Introduction
If you guys are looking for a quick and wholesome dinner, look no further 👀 !
Lentil patties—or lentil fritters—are tasty and fulfilling, and best of all, they are SO EASY to make, with canned or cooked dried lentils.
These are strongly inspired by chickpea fritters and falafel, which we also recommend.
I know, we are obsessed with mediterranean food, we might need an intervention soon 🫠.
Crispy lentil patties served with fresh parsley and lemon.
Basically all you have to do is blend everything in a food processor, choose your favorite cooking method like skillet, oven, or air fryer, and you are DONE!
Almost done actually. We think these are best with a sauce. You can go 🇬🇷 Greek with a garliky tzatziki sauce, or 🇮🇹 Italian with a rich marinara sauce.
Louise loves these next to to fluffy saffron rice (her new favorite rice dish). I’m more for stuffing a pita to the brim with lentil patties and sauce so that’s almost impossible to eat.
Ingredients
Lentils: you can use green, brown, or French lentils. Both canned or cooked from dried.
Flour: all-purose flour or chickpea flour.
Egg: substitute 2 tablespoons of water for the egg.
Grated parmesan: substitute 4 tablespoons nutrutional yeast.
Fresh parsley: substitute fresh coriander.
Onion
Garlic
Cumin
Coriander
Salt & black pepper
Lemon: for serving them.
Instructions
1. Pulse ingredients
To a food processor, add drained lentils, flour, egg, grated parmesan, chopped parsley, chopped onion, grated garlic, ground cumin and coriander.
Season with salt and pepper and pulse a few times until the ingredients are coarsley chopped and well combined. Don’t overblend!
Ingredients for the lentil patties in a food processor before and after pulsing them.
Tip: when making meatballs of any sort it’s best to either avoid garlic, or, if you like us can’t live without it, grate it very finely so that it cooks properly. I made a mistake here as you can see in the picture, I didn’t grate the garlic. The result is that we smelled like garlic for a week because the sliced garlic didn’t cook properly. Learn from our mistakes. Grate the garlic, best with a microplane 🧛.
Tip: Wanna make it egg free? No problem. Substitute 2 tablespoons of water for the egg.
2. Shape patties
Shape the lentil mixture into 12 small patties and put them on a baking tray lined with parchment paper.
You can do so by hand, pressing the mixture between the palms of your hands, or with a cookie cutter, press down the mixture with the back of a teaspoon.
How to shape lentil fritters by hand or with a cookie cutter.
3. Cook patties
PAN-FRIED: heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a nonstick skillet. Add the fritters and fry them on medium heat for 5 minutes on each side, turning them once.
OVEN-BAKED: brush patties with olive oil, and bake in a preheated oven at 400°F or 200°C for 20 minutes or until golden brown.
AIR-FRIED: brush your air fryer basket with olive oil to prevent the patties from sticking.
Arrange the patties in the basket, brush with oil, and air fry at 400°F or 200°C for 10 minutes or until golden brown (more brown than golden).
Honest opinion: the pan fried ones are the tastiest. Air-fried ones are also good. Oven-baked patties are less crisp and drier than the others.
Pan fried lentil patties served with tzatziki sauce.
Similar recipes
As you guys can tell from this site, we love lentils! They are easy and quick to cook and super versatile. If you liked these patties, we think you’ll like…
Lentil meatballs
Lentil curry
Curry lentil soup
Lentil salad
… they are all really eaasy recipes to make, wholesome, and just delicious. Enjoy 😊
