Chipotle Lentil Burgers & Potato Wedges

Thursday, October 17

Chipotle Lentil Burgers & Potato Wedges

Rating: 4

I’ve made this recipe several times before, but it’s been a little while. Normally, we make our own veggie burgers because we like knowing exactly what’s in them and we both try not to overdo it on the processed food. This recipe from Appetite for Reduction is one of our favorites - the black bean burgers in Veganomicon and these Chickpea & Spinach burgers are also amazing (although I make them with chard) – but I occasionally get an attack of the lazies and buy Gardein burgers. Anyway. I wanted homemade and I wanted these spicy little guys. We were under a bit of a time constraint & I didn’t get started as early as I’d wanted, so um, remember that movie “Groundhog Day”? Remember when the groundhog is behind the wheel of the truck & Bill Murray keeps saying, “Don’t drive angry. Don’t drive angry”? Yeah, for me it should be “Don’t cook hurried. Don’t cook hurried.” Apparently, this renders me unable to read. I didn’t goof it up too badly, and it was all totally fixable, but it added a certain level of stress to an already tense dinner making experience. Don’t get me wrong, the recipe isn’t a difficult one – I was just rushing. And may have, um, skipped a thing or two that I had to repair at the last second. Like forgetting to add the CHIPOTLES! Ugh. How does THAT happen?!  I realized it when I was about to make the patties. I minced them by hand (quickly) and then just mixed them in. But seriously, what a boneheaded thing to do. I think I may have used a little too much zucchini because this time they came out stickier than usual and I had to add more oil to the pan than I wanted to – the book says to use non-stick cooking spray but that stuff is the devil. I have no idea what’s in it and it also ruins your pans, leaving a gooey film on them that never comes off. Still, once they were cooked they were really good. If you make these, though, you should know that they are pretty soft & will squish out the sides of the buns a bit. Speaking of buns, we grabbed some from Dough Bakery the last time we were there & having fresh bakery buns for our burgers was really nice. (We freeze the extras so they last longer, but it’s hard not to eat them all in a few days time.) We had some potato wedges with chipotle aioli for dipping (1000 Vegan Recipes) on the side and had very happy vegan tummies.