Plant Based Vegan Lentil Burgers

These delicious plant based burger patties are made with the goodness of green lentils, carrots, mushrooms and toasted almonds but I promise you won't miss the meat. They take a little bit more time than a beef burger but are packed with deliciousness and make 8 at a time so there's plenty to feed everyone. Mr NQN loved these so much he gobbled down two enormous burgers in 5 minutes! Dear Reader, if you're looking for a nutritious plant based burger that is full of vegetables and legumes, this is a pushy recipe!

I cannot stress how good these lentil burgers are. One of the biggest fans of these burgers apart from Mr NQN was Teddy who usually is more of a carnivore than an omnivore (and certainly never a vegan). Every time I made one of these he'd come right over and whimper for some.

One of the most helpful tools for this recipe is a food processor because there's quite a bit of chopping involved otherwise. To make a beef patty it just requires the beef and some seasoning but to make a truly tasty lentil vegan patty you do have to add layers of flavours. It looks like a lot but a lot of this is just adding flavour and adding a variety of vegetables can only be a good thing. The resulting lentil patty is absolutely delicious, it's a bit delicate but none of these fell apart in the pan.

On the subject of vegan or plant based we had an Elliott birthday the other day for Mr NQN's mother Tuulikki's birthday (this was all pre-COVID-19). It was Teddy's first Elliott picnic and I think he had a good time as it was at Manly Lagoon and there are lots of dogs there for him to play with. We caught up with what everyone was up to and they never fail to surprise.

Mr NQN's brother has started a new job. This is a good thing as he has been suffering from a mysterious auto immune disease and who has moved back in with his mother. He's now a delivery driver at Uber Eats. He now gets to deliver coffee and toast and bottles of Coke to hungover residents of Manly and Freshwater (by the way nobody tips, I asked).

Mr NQN's brother in law Laporello is at home looking after the two kids. He had the idea of creating a youtube channel about how to ride a bike. I declined his offer of being the first video subject. He has never come across as particularly patient, quite the opposite in fact, so I pictured a video of him yelling at me and any children around us cowering in fear. That was a hard no.

Food-wise I brought cheese (real cheese, not vegan cheese) and made vegan burritos with garlic sauce. She was quite intrigued by the vegan garlic sauce as she had seen the recipe on my blog.

"Where is the chickpea water from?" she asked.

"From a tin of chickpeas," I answered.

"But where do you get the chickpea water?" she asked again, confused.

"You drain the water off the chickpeas and keep it and use it," I said.

"But where do you get chickpeas from?" she said.

"From a tin," I said, confused as we were going around in circles.

"Where do you buy tins from?" she asked.

"The supermarket...wait, what?" I said, my head spinning.

And so on it went until I was beaten down with the questions. I now regret sharing that recipe. At that moment an enormous black lab barrelled through our picnic and stopped all chickpea water talk. I'd now like to thank that dog. No hard feelings.

These lentil burgers may make an appearance at another Elliott family gathering, I'm not entirely sure. They're so good that Mr NQN wants me to keep making these for every occasion. I just perhaps will avoid tinned chickpea water talk.

So tell me Dear Reader, do you ever find yourself having strange conversations? Do you like lentil burgers? What is your protein of choice in a burger?

Plant Based Vegan Lentil Burgers

An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott

Preparation time: 30 minutes plus 60 minutes refrigeration

Cooking time: 45 minutes

For patties

• 1 cup dried green lentils, soaked over night and then boiled for 10 minutes in 3 cups of water and drained well
• Oil for frying
• 2 carrots, finely chopped
• 2 onions, peeled and finely chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, peeled
• 260g/9ozs. mushrooms, finely chopped
• 1 cup almonds, roasted and finely processed
• 2 chia eggs* (or flax eggs or 2 eggs if you're vegetarian)
• 1 cup breadcrumbs, finely processed
• 2 tablespoons vegan Worcestershire sauce
• 3 teaspoons mustard
• 2 teaspoons sugar
• 2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 2 teaspoons salt (I used chilli salt)
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1-1.5 cups red lentil flour

For burgers

• 8 buns
• 8 slices vegan cheese
• Tomato sauce
• American yellow mustard
• 2 tomatoes, sliced
• 8 onion layers
• Butter lettuce
• Sliced pickles
• Garlic toum (see recipe here)

To make 1 chia egg, mix 1 tablespoon of chia seeds with 2-2.5 tablespoons water

Step 1 - Place the cooked lentils in a large bowl. Fry the carrots and onions together until caramelised and there isn't any liquid left. Add to the bowl of lentils. Fry the garlic and mushrooms together until cooked and there is no liquid remaining (too much liquid and the patties won't bind together properly).

Step 2 - Add the almonds, chia eggs, breadcrumbs, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, sugar, cumin, salt and black pepper. Mix well and then place in a food processor and blitz.

Step 3 - Place the mixture back in the bowl and refrigerate uncovered for 60 minutes. Add the lentil flour into the mixture. Shape into large balls and then flatten to fit your buns. Heat a frypan on high heat and add oil. Fry each patty for around 5 minutes on each side so 10 minutes in total. I cooked my patties ahead of time and then that afternoon I topped each patty with a slice of vegan cheese and put it in a 180C/350F oven for 5 minutes until the cheese melted.

Step 4 - For these burgers I use brioche buns which are obviously not vegan but use whichever buns you would like. On the bottom bun I add some tomato sauce or ketchup, American yellow mustard, butter lettuce, 2 slices tomato, red onion, the lentil patty with melted vegan cheese with sliced pickles on top and garlic toum on the top bun.