[caption id="attachment_625" align="alignleft" width="225" caption="Because I am not writing a food blog I can take a silly picture of me and my meal! "]<img class="size-medium wp-image-625" title="CAE and Pumpkin-Bulgur Patty" src="http://www.karolinkabulgaria.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/dsc05400.jpg?w=225" alt="Because I am not writing a food blog I can take a silly picture of me and my meal! " width="225" height="300" />[/caption]

I just made the best dish I've had in a long time.  Spicy pumpkin and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgur_wheat" target="_blank">bulgur</a> wheat patties.  I know that this may sound meh to some people but it was easy and they are very tasty and very good for you.  I read about 5 different recipes and then did my own thing. It's better that way.

Also, that's how I've been living my life for the last six months and it seems to be working for me.  Oh and lots of the recipes had things that I thought would be hard to get a hold of and I didn't want to spend my day chasing down silly ingredients which I thought were extra or unnecessary any way.  I don't want to go to a lot of extra work for dinner--I just want something that is pretty easy to make, wont require to many pans (my stove only has two burners), and I want to use as many seasonal ingredients as possible. Is that too much to ask?

Not at all it turns out.  My dish was great.  I am happy and well fed and now I get to write about it while finishing a glass of Bulgarian red wine.  I'd recommend that pairing if you decide to make this dish at home.  The Bulgarian reds are really lovely.

So here's what I did:<!--more-->
<ol>
	<li>I roasted 1.5 pounds of pumpkin chunks for 90 minutes until they were soft and then I mashed it with a fork. But all of the recipes I read said that you could also use a can of pumpkin (just not the pumpkin pie filling).</li>
	<li>I cooked 1 cup of dry bulgur wheat according to the bad (or at least I think I did.  The bag is in Cyrillic so I just cooked it with slightly more water than I would rice and then I drained of the excess water.)</li>
	<li>While the bulgur was cooking, I chopped up one medium red onion and 4 cloves of garlic and sauteed this on the stove until they were soft.</li>
	<li>After mashing the pumpkin, cooking the bulgur and the onion &amp; garlic it was time for the patties.  In a big bowl (the bowl I mashed the pumpkin in), I added the cooked bulgur, the sauteed onion and garlic, 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts, two tablespoons of lime juice, one big tablespoon of dijon mustard, a teaspoon of cinnamon, a teaspoon of coriander, a teaspoon of cumin and a teaspoon of salt.</li>
	<li>At this point it was clear that I needed to add 2 eggs to bind the mess of things in my bowl together and about a 1/2 cup of flour.  (If I had bread crumbs I would have used these because I think that would have added a nice flavor.)</li>
	<li>Then after a good stir, I formed the mixture into patties using my fingers.  (The consistency wasn't that different from making hamburger patties--maybe a little bit moister).  It made about 20 medium sized patties.</li>
	<li>Now this step is important.  You can either bake the patties or you can fry the patties.  I am more of a baking girl so this is what I did.</li>
	<li>You can bake these at 350 F.  Just make sure that you grease the pan you are cooking the patties on well--my first batch were a little bit hard to turn over--and you'll need to turn these over after the first 12-15 minutes.  Both sides should get between 12 and 15 minutes for a total cook time of 24-30 minutes. (If you're going to fry them. I'd aim for about 8 minutes a side).</li>
	<li>I ate mine with a cabbage salad and some mustard on the side.  This said they would be great with baby spinach salad and a cucumber-yogurt dressing.</li>
</ol>
Anyhow, I had a great time making these.  Sure, it was more than a 30 minute meal but it was well worth it and nothing was too hard--mostly it's just waiting.  Oh and both pumpkin and bulgur are amazingly good for you and good for your wallet.  Unfortunately, they don't show up on this list <a href="http://www.divinecaroline.com/article/22145/52070" target="_blank">"The 20 Healthist Foods for Under $1"</a> but I think that they both should!

Now all I have to decide is whether I should call my friend or not...  I told a friend that he could come over tomorrow for leftovers but now I am debating telling him there aren't any (wink, wink).