Plant count: 12-15

Black Eyed Bean Burger With Fried Pickled Red Onions

I took the inspiration for this vegan recipe from a very old vegetarian book by Linda McCartney. I dabbled with vegetarianism many years ago, but it never stuck. I think it may have been my lack of food knowledge – in other words, not knowing what to cook. I think if I has allowed myself to accept what eating animal really meant at that time, for my health, for the environment and most of all, for the animals, I might have continued on that journey. It was a few years before that happened though, and then I decided to give vegetarianism another bash. By this time I had such a dairy intolerance and cutting out all dairy along with meat, made sense. So I began my vegan journey.

Black eyed peas are famous for being an important ingredient in “Hoppin’ John,” a popular Southern American dish believed to bring good luck.

  • Servings:

    4

  • Prep time:

    20 Mins

  • Cook time:

    20 Mins

  • Plant count:

    12-15

Ingredients

  • A tin of black eyes beans drained, or the equivalent in dried cooked beans
  • 2 shallots chopped
  • 1 garlic clove grated
  • Half a med carrot grated
  • 75g mushrooms roughly chopped into small pieces
  • 1 tsp cumin seeds
  • Half a red chilli deseeded and chopped into small pieces
  • 0.5 tsp dried mint
  • Salt and pepper to season
  • 2 Tbsp chopped coriander
  • 2 slices wholemeal bread
  • 2 flax eggs
  • 1 Tbsp tahini
  • 3 Tbsp pickled red onion (optional)
  • 2 Tbsp oil for frying

Directions

  1. Drain the beans and add to a bowl. Roughly mash with a fork so you have 75% mashed and the rest whole
  2. Prepare the shallots, garlic, carrots, mushrooms and chilli. Add to a frying pan with one Tbsp oil. Gently fry for 15 minutes.
  3. Add the cumin, dried mint, salt and pepper and cook for a further minute. Add to the beans.
  4. Pop the bread into a food processor and blend into breadcrumbs. Add to the beans.
  5. Add the tahini and flax eggs to the mix.
  6. Give everything a good stir so all ingredients are incorporated.
  7. Separate into 4 balls, then roughly flatten into patty’s.
  8. If you are making the onions, cook them in a hot frying pan until crisp then set aside.
  9. Add a Tbsp oil to the frying pan and add the burgers. I cooked two, we will have the others tomorrow. Fry on a med heat for 4 minutes each side.
  10. Serve on a brown roll with salad, some mango jam that you had left over from the pakora burger, some cheese, some Bombay mix, and the crispy pickled red onion. This would also be nice with sweet chilli sauce, mayo, barbeque sauce, or plain.
Smorgs:

Pea shoots Microgreens, Cheese, Bombay mix

Smorgs suggestions:

Mixed nuts, Pickled gerkins, Pickled onion crisps, Crispy onions

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