpreted the ingredient list pretty loosely, using up various nuts etc we had lying around.

300g parsnips, peeled and roughly chopped
1 tbsp olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
100g walnuts
90g unsalted cashews (used mixture of cashews and almonds)
200g breadcrumbs
100g pine nuts (used mixture of slivered almonds and sunflower seeds)
~2 tsp crumbled dried rosemary
~2 tsp crumbled dried sage
~ 1/2 tsp nutmeg
salt and pepper
50g cranberries (used ~2 tbsp dried sour cherries, rehydrated by soaking in ~ 2 tbsp boiling water)
1 egg (or 1 tbsp ground linseed mixed with 2.5 tbsp boiling water)
another ~1 tbsp olive oil

cranberry chutney or sauce (and a few sprigs of fresh rosemary or parsley) to serve

Heat the oven to 180C / 356F. Bring a pan of water to the boil and cook the parsnips until tender. In a frying pan heat 1 tbsp olive oil, add the onion and garlic and cook until softened.

Meanwhile, pulse the walnuts and cashews in a blender until roughly chopped and then mix with the breadcrumbs in a large bowl. Add the onions, garlic, pine nuts, rosemary, sage, nutmeg, sour cherries or cranberries and seasoning to the mix. Then beat in the egg.

When the parsnips are tender, drain and mash roughly with ~1 tbsp olive oil. Add the parsnip mash to the rest of the mixture. Grease a large loaf tin (and maybe line the base*), then press the mixture into it. Bake for 50-55 min, until set. Let cool for ten min, then turn out.

To serve, warm up some cranberry sauce with some added fresh cranberries (or use cranberry chutney), spoon it over the top of the nut roast, and decorate with cranberries and fresh herbs (I used two cranberries and a piece of parsley to make some kitschy-looking pretend holly.


This was really surprisingly good - deliciously crunchy around the edges but tender in the middle. Quite nutty and appetising, although the parsnips got a bit lost - another time I might mash them less or not at all. Definitely needed some sauce - luckily I had some cranberry chutney squirreled away, which was perfect (suddenly I see the point of all that preserving through Summer and Autumn - instant food in Winter!).

*I didn't grease or anything at all and it stuck to the base a little bit - not horrendously but a bit (I suspected it might, but thought I'd try the minimal effort route first). To avoid this, I'd definitely try greasing; potentially also lining the base.

Christmas: Lion's Mane 'crab' cakes

A gave me a bag full of Lion's Mane for my birthday. A very thoughtful (and tasty) present. I managed to take it home with me from the party (after rescuing from a drunken food-marauder), and then decided it was appropriately fancy to become part of our Christmas meal.

When I cooked it previously I wasn't too enamoured of the texture of it just sauteed. Also, this bagful was quite wet. So roasting seemed to be a smart place to start. Then I remembered seeing that Mycoterra Farm (who grew them) often use them to make 'crab' cakes. So I looked up a recipe and thought this one (and this one) sounded like exactly the right kind of thing.

(makes six little cakes)

To roast:
200-400g (approx 1/2 lb) Lion's Mane
~2 tbsp olive oil
2 cloves garlic
salt+pepper

Rest of the cake ingredients:
2 tbsp vegan mayonnaise (used vegan cream cheese as we had some leftover from the birthday cake S made me)
1/2 tsp soy sauce
1 cup breadcrumbs
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1 egg*
~ 1 tsp red wine vinegar
1 tbsp chopped parsley
1 tsp paprika
~ 2 tsp lemon juice
salt and pepper

coconut oil for frying

For the sauce:
3 tbsp vegan cream cheese (or vegan mayonnaise - reduce the lemon juice a bit if using)
1 tsp olive oil
1-2 tsp wholegrain mustard
1/2 tsp paprika
1/2 tsp white pepper
~1 tbsp cider vinegar
pea-sized blob of wasabi
few drops hot sauce
~1 tbsp lemon juice
salt and pepper

Heat the oven to 350F. Tear the Lion's Mane into little pieces and put in a roasting dish. Add the whole garlic cloves, olive oil, salt and pepper and roast for 30-40 min, until the garlic is cooked, much of the liquid has evaporated, and the mushroom is brown. Remove from the oven.

