Burgers n' Stuff

Even one of the local weather guys said it was going to be the first rain-free Memorial Day weekend in a hundred years. Yeh, it’s an exaggeration, and instead of rain it’s like a hundred degrees outside, but we are all about family tradition and were glad to be able to light up the grill on Memorial Day. And it actually DID rain at my house Monday morning!

A long time ago when I was shopping with my dad, I couldn’t decide between two items to purchase (can’t remember exactly what, something trivial) and after listening to me agonize long enough, he said “Do what I do, get both!” He was such a smart and practical man. I loved that he said that, and it makes sense to apply that advice to simple decision-making. In my case, spend a couple of extra bucks and save yourself hours of torment. While I wavered between two holiday burger recipes, I could hear him whispering to me, Make both! So I did. Certainly no food would be wasted, and bonus – leftovers for Chase AND me!

I thought Vegan Addict’s Blackeyed Pea Soul Burgers were outstanding and I really wanted to make them again. I used black beans this time, but basically kept the recipe the same. You can tell you’ve got good burgers when the patties are easy to form.

When I found this recipe for Caramelized Onion and Chickpea Burgers, it was practically irresistible. It would also allow me to come up with things other than the usual mustard, lettuce, and tomato for accoutrements. These patties came together nicely too. The recipe says they’re smaller because they’re so rich, but really they are huge! (Look, Aunt Sara, I'm using the platter you bought me - thanks again!)

I baked the bean burgers in the oven and cooked the chickpea burgers in the cast iron skillet.

I know, I got a little extra iron in a couple of my burgers, but I figure I can use it. And I may have mentioned before that Chase and I actually like burnt food. I think it’s from all the years of eating meat that we would only eat extra well done, which I’m sure is because we didn’t actually want to taste the meat! We were so brainwashed into thinking we couldn’t live without meat. Anyway, we grilled up 2 of each of the patties for dinner.

I made a sauce of Tofutti with cilantro, lemon juice, garlic for the chickpea burgers, and sliced some radish, cucumber, cilantro, tomato, and purple onion.

I made slaw too. Packaged broccoli slaw to which I added green onions, bell peppers, cilantro, and a mix of Italian and Asian dressings so it was spicy sweet. It was good on and alongside the burgers.

And I made a fresh fruit salad. It was awesome with apple, red grapes, blackberries, strawberries, blueberries, pear, apricots, and mango.

It was too hot to make fries, so I bought sweet potato chips. Here’s our table.

Chase remembered to grill the buns too.

Here’s my bunless chickpea burger. I have never been able to find glutenfree vegan buns.

Here’s Chase’s monster chickpea burger. We both really really loved these.

I didn’t take a picture of the giant bean burger he ate too!

I may be confused with 4th of July, but I was sure you had to grill AND have ice cream on Memorial Day. I hadn’t had frozen banana ice cream in so long. Thanks to Dreena for reminding me to make her Cashew Banana Ice Cream from ED&BV. Of course I only had peanut butter on hand, but OMG this is soooo good! Chase had his unadorned.

I had mine with fruit.

Oh, and here’s a slice of the banana bread I made a couple of days ago. Another winner from Happy Herbivore!

What a fun, delicious, and satisfying dinner. I wish all weekends were three days long.....