How to Make Homemade Veggie Burgers--Indian Style

I often feel exasperated that my vegetarian diet can end up being just as expensive if not more expensive than a carnivore's. Veggie burgers that cost $5.00 a box? While ground beef is $0.56 a pound? Why?

Well, I recently began making my own veggie burgers, and it turns out the preparation is much easier than I thought it would be.

After making the burger mixture and after my meal, I store all the remaining patties in the freezer. Try it too, and you will have delicious and low-cost homemade veggie burgers on hand!

Here's a recipe for Indian-Style Yellow Split-Pea (Toor Daal) and Brown Lentil Burgers (makes about 16 burgers).

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• 6 oz. yellow split-peas (toor daal)
• 6 oz. brown lentils
• half of a small onion
• 3 garlic cloves
• 1 T. tandoori powder (I like Sun Brand. If you can't handle spicy, use less than 1 T.)
• 2 tsp. chili powder
• 2 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. pepper
• 2 beaten eggs
• ½ cup bread crumbs

1. Prepare beans and lentils as you normally would.

2. Allow beans and lentils to cool. Then mash together.

3. Chop onion, garlic.

4. Mix all ingredients in a large bowl.

5. Roll mixture into patties and cook on greased skillet 5–8 min at 320 degrees.

Tips & Warnings

• Save even more money by buying the split-peas and lentils in bulk. Make a huge batch in a mixing bowl. Press into patties, separate the patties with wax paper, and freeze them.
• When flipping the patties, do so gently--they have a high moisture content and won't hold together as well as most burgers. And if you stack the patties when you freeze them, make sure you double layer the wax paper in between.

Resources

• This is a version of my article first published at True Adventures in Money Hacking