Homemade veggie burgers (Edited!)

I do enjoy cooking, especially when I am in the mood for it.  Of course I am one of those people who needs to be in the mood to do most things, I am sort of like that.  Except of course when it comes to going to work, and then it doesn't matter, I have no choice.  I get in the mood for it eventually, as the kids can usually make my mood good.  Well, ignore the last few days and that is true. I appear to be a bundle of contradictions today, and I guess that is usually true anyway.  Or else it is the wine talking!

ANY WHO, I was told about home made veggie burgers by a friend who I work with.  She was telling me about how good they were, how easy, how healthy and I knew I had to try them.  I recently was inspired to quit eating meat.  I say inspired because I have toyed with the idea for years. A good friend has talked to me about it a bit and I decided to have a go at it.  I think it has really been a good thing for me.  I have not eaten a lot of meat for a long time, so it was pretty easy to quit completely.  Giving up Diet Pepsi is quite another thing, that has been very hard.  VERY!  But that is another post.

So, I recently purchased a food chopper from Pampered Chef and that has made the making of veggie burgers easy and fast.  It works really well and best of all, it cleans up super easily.  Win!!!

I posted some pix of the finished product on facebook and had a request for the recipe.  So this is for Connie and anyone else who might want to use this technique. Special thanks to Lexi for the basic ideas behind this.

Homemade Veggie Burger

1 cup of brown or wild rice
Assorted chopped vegetables - I used  zucchini, carrots, onion, red sweet pepper and portabella mushrooms.  About 1.5  - 2 cups all together.
1 egg
oregano or seasoning to your taste.

Stir all together.  Heat olive oil in a frying pan, divide the mixture into 4,  cook for about 5 minutes on medium/medium low, until the mixture holds together.  You need to cook it long enough so it doesn't fall apart.  Flip, cover and continue cooking for another 4 or 5 minutes, or until veggies are done.

I plan to try making black bean burgers using the beans instead of the rice.  And use some mexican flavors instead of oregano.

Mix it all together! 

Resist the temptation to try and flip too soon!

Cook until veg is soft.  Or not, depending on how you like it.

As you can tell, the recipe is certainly adaptable to any and all veggies that you might like.  The rice fills out the recipe nicely and the egg holds the whole mess together.  :)  This is a good way to use up stuff in the frig.  I am going to mix in some of the grilled eggplant I have with the next batch.  I am pretty sure you could freeze these as well- after cooking.

Until next time, make some joy yourself!

*****EDITED TO ADD:******

RICE!  I don't make a lot of rice, so I had some of this in my cupboard!  It was really convenient and one bowl was just the right size to make this recipe!  And it is really good, has nothing extra in it- right for clean eating .....
and best of all, no pans to wash!  :)