While the mushroom is in the oven you can make the sauce - mix the sauce ingredients together in a small bowl with a fork. Taste for salt, pepper and acid and check consistency.

Mix the Lion's Mane (and roasted garlic - be sure to chop and/or mash up so it can spread through the mixture) together with the remaining cake ingredients in a mixing bowl.  Shape into little round burger shapes.  Heat coconut oil in a frying pan over medium heat and cook the cakes until browned on both sides. Eat while hot.


These were quite successful. S really liked them (especially the sauce), and while the total prep might be a bit much for an average day, the roasting method seemed to be a good way of cooking the Lion's Mane - better than sauteeing.

*think linseed-water mixture would be a fine vegan substitute

Green beans with walnut sauce

Was pondering doing something slightly different with green beans, came across this idea in my New Covent Garden Soup Company cookbook, decided to try it. Interesting.

1 lb green beans, washed and trimmed
handful of chocolate cherry tomatoes, trimmed and roughly chopped
2 oz walnuts
1 oz breadcrumbs
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 clove garlic
salt+pepper
3-4 tbsp olive oil

Put the beans in a steamer basket and steam for 5-10 min, until just done. Transfer to cold water immediately to stop cooking, then drain.

Put the walnuts, breadcrumbs, lemon juice, garlic and seasoning in a blender. Add olive oil a tbsp at a time and blend until fairly smooth. Taste for seasoning.

Put beans and tomatoes in a bowl, add the walnut sauce and toss until all well combined.

White gazpacho

With all the recent hot weather I made some kind of semi-logical jump and got to thinking about the food we'd eaten in Catalonia years ago. I want to try making aioli, the proper way, with just garlic, salt and olive oil. I also thought about gazpacho - we were buying it in tetra paks and drinking it in the car, out of the carton, while driving our rented Smart car around the Pyrenees. Both the red kind and the white kind - it was the first time I'd come across the white kind, and we were wowed: fresh, almondy, vegetal, liquid goodness. I don't think I have had it since: it is not available out of supermarket fridges round here, last time I checked. But what better way to work on our excess of cucumbers?

Note: this is my version of a white gazpacho, adapted to what I remembered / what I had in the fridge. I think it is fairly adaptable, but I also think this is not exactly authentic.

1/2 cup breadcrumbs
1/2 cup water
2 large cucumbers, peeled and chopped into big chunks
1 Granny Smith apple, peeled, cored and chopped into big chunks
1 clove of garlic, peeled
1 tbsp cider vinegar
2 tbsp olive oil
big pinch of sea salt
1/2 cup of slivered, blanched almonds

Put the breadcrumbs in a cup measure, fill up with the water and let soak while you prep the other ingredients. Put the peeled, chopped cucumbers and apple in a blender. Add the other ingredients to the blender, adding the breadcrumb-water mix last. Blend until smooth. Chill thoroughly before eating - and you can add an ice cube per cup or bowl of soup when serving to make sure it is properly cold.


This turned out waaayyy better than I hoped. It is delicious. Perfect combination of sweet, sharp, salty, savoury, tangy, refreshing... Nice and white as well - minor brown flecks from the breadcrumbs but other than that everything was ~white (peeled cucumber and apple, garlic, almonds etc).

Cauliflower with breadcrumbs

S made this - he said it was something his Dad used to make.  And that he thinks it was a classic German post-war dish.  There is something very German about it, I'm not quite sure what - pale, unadorned veggies, with toasty crunch, as a dearth of strong flavours lets subtle tastes shine on.  S loves fried garlic, I suspect that was an inauthentic 21st-century-german-whose-name-begins-with-S addition.

1 cauliflower head
1 cup breadcrumbs
2 cloves garlic, chopped
olive oil
salt and pepper

Clean the cauliflower, remove the outer leaves and divide into floret chunks about 2 in across.  Put in a steamer and steam for 10-15 min, until tender.

