Today we decided to make our favorite veggie burgers. We cook this one regularly now since we started these challenges back in October. It’s a great way of cutting down on meat, but still feel like your having a cheeky take away.

Making the potato wedges with rosemary and garlic instantly takes them up to another level. A mixed salad adds extra vitamins for your 5 a day. Although this week we don’t have as much fruit as I would normally order I have added plenty of vegetables and salad.

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Breakfast
Toast and Jam or Porridge

Lunch
Chicken Salad Sandwich

Dinner
Veggie Burgers with Potatoes Wedges and Salad

Snack
Banana Bread

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RECIPES

Ultimate Veggie Burgers

Burger Patty Ingredients

1 tin of 400g tin of kidney beans
1 small onion peeled and finely chopped
1 large carrot grated
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 tablespoon oil, plus 2 tablespoons to fry the burgers
1 heaped teaspoon flour,
plus flour to shape the burgers

Burger Sauce Ingredients

2 tablespoons of ketchup and mayonnaise
A dash of Worcestershire sauce (or mushroom sauce)
Dash of lemon juice (optional)
Freshly ground Pepper

Plus Extra burger Ingredients

Iceburg lettuce slices
Red onions thinly sliced
Gherkins sliced (optional)
4 slices of cheese
4 burger rolls

Ingredients for the salad:
2 inches of cucumber sliced into chunks
2 tomatoes diced
1/4 of the red onion thinly sliced
1/4 iceberg lettuce sliced
1 carrot peeled and thinly sliced

plus 4 large potatoes for the wedges

Method

Drain the kidney beans and rinse in cold water. Put into a saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to the boil, and simmer for 10 minutes until soft.

Put the onion, carrot and cumin into a medium frying pan. add a splash of oil and cook on a low heat to soften. When the kidney beans have cooked, drain, and mix with carrots and onion for another 5 minutes or so. Remove from the heat and mash together until you have a smooth puree. Stir in the flour to stiffen the mixture.

While the burger mix is cooling, make the finishing touches to the burgers by finely slicing the red onion, shredding the lettuce and slicing the cheese.

Mix the burger sauce ingredients together to make to make the Marie-rose sauce.

Divide the burger mixture into 4 and roll in to balls, Heat the remaining oil in the frying pan on a medium heat, then place them each in the pan and flatten gently to make the burger shape.

Cook for a few minutes on one side, before turning. You need to be gentle as they can be quite fragile before they fully cooked! When fried on both sides, put a little of the cheese on top of each one and cook, with a lid on if you have one for another minute until the cheese starts to soften.

Meanwhile prepare the buns by slicing them in half and lightly toasting the insides. Then start building your burgers by putting a layer of the sauce and the lettuce on the bottom, then the burger, followed by the onions and the gherkin, finally the bun top. They are now ready to eat.

Serve with some rosemary and garlic potato wedges and salad.

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Banana Bread
Recipe from Jamie Oliver

Makes a large loaf

Ingredients

Handful of walnuts (optional)
500g (5 Ripe Bananas)
125g Butter
125g Brown sugar
2 Eggs
200g Plain Flour
2 Teaspoon Baking Powder
1 Teaspoon Bicarbonate of Soda
1 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
A pinch of Salt
Oil

Method

Preheat the Oven 170°C or Gas Mark 5

If you are using walnuts, Bash them a bit to add crunch to the bread.

Mash the ripe bananas in a bowl and put to one side while you make the rest of the mixture.

Cream the butter and sugar together until smooth, then add the eggs and beat into this. Then add the broken walnuts and the banana and mix in well.

Sift in the flour, baking powder, Bicarb, cinnamon and salt and stir into the mixture until a smooth batter.

Take some baking paper and scrunch it up and wet a little under the tap then drizzle some oil over it and line the loaf tin.

Fill the tin and cook in the oven for about an hour, but check after 40 minutes with a skewer. If it comes out clean it should be cooked.

Let it rest for about 10 minutes afterwards to firm up. then once cooled transfer to an airtight tin.

This will last about a week, but ours isn’t normally around that long.