These homemade vegan burgers are scrumptious, satisfying, and easy to make. A recipe that both vegans and omnivores will love!
Over the years I’ve developed many recipes for hearty vegan burgers. Store-bought veggie burgers have improved in taste and texture, but for me they still never compare to homemade.
Homemade always better, right? Plus, you can really tweak seasonings like dried herbs and spices, and also salt – whereas you “get what you get” with commercial burgers.
It’s funny, though, because I think vegan burgers are still perceived as being bland or not very satisfying.
It feels like a long time ago since I wrote LTEV, but must reference it in this post because I have a full chapter on hearty vegan burgers in that cookbook. I wanted to show people that homemade burgers are far better than storebought, more satisfying, and can hold their own on a burger bun!
When I wrote Let Them Eat Vegan, our girls were younger and a little fussy about veggie burgers. Store-bought burgers were far too spicy for them, and if they saw pieces of onion, mushrooms, or bell peppers in a patty they would try and pick them out. Plus, many burgers didn’t hold up well on a burger bun.
So, I set out to create a collection of hearty vegan burgers that kids and adults would both enjoy – and that would be easy to make.
These Nutty Veggie Burgers are one of our favorites. They are dense and toothsome, and very satisfying. Since they have a base of nuts, along with vegetables and oats, they are one of the more filling vegan burgers.
These Nutty Veggie Burgers also hold up well on a bun, and they are EASY! So easy that there is no sauteing of onions or other ingredients before working the mixture together. Instead, all the ingredients go straight into the food processor. The machine does all the work, apart from shaping the patties!
To cook, you can bake or pan-fry (a non=stick works best). Then, serve up on a bun (or in a pita or green wrap). If you have Let them Eat Vegan, be sure to try the Almonnaise and Sunshine Fries to pair with these burgers. Quite a delicious way to round out these hearty vegan burgers!
Hope you really enjoy these… more soon! x Dreena
Nutty Veggie Burgers
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cups raw almonds
- 1/2 cup raw walnuts
- ½ cup raw pecans or more walnuts
- 1 small clove garlic roughly chopped/sliced
- ½ tsp sea salt
- 1 tbsp tomato paste or ketchup
- 2 tbsp nutritional yeast
- 1 tbsp tamari SOY-FREE: use coconut aminos
- 1/4 tsp poultry seasoning or 1/8 tsp each of dried thyme and ground sage
- ½ cup finely grated carrot packed
- ½ cup finely grated zucchini packed
- ½ – 1 cup rolled oats see note
Instructions
- In a food processor, add almonds, walnuts, pecans, garlic and salt.
- Puree until the nuts are finely ground.
- Then add ketchup, nutritional yeast, tamari, poultry seasoning (or thyme/sage), carrot and zucchini, and pulse through until the mixture becomes dense and is starting to hold together, and then pulse in oats.
- Remove blade, and shape into patties.
- To cook, you can either bake or pan-fry.
- To bake, place shaped patties on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
- Bake about 9-10 minutes on each side.
- I prefer these burgers pan-fried. To do so, use a good non-stick skillet.
- Place patties on skillet over medium heat.
- Cook patties, about 5-7 minutes on first side, and then another 3-5 minutes on second side until golden brown.
- Serve with lettuce, tomatoes and fixings of choice.
Notes
- Using ½ cup of oats will firm the patties up nicely enough, and you can use up to 1 full cup of oats for even firmer patties.
- If you’d like to make this into a loaf, it works pretty well. Press into a lightly oiled and lined (with a strip of parchment, for easy removal) loaf pan. Cover with foil and bake at 375 degrees for 25 minutes, uncovering for the last 5-10 minutes just to lightly brown the top. Let cool for 5-10 minutes in the pan, and then use the parchment to lift the loaf out of the pan to slice.
