The official start of summer according to my calendar is this Wednesday and somehow that date is totally in tune with what I’d decided is my personal “start of summer”. On Thursday my brother and his wife arrive from the U.K. (via Mexico – only slightly envious) for a week and Dan and I are pumped.

I can’t tell you what we’ll be up to because it involves Top Secret Birthday Celebrations for my brother but suffice to say, I’m excited for a few days off (our only real summer holiday this year – sob) and an excuse to kick off summer properly.

The other exciting thing happening this week? I’m celebrating five years of living in this wonderful city. If you’re the sentimental type then you can read my heart-on-sleeve ode to Minneapolis, which I wrote this time last year. I can’t believe it’s been half a bloody decade. Old.

These black bean burgers totally scream summer and they’re the best we’ve ever made at home. They have fantastic flavour and a really good texture, falling apart just a teeny tiny bit (I think that’s because we couldn’t quite get them dark and crispy enough on both sides). They soak up a fair bit of oil while frying so you’ll likely want to douse the pan with some more as you flip ‘em.

I love that they’re studded with sweetcorn and doubly love the spices added to the mix. It adds some great flavour without making them spicy at all. If you want them hot you’ll need to up the quantities of spices. We added a smear of chipotle sweet and hot sauce to our buns which brought the heat.

Black Bean Burgers
from Spoon Fork Bacon

Ingredients

• 1/2 yellow onion, chopped
• 1 jalapeno, seeded and chopped
• 3 garlic cloves
• 1 (14.5 ounce) can black beans, drained
• ½ cup plus 2 tablespoons rolled oats
• 1 ear yellow corn, kernels and milk removed from husk
• 1 green onion, thinly sliced
• 2 teaspoons cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon curry powder
• ¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/4 cup plain breadcrumbs
• salt and pepper to taste
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
• 4 whole wheat burger buns

Directions

1. Place onion, jalapeno and garlic in a food processor and pulse 5 or 6 times.
2. Add beans, oats, corn, green onion, cumin, curry powder, and cayenne. Season with salt and pepper and pulse 8 times. Scrape downs sides of the bowl and pulse an additional 5 to 8 times (depending on desired texture).
3. Place mixture into a mixing bowl, cover with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator for at least two hours.
4. Remove chilled mixture from refrigerator and stir in breadcrumbs. Adjust seasonings.
5. Pour oil into a heavy bottom skillet and place over medium. Form mixture into four equal patties. Cook patties for 5 to 7 minutes on each side or until a crust develops and the patties are heated through.
6. Remove patties from heat and place onto burger buns. Assemble burger with toppings and condiments of your choice and serve.

Today I wanted to share a healthy, simple lunch idea with you guys: baked quinoa and millet patties. They taste so good inside a warmed pita bread alongside a simple salad with lemony vinaigrette.

I had a very virtuous Sunday this weekend. My plans to spend all day at the May Day Parade were scuppered when it got cancelled due to weather (we’re having April showers in May…) and so I was left with not a single plan for the day.

First, I made up a batch of Warm Breakfast Quinoa for the week. Halo shining, I decided while I was at it I’d prepare some healthy lunches too. This never happens – instead everyday I scramble around my kitchen trying to find something that my co-workers won’t judge me for eating as I rush out of the door (side note: bringing a LOT of cookies to work helps avoid the squinty-eyed weird looks from happening too often; being the Bringer of Baked Goods is a good thing).

I made up half of the recipe below, adapting Heidi Swanson’s original to use millet as well as quinoa and parsley instead of dill (which I hate). They taste excellent with a healthy dash of sriracha sauce and a couple of them would go down a treat at breakfast time with a fried egg and some wilted greens.

