I have sad news.
My dear friend, Sara, is moving away on Saturday.
She’s moving to Denver.
Ok, so it’s not actually sad. It’s pretty cool. And I get to visit her this winter!
Selfishly, though, I’ll miss her.
Although, she did give me her beans.
Nope, that’s not a euphemism for anything. When one is preparing to move cross-country, it’s generally wise to unload the heavy, non-essentials from the load. Ergo, I inherited the beans.
I guess I…inherited the wind…? (womp womp)
Anyway, since she gave me a few cans of kidney beans and I’m not a fan of chili (there was a food poisoning incident- I don’t want to talk about it), I needed to think up something clever to do with them.
And then I remembered Emily’s vegan black bean burgers. That would work with kidney beans, too, right?
Why yes, yes it would.
You may notice that I jazzed these burgers up a little bit. Plus, I noticed that kidney beans have a much softer consistency than black beans, so I added some extra bulk and handled them with a bit more care.
Spicy Kidney Bean Burgers
serves 6
Adapted from Daily Garnish
1 22 oz can red kidney beans
1/4 c old fashioned oats, raw
1 carrot, grated
1/2 medium onion, grated
1/2 t garlic salt
1/4 t cumin
1/4 t cinnamon
1 t garlic chili paste (find it in the ethnic foods aisle, or use any chili sauce)
1 t olive oil
up to 1/4 cup breadcrumbs
1. Preheat oven to 320°.
2. Place oats in a food processor and pulse until coarsely chopped.
3. Drain beans, add 3/4 of the can to the oats. Add carrots, onion, oil, spices and chili paste and pulse to combine.
4. The mixture will most likely look pretty loose, so slowly add in breadcrumbs until it thickens up (it will still be loose, but not runny). Add the remaining beans and pulse once or twice to break them up slightly.
5. Grease a baking sheet and form mixture into 6 patties. They will be sticky, just form them as best you can.
6. Bake for about 20 minutes and flip. Bake for another 10-15 minutes until they are slightly crispy on the outside.
7. These can be grilled for 3-4 minutes per side to add extra flavor, but watch carefully as they will burn!
You could easily adapt these for your non-spicy-loving friends. Although, I wouldn’t suggest it.
Garlic chili paste is the stuff of dreams.
These are not the firmest burgers, but they’re really good.
I think I did my inheritance proud.
Aww, boo to your friend moving. My bestie moved to Boston last Nov and I still miss her like crazy!
Sucks that your friends moving, but getting to go to Denver is awesome. Plus, those burgers sound fabulous.
I’ve made similar black bean burgers- and yeah, they don’t stay together as well as their beefy friends. But whatev. I’ll eat them in a bowl with a spoon if need be. They’re fab.
It’s true- no shame in eating solid foods with a spoon. It’s just prepping us for our nursing home days. We’ll be the cool grannies in the corner.
Love me some bean burgers and I find it is a general rule that the messier that food, the better.
For veggie burgers, I like to add eggs or tahini to the mix to help keep them together. I’m definitely adding chili paste to the next batch that I make though, because that’s a great idea.
Yeah, I wanted to keep them vegan, so no eggs. Plus I wanted to make them “pantry” burgers, and none of the ingredients go bad very quickly.
My BFF lives in Denver! It’s wonderful there! It’s sad that she’s moving though 😦
I LOVE red beans. You did the beans proud!
Why, thank you. 🙂
I’ve never been to Denver, which is sad because it was so cheap to fly there from OKC. Yay for a visit. Boo for her leaving. Yay for beans!
That is too bad that you never made it to Denver while you lived out there! Ah well, someday!
I still need to make my own bean burgers!
It sucks when friends move. But then, I gues I suck since I’m moving away. Denver is one of the spots I’m looking at though so hopefully she will dig it!
[…] as I’ve made black bean burgers and spicy kidney bean burgers already this summer, I wanted to use up some of these beans without going down the burger […]