I don't really hate Vegetarians as a chef its just sometimes its such a struggle to find a truly outstanding dish that makes them happy as customers. Most times the veggie option is some form of Pasta or Curry or if they are lucky the Chef might have a portion of quorn mince in the freezer ! Trouble is he will probably turn the mince into a Pasta or curry dish anyway ! ha ha !
So over the coming months I am going to try and find a selection of truly inspiring non meat dishes and in true test pilot style I am going evaluate them so that you the reader when you have a Vegetarian around for dinner you can wow them with more than a pasta sauce and a bit of melted cheese !
Veggie Channa Marsala Burger.
This is a clever way of making a spicy burger out of an Indian stew dish made with chickpeas and spinach.
Whenever I make a burger I tend to place the meat and all the other ingredients into a bowl and mix away. Then I make my little meat patties and form them using my previously mentioned stolen burger press and then Alakazam one top notch burger ! However for this Veggie burger it involves cooking your mix, letting it cool forming into burger patties then cooking in your frying pan. It sounds like a bit too much effort but ill give it a go.
This recipe will make about 4 burger patties.
In a pan heat a good splash of Olive Oil. Now add 2 finely chopped Onions, 1 TBSP of finely chopped Chillies and a TBSP of Garam Masala. Cook for a few minutes and then add 1 grated ginger stalk, 4 chopped cloves of garlic and 1 medium grated carrot. Cook until soft. Now add 400gms of drained Chickpeas, 415 grams of frozen garden peas and 250mls of coconut milk. Next add 2 handfuls of spinach and cook until all the Chickpeas and Vegetables are soft.
I then added some polenta into the mix to absorb some of the liquid but you can add fresh bread crumbs. I then mashed the pans contents up a bit with a masher then added a nice couple of handfuls of fresh coriander and then turned it out onto a tray to let it slightly cool so I could form it into burgers. I personally would leave the mix overnight in the fridge to let it set a bit more but on this occasion I cooked them straight away and I had to use my skilled craftsman of the kitchen Jedi like abilities while cooking them to avoid them breaking up !
You could turn this into a Cheese burger if you want but I just had it in a nice soft bread bun with a dollop of coriander and lime mayo and some potato skins ! OK Potato skins are not very sexy chef but I have developed a bit of a love affair with these little bits of potato goodness while working last week in a Pub in North Shields ! If for no other shallow reason than the beautiful waitress called 'Claudia' asked me to make her some after service every night ! ha ha !
I have to admit that eating this Burger was a great surprise. The combination of the almost meaty like texture of the Chickpeas combined with the rich Coconut milk and the fragrance from the coriander made this Veggie dish absolutely delightful !
I honestly would eat this as a stand alone dish. Could I give up Meat and live off these......erh....no !
But it was dam tasty. If you would like to try a few different Veggie burger dishes I have a book called 'The Best Veggie Burgers on the Planet ' by Joni Marie Newman which you are most welcome to borrow.......Enjoy !
Woah! Pretty harsh on Vegies at the start.
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Hi A C. sorry I could have worded that a bit better ! I was really trying to express how little some of the kitchens I have worked in try to make a good veggie menu to run alongside there main menu. Quite often its just a token effort based on a tomato based or curry sauce.The Veggie is often seen as an irritation to the chef and that is why I am going to try and uncover some stand out veggie dishes over the coming months. Thanks so much for taking the time to read my post though. Best wishes Kevin.
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