image credit: Hannah Kaminsky
Sarah says
Hi Dreena,
I actually have a question about your granola recipes… I have trouble getting brown rice syrup and there have also been some scares about it recently (contains arsenic)… I was wondering what I could replace it with. Could I use maple syrup or should I use something more neutral such as agave? Any other suggestions? I don’t want to change the taste to much or the perfect texture of your granola…
Dreena says
Hi Sarah, you can use barley malt as an alternative (though it’s not gluten-free if that’s an issue). Here’s a link about br rice syrup and the arsenic issue, I think there has been a lot of scare reports circulating. This might help, and if not I’d opt for barley malt as it has the same texture as br rice syrup – agave is much thinner (and also sweeter). 🙂
http://www.christinacooks.com/_blog/Living_the_WELL_Life/post/Brown_Rice_Syrup_and_ArsenicThe_Truth_I_Discovered_-_by_Christina_Pirello/
meg says
I use hight quality grade A maple syrup to make granola. It’s has a very mild maple flavor. You wouldn’t be able to tell it was used in the recipe. Give it a try and see what you think…
Gail says
I live in your ‘hood & had pretty much the same experience as you & your hubby at that raw restaurant, so got a chuckle over your comments. I much prefer Gorilla Foods downtown.
Love your new cookbook; haven’t made that many recipes as yet, but everything I’ve tried so far has been great………..actually I have most of your books!
Happy Dad’s Day to you & your family……
Molly says
Hi Dreena,
I have all your cookbooks and read your blog frequently but never post. Tonight I made dinner for my dad and husband for father’s day. It was an entirely “Dreena” dinner–I made sun-dried tomato pesto pasta, salad with “honey” mustard dressing and polenta croutons, and steamed broccoli. It was yummy!
My very favorite pesto recipe is the Brazil Nut Pesto from your newest book. That is just a gorgeous-tasting dish!
Keep up the awesome work!
By the way, do you know of any vegetarian or vegan baby food cookbooks? I have an 8 month old and don’t know what to make him. It’s intimidated me so much so far that I’ve actually been buying earth’s best jarred baby food so far…
Thanks!
Molly
Dreena says
Hi Molly! Well I’m glad you decided to comment today. 🙂 How fabulous to know you are enjoying my books and so many recipes!! I love that Brazil Nut Pesto too, waiting for basil season… WAITING! 😉 Do you have my cookbook “Vive le Vegan”? It has an entire section on feeding babies and toddlers. I think it will give you a lot of information since he is still young and you are in that first stage of food introduction. It’s at the back of the book. Also, I do reference feeding babies in LTEV – to a lesser degree, but you will find some tips in there. There are a few vegetarian baby books on the market, but not sure if there’s been anything new in recent years. Making your own baby food is not hard, and is FAR cheaper (and tastes/smells better – before and, er, after). You can use a food processor or high-powered blender and make it in large batches. Def go to the section in Vive for ideas at your boy’s stage – and beyond. You’ll get the hang of it quickly… think baked sweet potatoes blended with zucchini, and later potatoes and avocadoes mixed with beans or quinoa… it just takes an hour twice a week to make a couple of batches for fridge/freezer. Hope that helps!
Molly says
Thank you Dreena! I do have Vive Le Vegan, and LTEV too–all of them, actually. I really appreciate that whole section on feeding babies and toddlers in Vive! I think I’m just over-thinking the situation. I just need to jump in and just start making stuff for him and it will become less intimidating for me…
Daisy says
What if your food processor died recently and you have a non-high-speed blender? My husband’s ready to start making the switch (I never thought it would happen!) and burgers are always a big deal, but just wondering how the recipe might fare with the resources I have at the moment!
Dreena says
Daisy, I wouldn’t do it in a blender, just won’t work through the nuts well w/o any liquid. Do you have a mini-processor or anything else to first grind the nuts? Trying to think of options here, the main thing is getting the nuts processed down… I would get a food processor in your hands if I could!!! I wouldn’t want to be w/o mine!! 🙂
Daisy says
Thanks, Dreena! Yeah, I need to replace the food processor; just not sure when nor which one I want. I think I only had it 2 years, so I’m not impressed that it died already. (It literally BROKE, plastic breaking, while I was using it.)
Dreena says
Oh, that’s WRONG!! That irritates me with appliances, they should have a life of 10 years I think. I had an electric kettle that lasted only 1 1/2 yrs, I was so ticked!! Well, if you’re going to make the leap for a new one, I’d suggest at least a 12-cup processor (if you didn’t have one before) – it will give you room for double-batching recipes, etc. Here are some on amazon, just fyi: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=12-cup+food+processor
good luck!
Mauree says
Dreena do you soak the nuts first?
Dreena says
Hi Mauree, nope, just add them to the processor and go! 🙂