Deconstructing a burger

I mentioned this tofu-nut-burger,  served with a homemade apple sauce in my last post. I didn't include a recipe or talk much about it  because this super delicious burger deserves and entire post all to itself. .

You see, I am on a quest to get people to like tofu. Like tofu? It's a difficult task because tofu is really quite blah. Honestly. It's healthy but it's blah. It is, however, a terrific base for veggie burgers. And it's cheap too. And terrific. Wait... I said that already., right.

I  had already tried several variations of tofu-based burgers (all successful) when I came across Heidi Swanson's one in her blog 101 Cookbooks.  Always game to try new recipes, I decided to give hers ago especially since her burger had lots of nuts in it and I LOVE nuts. Love, love, love nuts.

I made a few changes to Heidi's recipe. Nothing major, really.  I added some cottage cheese because ... well, because I really love cheese as well and I served the burger with  apple sauce  because I had a lot of apples in my larder and I thought a sweet and sour apple sauce would go well with the nutty patty. Oh, I also had some pine nuts from I can't remember when and so I tossed a few in too, toasted first of course.

Here is what you need: 

450 g  tofu. Use firm tofu, drained. I used the pre-fried Japanese tofu with seaweed, just for added flavour. 

1/2 cup raw cashewnuts, chopped fine

1/4 cup pumpkin seeds, chopped fine
2 tbsp toasted pine nuts.

1/2 cup mushrooms, chopped fine. I used swiss browns but you can use Shitaake or button mushrooms too. 

1/4 cup cottage cheese, crumbled

1 large egg 

1/2 cup breadcrumbs (keep some more at hand)

1/2 tbsp soy sauce

1 tbsp mustard

2 tsp ground cumin

2 tsp paprika

salt and pepper

Here is what you have to do:

Mix all the ingredients up by hand. If you have a food processor, you can use it (in which case you don't need to chop up the nuts beforehand). It's nice to feel the nuts in the patty so don't let the nuts get to be too fine. Once the ingredients are all nicely mixed, start forming patties (SEE PIC BELOW) using just your hands. You may need to add more breadcrumbs to help hold the patty together.  

Once the patties have been formed and line on a tray/plate, cover them with foil and pop them in the fridge for about 30 mins for them to set a little.

Heat some oil in a shallow saucepan. When it's hot, slowly drop the patties in. Don't overcrowd the pan as it slows the cooking process. Turn the head to meium-low and cook the patties till they start browning at the bottom. Flip them. Once they're nice and golden all over take them out and leave them to cool.  

For the curry apple sauce, you will need:

4 red apples 

1 sick of cinnamon

2 tbsp sugar (more if you like it sweeter or if you are using green or not so sweet red apples)

1/2 cup water

2 tsp curry powder 

Put all the ingredients in a saucepan and let it cook, covered, over low heat. Cook until the apples are saoft enough to mash and the liquid is almost all evaoprated. Remove, mash  the apples and leave to cool. 

Assembling the buger.

Butter the buns/bread and toast them. Spread the lettuce on the bottom bun (I like chopped lettuce) and then spread some of the apple sauce over the lettuce. The patty goes over the apple sauce and if you like a little more zing, a little mustard atop the Patty. Cap your burger and you're good to go.