Beet and bean burgers

Beet. I love it in pretty much any form, probably a result of growing up in Russia (yes, I also love cabbage and potatoes). Borscht is my favourite soup, and small cubes of beet slow-roasted till caramelized on the edges are one of my favourite salad add-ins. Sadly, though, many people either hate beets or are afraid of the colour. I once made borscht as a starter at a friend’s dinner party and the ox-blood jokes were less than appetizing, as evidenced by the unfinished bowls of soup.

Hmmmm beets

I’ve managed to convert Andrew to the roasted, caramelized beets, but he is still wary of the idea of borscht. So last night, needing to use up a bunch of beets, I decided to veer away from our usual roasted beets. Not borscht yet, although we'll get there eventually. In the meantime, I made beet and bean burgers with baked parsnip chips. Maybe that doesn’t sound very good; I’m not sure since it sounds delicious to me. And it was delicious. 

Burgers and fries, sort of

Lucky for me, though, I love a good burger but don’t have a huge amount of nostalgia for them, so the idea of a vegetable and bean based patty doesn’t offend me. Childhood memories of burgers seem to revolve mostly around McDonald’s. That’s more special than it sounds, since the McDonald’s in question was the first one in post-Communist Russia, and was as a result very much a symbol of ‘freedom’ in 1992 Moscow. 

It was also huge – at the time, the biggest McDonald’s in the world – and incredibly busy, to the point that on our first visit, we queued outside in far below freezing temperatures for maybe an hour. Once inside, we became part of a slow-moving mass of people all trying to make their way to the counter to order the iconic meal. Service was fast and polished once my dad managed to shout out our order, but then we had to squeeze back through the masses, balancing a laden tray all the while, and search for a table. For most customers, searching for a table involved finding an inevitably occupied table, standing directly next to one of its occupants, and giving them a cold, mute stare to hurry them along in order to free up the table. We eventually settled on a modified approach of apologetically hovering close to occupied tables, although that posed the risk of losing a potential table to a more insistent local.

This whole process may sound like an unpleasant experience, but it really wasn’t. Everyone was so excited to be there and it seemed, for the first few times at least, like such a big deal to be able to go to a McDonald’s in Moscow. Which of course, in 1992, it was.

It eventually became less of a big deal. New McDonald’s venues sprang up all over the city, the crowds thinned out, and it became just the place my friends and I would go to hang out on weekends for a cheap meal.

So while I may have nostalgic memories of McDonald’s, the nostalgia has very little to do with their burgers, or with burgers in general. I am just as happy eating a veggie version as I am eating a beef burger, and this beet and bean version is the best I’ve made in a long time.

Ready to eat

Beat and bean burger patties

Friendly warning: the patties might look a little scary because of the beet’s colour. Also, you do need a food processor to make these – or if you try them without, let me know how it goes.

Makes four large patties.

2 very big beets, scrubbed (no need to peel them)

1 medium onion

1 tbsp balsamic vinegar

Olive oil

A slice of bread – I used brown, but whatever you have on hand is fine

2 cloves garlic, peeled

1 ¼ c cooked sugar beans, or tinned (you could use whatever beans you like or have on hand)

2 – 3 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

Salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 200 C. Chop the beet and onion into smallish pieces and place in a roasting pan. Add the balsamic vinegar, a tablespoon or two of olive oil, some salt and pepper, and toss. Roast the beet and onion mixture for about 30 minutes, or until the vegetables start to caramelize.

Remove from the oven and turn the temperature down to 180 C. Place the beet and onion mixture in the food processor along with the bread and garlic. Process until everything is chopped up very small, but be careful not to puree the mixture. 

Now add the beans, Worcestershire sauce, and some salt and pepper, and pulse a few times to break the beans down a little. There should still be lots of whole beans in the mix, since this adds texture to the patties. Taste the seasoning and add more salt, pepper, or Worcestershire sauce if needed.

Spread one or two teaspoons of olive oil onto a baking sheet. Divide the mixture into four portions and shape each portion into a patty, placing the shaped patties on the greased baking sheet. 

Bake at 180 C for about twenty minutes. Switch the oven to grill and grill the patties for 5 or 10 minutes to colour and crisp the tops.

Remove from the oven, and you’re done with the patties. We put them on Portuguese rolls with mustardy homemade mayonnaise, tomato sauce, baby spinach, and for me, chopped up baby tomatoes (Andrew hates raw tomato, which boggles my mind). We served them with:

Baked parsnip chips

Almost like French fries! Except not really, but still very good.

Serves two.

4 medium parsnips

Olive oil

Salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 180 C. Cut the parsnips into long thin strips, although you’ll probably end up with some shorter fatter pieces – that’s fine.

Place the strips on a baking sheet and add about a tablespoon of olive oil and salt and pepper. You could add any other seasoning at this point – smoked paprika would be very good. Toss to coat all the strips, spread them out in one layer on the tray, and place the tray in the oven. 

Bake for 25 – 40 minutes, depending on how thick you cut the strips and how crispy you like your chips. You could flip them over halfway through to make them brown more evenly, but I am much too lazy to do that and they still turned out great – only two really skinny ones became too crispy on one side.