Spiced Chickpea Burgers.

Since I spent about ten dollars on coffee and chocolate today, I decided that dinner would have to be entirely homemade. I had some leftover chickpeas sitting in the fridge, and some sweet potato fries in the freezer. The obvious presented itself in the form of burgers.
I've only had one chickpea burger before, from a cafe in Media, but it was rather dry and plain. In order to make mine better, I searched the web for chickpea burger recipes and found quite a variety of recipes, many from which I borrowed ideas, but none that I fully followed. Since I didn't have any fresh veggies on hand, I decided to flavor the chickpeas with a boatload of spices, and wished for the best!

Ingredients:
1 14 oz. can garbanzo beans, de-shelled
1/2 c. rolled oats
2 tbs. water
1 tbs. ground flax
1 tbs. cashew butter
1 tbs. fresh lemon juice
1 tbs. Worcestershire sauce
1 clove garlic, finely minced
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. cumin
1/2 tsp. dried onion
red and black pepper, to taste

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. In a medium bowl, add garbanzo beans and oats.


3. In a small bowl, combine water with flax and mix. Add to chickpeas and oats.


4. Add lemon juice, Worcestershire, cashew butter, salt, cumin, garlic, dried onion, and
pepper to the chickpea bowl. Stir until ingredients are thoroughly combined, and spices are evenly distributed.




5. Place mixture into a food processor, and blend until the chickpeas are sticking together. (Depending on preference, you can either blend the mixture thoroughly until the chickpeas make almost a paste, or blend very slightly so that chickpeas are still coarse and somewhat whole).


6. On a non-stick cookie sheet, form the chickpea mixture into patties.


7. Bake for fifteen minutes on each side. Serve with your favorite toppings and enjoy!


Sunflowers courtesy of Whole Foods -- free!



I was a bit hesitant at serving these burgers to Jay, because he actually doesn't like garbanzo beans. However, with the right trimmings, he really enjoyed it! Next time, I would mash the garbanzo beans instead of processing them, because they had a slightly boring texture as they were. I would also add some veggies to spice things up!
These burgers make a simple, quick, veg-friendly and vegan-possible dinner; just skip the worcestershire! I will definitely make these again!