whatever happened to mr. bean?

My opinion of veggie burgers hinges on two key points. One, trying to imitate the taste of meat is counterproductive and never works, two, I like a fair amount of "chunk" in the chosen base, whether it be vegetable, grain, or bean. As a result of these two preferences, I'm incapable of consuming about 95% of store-bought veggie burgers with any amount of what I would call "joy." So my cooking gaff last week seemed curiously fated. Essentially, what I ended up making myself was a vat of pretty damn delicious veggie-burger base.

I've tried making black bean veggie burgers before and it hasn't worked out. The right recipe and a little luck later, though, and I am basking in beany success. Thick, hearty, flavor-dripping, perfectly textured, beany success. Yuuuuummm. I served mine with pieces of thinly, thinly sliced zucchini which I seared in the pan at the same time as the burgers themselves. Perfection!


Black Bean Burgers adapted from A Mighty Appetite

You Will Need:
4 cups cooked, rinsed and drained black beans (about 2 ½ 15-ounce cans)
1/2 cup Japanese-style panko breadcrumbs
2 large eggs
4 scallions, both white and green parts, minced
3 tablespoons (a small handful) chopped basil or cilantro, or a combination
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 1/2-2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 1/2 teaspoons dried oregano
1 teaspoon coarse salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

To Make:

Place the black beans in a large mixing bowl and mash -- do not overmash! Leave a good amount of the beans whole for good texture. Add bread crumbs, eggs, scallions, fresh herbs, garlic, cumin and oregano to the mix and continuing stirring/lightly mashing until well combined. When the mixture is turned out to your satisfaction, portion and shape it into patties about one inch thick. Sprinkle the patties with salt and pepper. Place a cast-iron skillet over high heat, without any fat; when it is hot but not smoking, add burgers to dry pan. Cook for about four minutes on first side or until well seared and with a flipping spatula, turn onto second side and allow to cook for an additional five minutes, over medium heat.

black bean soup and a lesson learned

I am unlucky with three things in life: electronics (always broken within a month), soups, and my health. These are listed in descending order of importance. Maybe I would have better health if I had more luck with soups.

I suspect that soups are not meant to be made from recipes. That they should be reserved for that special, seemingly innate, intuition of "moms" (emphasis on quotes). In the end, my black bean soup was an unequivocal failure. What I did end up with was a good lesson and a large pot of puffy, garlic-rich black beans. I look forward to making them into other things.

Below is the recipe reproduced in full, my annotations in italics. To make a good soup, try following the italicized version. To get hearty and delicious black beans, follow the regular version -- but leave out the eggs/tortilla and change the simmering time to 1.5 hours.

This is the choose your own adventure of recipes. Tell me how your adventure ends.



Grandpa's Favorite Black Bean Soup

You Will Need:

8 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
1 medium bell pepper, chopped (2 medium bell peppers, 1 large carrot, 1 green zucchini -- double the amount of vegetables)
1-2 tbsp olive oil
6 cups of chicken broth (vegetable is a fine substitute)
2 15 oz cans of black beans (1 bag of dry beans will suffice -- boil them for 2 minutes in water and let soak for an hour. They will cook the rest of the way down while the soup simmers)
fresh thyme, to taste
fresh oregano, to taste
4 eggs
corn tortillas
sour cream
fresh cilantro

To Make:

1. In big soup pot, grill garlic, onion and bell pepper in oil and stir. Grill until vegetables soften, onion becomes translucent. Done best over medium high heat.

2. Add chicken broth, black beans, fresh thyme and oregano to pot. Stir ingredients.

3. Bring to a boil. Lower heat, cover pot and simmer soup for at least half an hour. This will allow the herbs to fully flavor the soup.

4. Crack eggs on edge of pot and drop into soup in different areas of pot. Do not stir! The eggs will cook in place in 2-3 minutes.

5. Remove soup from heat.

6. To best enjoy the soup, place a hard boiled egg in each bowl and fill with black bean soup.

7. Tear corn tortillas in strips and sprinkle over bowl. Add a dollop of sour cream and a generous pinch of freshly chopped cilantro.





This recipe came care of the first print issue of Remedy Quarterly, which I received in the mail (appropriately enough) on my birthday. It is a beautifully curated collection of recipes and stories about food; I highly, highly recommend grabbing a copy while you still can. The ginger cookie recipe alone is worth it.