What do you do when it’s dinner time, and you haven’t got any ingredients ready for the meal?

What if (perhaps as a result of being an ultralight hiker), you also have a huge surplus 500g sachet of tuna?

Tonight these particular stars aligned, and I ended up making these amazing Tuna Patties: http://allrecipes.com.au/recipe/15705/tuna-patties.aspx

I did tweak the recipe considerably, though:

Ingredients:

• 2-3 large potatoes, peeled and cubed for mashing
• Optionally, swap one of the potatoes for a kumara or some pumpkin
• 500g tuna flakes
• 2 carrots, grated and excess juice dabbed out with a paper towel
• A goodly handful of frozen chopped spinach
• 1 onion, cubed
• 3 garlic cloves, chopped
• 1/8th tsp cayenne pepper
• 1/2 tsp basil
• 1/2 tsp oregano
• 1/2 tsp sage
• 1 tsp veggie stock powder
• 2 eggs
• 2 tbsp mustard

Method:

• Boil the potatoes in salted water until cooked.
• In another pan, fry the onions for 2 minutes, then add garlic.
• Fry until the onions start to brown, then add herbs, spices, and stock powder.
• Continue to fry for another minute, then remove from heat and let cool.
• When the potatoes are cooked, tip out all the water, and allow remaning water to evaporate.
• Mash the potatoes - they’ll seem unpleasantly dry, but that’s OK.
• Mix the carrots, mashed potatoes, fried onion and garlic, all together in a bowl.
• In another bowl, mix together the tuna, the eggs, and the mustard.
• Now combine everything together, and give it a good mix.
• Form the mixture into patties and fry in a lightly oiled pan.

In retrospect, this recipe seems really difficult, but it was actually quite straightforward, and it was totally delicious. Definitely good with a bit of mayo on the patties. Yummo!