These chickpea and nut burgers are a from-scratch veggie patty built around canned chickpeas, walnuts, sunflower seeds, and quick oats. The whole thing comes together in about 30 minutes, and the patties hold their shape on the pan — no falling apart mid-bite. If you’ve been burned by crumbly veggie burgers before, this recipe is worth your time.
Why this recipe works
Two things make this recipe reliable. First, toasting the walnuts and sunflower seeds before they go into the food processor draws out their natural oils, which helps bind the mixture and adds a deeper, nuttier flavor that raw nuts simply don’t give you. Second, the pulsing technique matters more than it sounds — you’re aiming for a coarse, chunky paste, not a smooth puree. That rough texture gives the finished patty something to grip onto itself. Over-process the mix and you lose the structure that keeps the patty together in the pan. A few short pulses is genuinely the right call here, not a shortcut.
If something goes sideways
- Patties won’t hold their shape when you form them: The mixture is probably too dry or wasn’t pulsed quite enough to bring it together. Add water one teaspoon at a time and press the mixture firmly. Refrigerating the formed patties for 20 minutes before cooking also helps them firm up.
- Patties stick to the pan: The pan likely wasn’t hot enough before you added the oil, or you tried to flip too early. Wait until you can see a brown crust forming at the edge before you attempt the flip — the patty will release on its own when it’s ready.
- The inside is still cold when the outside is browned: This happens when the heat is too high. Medium-low is correct for these patties. Cover the pan as the recipe says — the trapped steam finishes the inside without burning the crust.
- The flavor tastes flat: Taste the raw mixture before you form the patties and adjust salt. Chickpeas and oats both absorb seasoning heavily, so the mix needs to taste slightly bolder than you think is right before cooking.
- Mixture is too wet to form patties: Skip the egg in the mix — it makes the patty mushy. Instead, add a tablespoon or two of extra oats and let the mixture sit for five minutes so the oats can absorb the excess moisture before you shape.
Storage and reheating
Cooked patties keep in the fridge for up to four days in an airtight container. To freeze, place uncooked formed patties on a parchment-lined tray, freeze until solid (about two hours), then transfer to a zip bag — they’ll keep for up to three months. Cook from frozen over medium-low heat with the lid on, adding a couple of extra minutes per side. To reheat cooked patties, a dry skillet over medium heat for two to three minutes per side gives you a better result than the microwave, which tends to make them soft and a little gummy.
Heavenly Chickpea and Nut Burgers
Ingredients
- ¼ cup sunflower seeds
- 1 cup walnut in pieces
- 1 can chickpeas drained and rinsed
- 1 cup oatmeal quick-cooking
- 1 tablespoon chia seeds
- ⅓ cup red onion finely chopped
- ½ cup cilantro finely chopped
- 2 cloves garlic grated
- 1 tablespoon tamari
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
- 1 tablespoon chilli powder
- 1 tablespoon ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon coriander ground
- 1 teaspoon mustard ground
- 1 drizzle honey
- ¾ teaspoon sea salt
- 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
- 2 tablespoon olive oil extra virgin
- 5 medium buns multigrain
- 1 tablespoon red bell pepper jelly
- ½ cup mayonnaise
- 1 handful lettuce
Instructions
- Toast the sunflower seeds and walnuts in a large frying pan over medium, tossing or stirring the nuts to avoid burning every so often, for 8 to 10 minutes until just brown and fragrant.
- Add toasted seeds and nuts along with chickpeas, oatmeal, chia seeds, onion, herbs and garlic into a food processor and pulse it a few times (3 or 4, 3-second pulses) to get everything blending together.
- Add tamari, Worcestershire sauce, chilli powder, cumin, coriander, mustard, salt and pepper to the bean mixture in the food processor and continue to pulse (another 3 or 4, 3-second pulses) until everything is incorporated, but the mixture is still chunky.
- Empty the contents of the food processor into a large mixing bowl. With a spatula, stir the bean mixture by hand to make sure everything is evenly incorporated.
- Form the bean mixture into 5 or 6 patties. Patties should be about a ½ cup of the bean mixture.
- Heat a teaspoon of extra virgin olive oil in the frying pan that the nuts were toasted in over medium-low heat to fry the chickpea and nut burgers.
- Fry the burger on the first side for about 5 minutes, covered with either a lid or a piece of aluminium foil, until brown and crisp, flip, add cheddar cheese to the top of the burgers, cover, and continue to cook until the cheese is melted and the burgers are warmed through.
- Serve on multigrain buns with mayo, red pepper jelly (or other favourite condiment) and lettuce with crispy kale chips or oven fries.
Nutrition
Your questions, answered
Can I make these without a food processor?
Yes — mash the chickpeas well with a fork or potato masher, then chop the toasted nuts by hand until they’re roughly the size of peas. The texture will be slightly chunkier, but the patties will still hold together as long as you mix everything thoroughly and press the patties firmly when shaping.
Can I swap the walnuts for a different nut?
Pecans work as a direct substitute and behave almost identically in the mix. Cashews are softer and will blend in more, giving you a smoother patty with less crunch — still good, just different. Avoid very hard nuts like macadamias, which don’t break down evenly in a few short pulses.
How do I know when the patties are cooked through?
These are fully plant-based patties, so there’s no meat-safety temperature to hit — you’re looking for a firm, browned crust on both sides and a hot center, which takes about five minutes per side over medium-low heat. If you press the center gently and it feels solid rather than soft or cold, it’s done.