I’m slightly embarrassed by how long this post has taken to write.
I prepped the ingredients over a week ago.
I steamed the squash, cooked the quinoa, thawed the spinach and edamame, and assembled the team of seasonings.
Then I mixed everything together in a tupperware and forgot about it.
The other day, however, I remembered it in the back of the fridge and quickly took action.
I formed patties out of the mix, rolling them smooth between my palms before adding them to a hot pan.
Blurrrrry.
Some were too difficult to flip and kept falling apart, so I split those ones in half so they could finish cooking and still maintain a patty shape (like sliders). The rest held together well though, which leads me to believe the recipe could probably handle more chia seeds.
In the end I had some beautiful squash pattycakes.
Yes, I used old hummus containers to store them individually.
Squash Patty-cakes
Ingredients:
- 1 cup quinoa
- yield of 1/2 butternut squash (~2 cups)
- 1/8 cup frozen chopped spinach, thawed
- 1/4 cup edamame
- 2 tbsp chia seeds
- 2 tbsp non-dairy milk (I used coconut milk)
- 2-3 cloves chopped garlic (or more to taste – I used 1 tbsp Garlic Gold)
- 2 tsp onion powder
- pinch of chili powder
- 1 tsp paprika
- salt & pepper to taste
**Next time I would add in breadcrumbs or an extra scoop chia seeds to help them hold together better**
Directions:
Over-steam the butternut squash so it’s mushy and easy to mash with other ingredients. Add chia seeds, non-dairy milk, frozen spinach, edamame, and quinoa and let it all gel together.
After a while, add in the garlic, onion, chili powder, paprika, salt & pepper.
Fry in a pan, flipping as needed so both sides end up with a brownish sizzled outside.
Store in tupperware (or freeze them) for easy eatin’ over the work week.
I loved the texture of these so much. They weren’t hard like veggie burgers. Instead they were soft inside, similar to the famous Plant Burger (from SF), but with a crunchy quinoa crusty exterior. I love it.
I do think they would have held together more with the addition of another tbsp of chia seeds or maybe some breadcrumbs. I have a few ideas for variations dancing around in my head…
In the meantime, I have a few more home-made pattycakes left. I love that the main ingredients are all my favorite things – quinoa, squash, spinach – what’s not to love!
Random little tidbit: Spinach is often praised for it’s stellar nutritional profile, because it is truly loaded with vitamins and minerals. But in addition to the massive amounts of Vitamin K, Vitamin C, manganese and folate (all good things), spinach has glycoglycerolipids. These are known to help protect the lining of the digestive tract from damage, especially damage related to unwanted inflammation.
For anyone with IBS, IBD (Crohn’s and Ulcerative Colitis), and/or other GI disorders, this is a key quality that can be very beneficial in calming irritations or flare ups.
I love the idea of quinoa burgers! I’ll have to try those out.
great recipe!
they look perfect to me!
nice factoid…i think we ALL can use all the digestive help we can get since no one’s perfect and our tummies have to deal w/ lots they probably dont want to. Thanks for sharing the deets!
Quinoa + squash + spinach together sound delightful.
I love veg burgers that are soft in the middle. Must check out this PLANT Cafe when I’m in San Fran next month!!
Awesome info on the spinach! I love how colorful your patty-cakes are! Great way to use quinoa too!
These look SO GOOD. Oh my gosh I LOVE how big and fluffy they are!! And they have edamame in them…bookmarked!
YUM these are going down in my recipe book!
these look deliiiicioussss! i wonder if for a nonvegan version would egg hold them together?
Definitely.
These burgers look great! You are so well organised – jealous. 🙂
genius, friend.
You provide so much useful info! These pattycakes are so tasty! Definitely one of your top recipes 😀
This looks amazing! I never would have thought to make quinoa burgers!! You’re a hippie genius 😉
This recipe looks great, perfect to share with my non-vegan hubby. Awesome job! And I appreciate the spinach factoid and feel much better about smashing it into my smoothies. 🙂
Yowza.
Well worth the wait.
I was in San Clemente this afternoon, and I am pretty sure i saw you and your husband! I really wanted to come say hi but i chickened out. I felt like a stalker. I was so excited though. I had seen a celebrity 🙂
Shortly after I realized it was time to maybe leave my first comment, after two years of stopping by your blog regularly. Yay !
hahaha…you SHOULD HAVE said hi!! it was definitely me 🙂
oh those look good, i love quinoa and butternut squash. i made some lentil mushroom burgers over the summer that could easily be veganized. definitely check them out:)
awwwww. thanks!
do it. i love that place so much. youll prob run into my sis because she LOVES that place and hits it up all the time. yummmmm
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These look great, but I’m curious about one thing- you said the cooked quinoa had been in the fridge for about a week. Sometimes when I make quinoa dishes (but not always!), they seem to go funky after a couple days (in the fridge, airtight tupperware, etc). Any thoughts on why this might be happening? It seems to happen most when there’s squash and/or onions involved, but I have no scientific proof of that 🙂
hmmmm…im not sure. these were definitely stored for longer than a few days and they were still fine. im trying to think where the issue could be but i cant think of anything!