Baked Quinoa and Millet Patties
adapted from 101 Cookbooks

Ingredients

• 1 1/4 cups / 6 oz /170 g cooked quinoa, at room temperature*
• 1 1/4 cups / 6 oz/ 170 g cooked millet at room temperature*
• 5 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 1/2 teaspoon fine-grain sea salt
• 1/3 cup/ .5 oz /15 g finely chopped fresh chives
• 1/3 cup /.5 oz /15 g finely chopped fresh parsley
• 1 cup / 1.5 oz /45 g finely chopped kale
• 1 yellow onion, finely chopped
• 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 cup / 3.5 oz /100 g bread crumbs, plus more if needed
• water or a bit of flour, if needed
• 1/3 cup / .5 oz / 15 g crumbled feta cheese

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400F / 200C.
2. Combine the quinoa, millet, eggs, and salt in a medium bowl. Stir in the chives, parsley, kale, onion, garlic, and cumin. Stir well.
3. Add the baking powder and bread crumbs, stir, and let sit for a few minutes so the crumbs can absorb some of the moisture.
4. Gently stir in the feta.
5. Form mixture into twelve 1-inch / 2.5cm thick patties with your hands. It seems best to err on the very moist side to avoid a not-overly-dry patty, but you can add more bread crumbs, a bit at a time, to firm up the mixture, if you need to. If the mixture is too dry then add a bit more beaten egg or water to moisten it.
6. Arrange the patties with a bit of space between each on a Silpat-lined (or greased) baking sheet. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until the bottoms are brown. Flip and bake for another 5 minutes.
7. Enjoy hot, or allow to cool to room temperature on a cooling rack. Makes about a dozen patties.

*To cook a batch of quinoa and millet: Combine 1 cups/ 6 oz/1700 g each of well-rinsed uncooked quinoa and millet with 3 cups / 700 ml water and 1/2 teaspoon fine-grain sea salt in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil, cover, decrease the heat, and simmer for 25 to 30 minutes, until the quinoa and millet mixture is tender and you can see the little quinoa curlicues.

Black bean burgers are another item that are none too cheap to buy in stores and yet I fork over my hard-earned cash for them on the regular because they are so dang delicious and quick to make.

They are also incredibly easy to make yourself. Once I thought about this for a minute, I realized that I should totally be making big batches of these go-to salad, sandwich, wrap and whatever-else-you-like fillers and spending my dollar bills on something else.

I looked at a few recipes online for some tips to make sure these turned out just right but this recipe is an Eating for England original.

Spicy Black Bean Burgers
(makes 6 patties)

• 15oz can organic no salt added black beans
• 1/2 onion, finely diced
• 1/2 green pepper, finely diced
• 2 garlic cloves, finely diced
• 1 jalapeno pepper, finely diced
• 3 tbsp green onion, finely diced
• 1 egg
• 1 tbsp cumin powder
• 1 tbsp chili powder
• 1 tsp hot sauce
• 1/2 cup wholewheat Panko (normal breadcrumbs can be substituted)

Directions

• Preheat oven to 375.
• Drain and rinse the black beans.
• Place black beans in a medium bowl and mash with the back of a fork til thick and mushy.
• Add the onion, garlic, green pepper, jalapeno pepper, and green onion and mix.
• In a separate bowl, crack egg and whisk. Add chili powder, cumin and hot sauce and mix.

• Pour wet mixture into bean mixture and stir.
• Add Panko or breadcrumbs and combine until mixture is sticky and holds together. Divide mixture into patties.
• Place patties on a lightly greased baking sheet, and bake for ten minutes on each side.

I served mine on a wholewheat English muffin but obviously you can have it however you like – the options are endless! I have to say, the “mm” noises from my official taste-tester confirmed that these turned out pretty awesome. They are definitely spicy though so if you’re not a fan of hotness then omit the jalapeno or cut the hot sauce.

As with my homemade granola bars, these burgers are cheap as chips to make and don’t have any scary or weird ingredients in them – they are just healthy, delicious and fresh!

The nutritional stats made me happy: 145 calories, 1.8g fat, 25g carbohydrate, 7.9g fibre, and 8.9g protein. Nosh on these to your heart’s content!

Next time I’ll be making a much bigger batch and freezing them so that my store-bought veggie burger habit is finally kicked to the curb!

What expensive food do you wish you could make at home?
I’d love to make pesto but alas, I lack the equipment to do it!