Bloody Yurt Beetroot Burgers with Sweet Potato Fries
Welcome to our first day of our journey through culinary America, made vegan! To start with: Burgers. But … a bit different.
When we were living in our cosy yurt not long ago, I only had a rudimentary semi-outdoor kitchen with a simple table top gas stove. Gladly I was able to use my immersion blender that I had brought with me. But that was it. No oven. No kitchen machine. For me, this was a REAL adventure and a fine experience to see how I can prepare our favorite dishes without all the usual modern times kitchen tools AND vegan. This is how our YURT BURGERS were born. They might not ressemble totally a usual burger, but wow, adding this beetroot-soy-sauce on top of the bread and patties, this dish became one of our favorit of all times!
These Yurt Beetroot Burgers are so simple! Don’t look at all the side dishes that we use to serve them with. Just the patties and the bread alone. I simply blend either cooked (best for a bloody red coloured sauce!) or even sometimes raw beetroots with the veggies that I have at home (mostly zucchini and carrot), preserve the pulp on one, the juice on the other side and make patties and sauce out of these both. For the patties, you don’t need many more ingredients in fact. I sometimes, according to my mood, add some simple flour (for more dense patties), sometimes just cornstarch and fine rolled oats for a softer patty version. Places in hot oil, and whoops, done they are.
This recipe is also a perfect OLD BREAD recipe. You can use whatever bread you have. It just needs to have a flat surface to be able to roast them on both sides, which gives this dish a particular flavor.
If you want, you can prepare your own ketchup (naturally sweetened with agave syrup) in only 5 minutes following my recipe for a SIMPLE HOMEMADE KETCHUP.
Best served with a fine Ginger Apple Cider, homemade!
Please feel free to ask any questions about the ingredients or method.
Have fun!
Bloody Yurt Beetroot Burgers with Sweet Potato Fries
Equipment
- 1 immersion blender
- 1 sieve
Ingredients
For the patties
- 1 cup cooked beetroot, cut in pieces
- 1/2 cup zucchini, cut in pieces
- 1/2 cup carrots, cut in small pieces
- 500 ml water
- 1/4-1/3 cup rolled oats (the fine ones) for a gluten-free preparation please see that they are certified gluten-free!
- 2 tbsp cornstarch
- 1/2 tsp curry powder
- dried herbs optional
For the sauce
- 1 tbsp cornstarch
- 2-3 tbsp soy sauce
For the Sweet Potato Fries
- 1/2 large sweet potato
Further
- 4-6 slices aubergine
- 2 slices (old) white bread or gluten-free bread
- 2 leaves lettuce
- 2 portions Homemade Ketchup see recipe link below!
- dijon mustard
- olive oil for frying
- salt, pepper
Instructions
Prepare the patties
- In a blender cup, blend the beetroot, the zucchini, the carrots and the water. Pour the mixture through a sieve, preserve the juice in a pot or bowl. With a spoon, scrape and push the pulp a little to make sure, that as much excess liquid as possible leaves the pulp. Set the juice aside.
- Add the oats, the spices and herbs and the cornstarch to the pulp. Mix well. Season with salt and pepper, and some dried herbs (optional).
- In a non-sticking pan, heat up some oil. Take on spoonful of patty mixture in your hand, softly form a sort of ball (it will still be quite soft, but that's how it should be for this recipe!), place this ball in the oil and press softly down with your fingers to form a patty. Fry the patties until golden brown on boths sides, transfer them on a plate or oven dish and set aside (you can place them in an oven preheated to 50 degrees to keep them warm, if you wish – I normally use the heat of the sauce later to warm them up again right on the plate before serving – probably the "lazy method" ;-), but just the way it is for kitchens without oven… ).
Continuing with the preparation
- Peel and cut the sweet potatos in more or less thin slices.
- In the same non-sticking pan, add some more oil and roast the aubergines until brown on both sides. Transfer them to a plate and set aside.
- In the same pan again, add more oil and fry the sweet potatos. I usually flip them with a spatula and a fork, to make sure they get fried all around. Transfer the sweet potato fries to a bowl.
Prepare the sauce
- Take a few spoonfuls of the beetroot juice from before and place it in a glass or cup. Now, to use the roasting and frying flavours best, I recommend to use the same pan again. See if there is too much residual oil from frying – if yes, take it out. Pour the rest of the juice into the pan, bring it to a boil and let simmer until the liquid is reduced to 3/4.
- In the meantime, mix the beetroot juice that we preserved before (the one in the glass) with the soy sauce and 3/4 tbsp of cornstarch (see that the starch has dissolved totally).
- As soon as the juice in the pan has reduced, mix in well (with a spatula) the cornstarch-juice-mixture. Let it thicken (approximately 1-2 minutes). If the sauce is still too liquid, repeat this procedure using one spoonful of water and a little more cornstarch. If the sauce is too thick, add slightly more water. Transfer the sauce to a bowl or pot.
Finalization
- Roast the bread on both sides in the same pan again, adding some more oil to it.
- Place one slice of breach each on one plate. Place two patties each on top of them. Pour half of the sauce on each portion.
- Decorate with the lettuce and the aubergines (feel free to place the aubergines beneath the patties on the bread for a more authentic burger experience…).Add Homemade ketchup and some mustard. Serve with the sweet potatos and a fine GINGER BEER on the side.