Spring Recipe Contest: Black Bean Burgers

Another wonderful friend, Ashlee, recommended these black bean burgers. Going into it, I didn't think they would be anything to write home about, but I must say that they were extremely tasty. We made a few substitutions (as always!), so without further ado, here's what we did:

Ingredients:

• 4 cups black beans, rinsed
• 1 green bell pepper cut into 2 inch pieces
• 1 onion cut into wedges
• 6 cloves of garlic, peeled
• 2 eggs
• 2 tablespoons chili powder
• 1 tablespoon cumin
• 1 tablespoon curry powder
  
• 2 teaspoons hot sauce (we used chipotle Tabasco sauce)
• 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
• 3/4 cup bread crumbs
• 3/4 cup oatmeal

Preheat grill to medium heat. In a large bowl mash the black beans with a potato masher until thick and pasty. In a food processor finely chop the bell pepper, onion, and garlic. Mix into the beans. In a small bowl mix together the egg, chili powder, cumin, curry, hot sauce, and Worcestershire sauce. Stir the egg mixture into the bean mixture. Mix in the bread crumbs and oatmeal so that the mixture is sticky and holds together. Shape the mixture into 8 or 9 patties and place on a greased piece of aluminum foil. Grill on medium heat for about 5 minutes per side.

With this recipe, we were supposed to have 2 tablespoons of cumin, but we ran out of cumin, so we substituted curry for our second tablespoon. With the curry and the Tabasco sauce, these burgers had a little edge to them, which made them quite tasty. Also, the original recipe just used bread crumbs and didn't include oatmeal. However, when my mom makes meat loaf, she uses oatmeal instead of bread crumbs to make it a little healthier, so I thought I'd give that a try in this recipe too, and I think it turned out well. To be perfectly honest, neither my husband nor I even noticed the oatmeal when we were eating them. I think next time I'd make it solely with oatmeal and not include any bread crumbs. One thing that I need to make very clear is that you HAVE to grease the aluminum foil!! We forgot that step, and they stuck terribly. Overall, this was a very yummy recipe and one that we'll definitely make again! Thanks for the recommendation, Ashlee!