Most of the time when I check my mail there's nothing exciting in there, mainly just bills or flyers. Sometimes, though, the newest issue of Everyday Food is in there, and it's a beautiful day. Their March 2011 issue has page after page of recipes that I have to try, and the first one I made is the Mediterranean Chickpea Burgers. I have had a recent obsession lately with burgers, especially bean burgers. I had to text my roommate sister the other night to see if she was sick of the Veggie Burgers with Tahini Mayonnaise yet, because I felt like making them again for the third time in two weeks. (Side note: The veggie burgers are even better when a little Sriracha sauce is stirred into the mayonnaise. Also I discovered that butter lettuce is good on them, and I hate lettuce on burgers)
The chickpea burger that I made last night, does have beef in it. The patties are roughly half ground beef and half chickpeas and bulgur wheat. NOM NOM NOM. When I was buying the ground beef I managed to give myself a heart attack and embarrass myself all at the same time. What you need to know is that I am half Dutch, which means I am half cheap. I have zero issue paying lots of money for Lululemon, but I will not spend lots of money on other things, like ground beef.
I was looking at the ground beef and for roughly a pound of it, the price was $9 or so. Usually it's about $5, so this sent me into a panic attack about food prices going up and how I would no longer be able to afford one of the cheapest meats to buy. I spotted a butcher and I said "Hey, why is the ground beef so expensive?" and he said "That's ground bison". I'm an idiot.
Mediterranean Chickpea Burgers
adapted from Everyday Food
serves 4
Ingredients
2 ounces feta cheese
1/4 cup low-fat plain yogurt
coarse salt and ground pepper
1/4 bulgur
1 can (15.5 ounces) chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1/2 pound ground beef chuck
1/3 cup roughly chopped mint leaves
nonstick cooking spray
4 hamburger buns, split and lightly toasted
1 small cucumber, thinly sliced
1 large tomato, sliced
Directions:
1) In a small bowl, mash feta with the back of a fork until smooth. Stir in the yogurt and season with salt and pepper. Set aside.
2) In a small heatproof bowl, combine bulgur and 1/2 cup boiling water. Cover with plastic wrap and let sit 10 minutes. Meanwhile, in a food processor, pulse chickpeas until coarsely chopped. Transfer to a large bowl and add beef and mint. Drain bulgur and add to chickpea mixture. With your hands, mix until mixture is evenly combined and holds together when pressed into a ball. Divide into four 1-inch-thick patties and season with salt and pepper.
3) Lightly coat a large nonstick skillet with cooking spray and heat over medium-high. Add patties and cook until browned and crispy on the outside and cooked through, 8-10 minutes, flipping once. Serve on buns with sliced cucumber, tomato and feta-yogurt sauce.
Overall, I found the patty to taste strongly of ground beef. Not a lot of flavor. To combat this, I would add some lemon juice to the feta-yogurt sauce next time. It was a good burger, but it just needed something extra to make it great.
3 comments:
I have to say, I am impressed with how burger-like your burgers turned out. I tried this recipe on Tuesday night (following the EDF magazine's recipe), and mine started to crumble apart while they were cooking. Maybe an egg would have helped the ingredients stick together. I thought the flavors and ingredients would make a great burger, but they just didn't hold together.
The one in the picture is the only one of the 4 that didn't crumble. I think you are right about it needing an egg.
Or even making 5 patties instead of 4, perhaps the size causes it to fall apart?
I also saw this recipe and was so excited. I used ground lamb instead of beef and they were just outstanding. I cut them in half and stuffed them inside a pita so when it fell apart, it wouldn't cause a problem.
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