Our Plant-Based Valentine’s Day (Chickpea Patties w/ Spaghetti, Corn Butter Toast & Chocolate Lava Cake)

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MEET THE KROCKS: We are a married couple who started on a life-changing whole food, plant-based weight loss journey in June 2018. To date, we have lost over 290 pounds combined and we aren’t done yet! Read Our Story

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One of my long-term goals is to figure out better ways to incorporate our new whole food, plant-based (WFPB) diet into our everyday lives. When we first started following this way of eating, occasions like Valentine’s Day would be an excuse to stray from the diet and have a “cheat meal” out at some restaurant we used to love.

This year, coming right off Mary’s Mini, I decided we would stay in and cook a nice meal at home. I’m SO glad we did this, because it has shown me that we don’t need to have a “cheat meal” to enjoy a holiday. In fact, I enjoyed this Valentine’s Day more than any I can remember in the recent past. It was fun putting together a nice meal at home that was in line with our normal way of eating.

Of course, we decided to bring you along so you can see how easy it is to make special occasions just as special (or more) on a WFPB diet!

Our Valentine’s Day Menu

Brian was in charge of the main entrée and I was in charge of dessert. He decided to make a heart-shaped chickpea patty on top of a bed of spaghetti with a delicious tomato sauce. He served it with a side of toast topped with corn butter. For dessert, I made a plant-based chocolate lava cake.

We combined four different recipes for this dish. All of the recipes are linked below, and we have also included detailed notes with any modifications we made to the recipes.

Heart-Shaped Chickpea Patties

Recipe:
The Jaroudi Family’s Easy Chickpea Nuggets

Notes:
*We basically followed the exact recipe linked above, but instead of forming the batter into nuggets, we pressed it into our heart-shaped cookie cutter (linked below).
*For the bread crumbs, we toasted a few slices of Ezekiel bread and pulsed in our food processor until they were fine crumbs.
*We baked our chickpea hearts in our new Ninja Foodie Digital Air Fry Oven. We used the bake setting at 350°F for 10 minutes, then flipped them and did another 10 minutes. Then we let them sit while we finished the cooking the rest of the meal and stuck them back in on the air fryer setting for about 5 minutes on 425°F. In the original recipe, Brittany bakes the nuggets in an oven for 40 minutes. The cooking times will definitely depend on which appliance you use and the thickness of your hearts.
*You can get at least 4-6 large hearts out of one batch of the batter. We used a 4.2 inch heart-shaped cookie cutter. We made two that night and refrigerated the remaining batter.
*The next day, we actually used a rolling pin to roll it out (like cookie dough) between two pieces of parchment paper. It was a lot easier to work with the chilled batter in this way. We also got them a bit thinner (about 1/2 inch thick) and I personally liked the thinner ones a bit better. Using this method, you could use any shape/size cookie cutter on the chickpea batter and have fun with it!
*Brian also drizzled the hearts with a balsamic glaze when we made them again the next day and it made it taste even better and look extra fancy!

Spaghetti with Tomato Sauce

Recipe:
Our Chickpea Tomato Sauce (minus the chickpeas)

Notes:
*For the sauce, we made our chickpea tomato sauce but left out the chickpeas since we already had a chickpea patty on the dish.
*We also decided to swap the can of fire roasted tomatoes for a can of San Marzano tomatoes.
*Since the San Marzano tomatoes weren’t diced, Brian actually used our stick blender for a few seconds to get a smoother sauce.
*We used a whole wheat spaghetti, but you could also use spaghetti squash (like we did in the recipe above) or your favorite bean pasta!

Corn Butter Toast

Recipe:
Brand New Vegan’s Corn Butter

Notes:
*For this one, we followed Chuck’s recipe exactly. We used canned corn (no-salt added) and fresh garlic.
*I personally think this tastes better cold! We had some the next day and it was even tastier… if that was possible!
*For the toast, we used the same Ezekiel bread we used for the bread crumbs on the chickpea patties.

Chocolate Lava Cake

Recipe:
The Jaroudi Family’s Easy Chocolate Lava Cake

Notes:
*I made a double batch of the recipe above and baked it in ONE 16oz CorningWare dish for about 16 minutes.
*For the data paste, I used “Wanna Date? Original Date Spread” that I saw on Shark Tank. There is a link below to Amazon, but DO NOT pay $40 for two jars… that is just insane LOL. I got mine at World Market with a coupon and paid about $6 for one jar (which is still insane). I would recommend just making Brittany’s date paste instead, but I was too lazy and already had this on hand 🙂
*For the chocolate center, I used a few pieces of Lily’s Chocolate Bars (sweetened with Stevia) instead of chocolate chips.
*We made another one today (so I could get photos) and we added strawberries for an extra tasty treat!

Watch the video to see us make this meal and try it out!

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Ninja Foodi 8-in-1 Digital, Toaster, Air Fryer
Cuisinart CFP-9GMPCY Food Processor, 9-Cup, Gunmetal
Vitamix A2500 Ascent Series Smart Blender, White (Renewed)
Wilton Nesting Heart Cutter Set
Food For Life Flourless Sprouted Grain Bread, Whole Grain, 24 oz
Cento San Marzano Peeled Tomatoes, 28 oz
Mueller Austria Ultra-Stick Immersion Multi-Purpose Hand Blender
365 Everyday Value, Organic Whole Kernel Corn, No Salt Added, 15.25 oz
CorningWare French White 16-Ounce Round Dish, Set of 2
Wanna Date? Original Date Spread **Again, DO NOT pay $40 for two jars, which is the current price on Amazon. Check out World Market (they sell it for $8/jar but wait for a coupon!) or just make Brittany Jaroudi’s date paste.
Extra Dark Chocolate Bar by Lily’s Sweets, 12-Pack