Recipe #13: Chickpea-Brown Rice Burgers

Our first recipe was a burger made with quinoa and mushrooms and it was an easy transition for my newly meatless palate.  Now that I've become accustomed to the veggie ways we figured we should try another veggie burger recipe.

A veggie burger has now been my go-to meal when I go out with some of my friends to watch hockey games. As they chow down on their chicken wings (As I stare) I get the veggie burger with a side of deep fried pickles. Not a very healthy meal I know but I've become a veggie burger connoisseur of sorts. 

Although I now enjoy the veggie burgers, one of my biggest temptations is the BigMac. Ms. Boyardee's family sends me pictures of BigMacs and I am always tempted to go to the closest Mcdonalds and binge out. Luckily, I got a large bag of BigMac sauce for christmas this year and have been putting it on pretty much everything to crush my cravings...even cereal. The day before we made this recipe we got a Mcdonalds coupon book in the mail...2 for 1 BigMac meals...I told Ms. Boyardee we needed to make burgers the next night and buy a shredder or I was gonna give in. 

The recipe is simple enough, cook some brown rice, add some cooked chick peas, and mash them both together until they have the consistency of ground meat. We then add an egg, shallots, garlic and parsley. We then make tiny little "meat" patties and cook them on stovetop in some olive oil until golden brown. 

The recipe calls for lettuce leaf bus to make it healthier and I did't mind them but I think I would have much preferred a bun...more BigMac-like. We topped the burgers with red onion, roasted peppers and dijon mustard. The burgers were good but what made them GREAT was an addition of the BigMac sauce....even Ms. Boyardee was sold. The pictures are again magnificent, and I plan on smuggling in BigMac sauce wherever I go from this point on. 

A: 7/10

J: 7/10...8.5/10 with BigMac sauce