Bean-A-Thon: Spicy Black Bean Burgers

The minute Mara sent me her bean recipes to try I knew that her Spicy Black Bean Burgers were going to be made.  I LOVE black bean burgers & I LOVE spice, so I knew it would be a match made in heaven.

Last weekend when I kicked off the Bean-A-Thon, I cooked three types of beans: black beans, white beans and pinto beans (which I made right away into my Spicy Cinnamon Chili).  I froze the white beans & black beans knowing I?d be using them this week or next.

For those of you who don?t know, if you want to buy dry beans (its cheaper, there are no preservatives & its better for the environment!), but know you won?t have time to cook them every time you want to make beans, you can cook the beans when you do have time and then freeze them in your ?usual? serving size for later use.   (I usually freeze in 2 cup batches ? a can of beans in 15 oz., or about 2 cups.)  Then when you want to make a recipe, you simply defrost the beans, sometimes add a little liquid and voila.  Home-cooked beans.  Its an awesome trick!

So I took my black beans out of the freezer Friday night, knowing that (since I had just purchased Ore Ida sweet potato fries) Spicy Black Bean burgers were definitely on tap for this weekend.

On Saturday, following Mara?s Spicy Black Bean Burger recipe, I started by mashing up half the black beans in my blender with the cut up green pepper, onion & garlic?which didn?t work. 

So then I had to use the food processor.  And do it in itty bitty bits.  Cuz my food processor is tiny.  So that took a while?.

I ate some of these beauties while I food processed?

Then I had black bean mush.  And I added chili powder, cayenne pepper, ground cumin, salt & pepper, an egg & pulverized Special K to the mix.  (I subbed the cayenne pepper & ground cumin for the tabascao sauce, because I was trying not to spend more money.  And the Special K for the bread crumbs because most bread crumbs have dairy in them.)

And I mixed it up with a fork.  And then formed lovely, misshapen patties.  Though Mara?s recipe states that it yields 4 burgers, I ended up with 11?more on that in a second.

I then plopped them into the preheated to 400 oven on parchment paper-lined cookie sheets, and cooked them for 12 minutes on each side.

And I paired my burger on a bed of spinach & tomato salad with some Ore Ida sweet potato fries & ketchup.

All in all?  An awesome lunch yesterday (and I?m definitely looking forward to leftovers!) ? Thank you sooo much to Mara for such an awesome recipe!  I loved the mixture of flavors (I?m sure it would?ve been even better with tabasco sauce (or another hot sauce), but I made do, and made do quite well!

What would I do differently?  Well, for one, when I double the recipe on accident (you remember those 11 patties I made?yeah I used 2x the quantity ? whoops!), I should really have doubled the number of eggs used in the recipe.  I believe it would?ve fixed the problem I had: after I cooked the burgers, I had just 2 patties that stayed together?The rest are all crumbled?crumbled deliciousness!  And I would also try to have hot sauce on hand to use, because I think it might add another element to the mix.  But since my Bean-A-Thon is partially a way for me to try to save money?I opted to use what I had on hand

Do you eat veggie/no meat burgers?  If so what is your favorite kind?  Veggie/Bean/other burger?  Do you make it ? or do you buy it at a grocery store/restaurant?  I love black bean burgers?But I?ve also had a few potato based burgers that are delicious as well.