Meanwhile, prepare the garlic.  Heat ~1 tbsp olive oil in a pan and lightly fry the garlic.  Add the breadcrumbs and toast for 2-3 min til browned (but not burnt) and smelling good.

To serve, put some freshly steamed cauliflower in a bowl, add breadcrumbs and eat straight away (it all was gone before I could take a photo).


Simple and tasty - good mixture of subtle flavours and textures.  One of the most exciting things S has cooked for me in a while.

Apple and mincemeat strudel

Using up the rest of the filo I used for this.  And some of the excess mincemeat jarred before Christmas - turns out it is still fine.

4 medium dessert apples
1 small (~250g) pot mincemeat
4 tbsp melted butter / marg
2 tbsp warm honey
~1 tsp lemon juice
1 cup breadcrumbs
4 sheets #7 filo

Preheat oven to 350F.

Peel and finely slice the apples.  Mix with the mincemeat.

Melt ~ 2 tbsp 'butter' in a small frying pan, add breadcrumbs and stir til they are browned and fragrant without being burnt at all.

Lightly oil a large cookie sheet.  Place the first filo sheet on it, smear with melted butter, then layer the other filo sheets in the same way (keep enough melted butter to put some on top of the roll at the end).

Spread the top sheet with warm honey, then sprinkle breadcrumbs on top of that.

Put the apple mix along the long side of the filo sheets.  Then wrap it up.  Cut slits in the top filo and put some butter on top.

Put in the oven at 350F for 30-40min, til the filo is golden brown.

Allow to cool for ~15 min before slicing and eating.

This is actually surprisingly good!  The filo is a good texture and not burnt at the bottom, the apples are well cooked, the filling is tasty and not too sweet.  The browned breadcrumbs were definitely worth adding - they elevate it to being a proper strudel and not just an apple pie.  The apple vs mincemeat ratio is perhaps a little out - might have used more apple and less mincemeat.

Muhamarra (pepper-walnut-pomegranate molasses paste)

Came across this after buying some pomegranate molasses a while ago, when searching for interesting things to do with it...  Basically used this recipe. Also this one.

5 red peppers (or a mixture of peppers and chillies) - used 2 red peppers and 3 poblanos
1 good handful fresh breadcrumbs
120g walnuts, toasted and roughly chopped
1 medium onion, diced
About 125ml olive oil
1 tsp chilli flakes - left these out as I thought it'd be spicy enough with the poblanos
2 tbsp pomegranate molasses
Juice of 1 lime
½ teaspoon cumin
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Heat the oven to 200C/400F/gas mark 6. Place the whole red peppers on a greased baking sheet and roast until blackened. Put in a sealed plastic bag to steam for 10 minutes, then peel, core and deseed. In the meantime, put the breadcrumbs in a food processor with the walnuts and pulse until quite fine.
In a small pan, sauté the onion until lightly golden. Add to the breadcrumb and walnut mixture with the peppers and the rest of the ingredients, apart from the oil; pulse to a thick paste. Add olive oil until it's a consistency you like. Taste, add more lime juice, pomegranate molasses, cumin and salt and pepper, if you like, and serve with crudités or toasted pitta wedges.

v.2.
3 red peppers
1/2 cup breadcrumbs
1/2 cup walnuts, toasted
1 clove garlic
1 tsp dried red chilli flakes
1 tbsp pomegranate molasses
juice of 1/2 lime (or lemon)
1 tsp ground cumin
1-2 tbsp olive oil

Char red peppers whole on flat cast iron ovenproof pan over stovetop burner. Put in a bowl, cover and allow to cool, then remove peel and seeds and put flesh in blender with the red of the ingredients. Blend until smooth.


It's good! The walnut - spicy pepper taste comes out really nicely, with sour notes from the lime / molasses.  Very more-ish. Version 2 is the simplified version, it is quicker and less faffy, and I think just as good.