Baba Ganoush with Fried Onions

While this is not your traditional baba ganoush, it reminds me of the dips we used to have when I was a kid. Some of you will be horrified by the ingredient list, but this one is a classic for me.

Pin It Now!

Traditional Ratatouille

I recently came home from the farmer's market with a huge veggie haul. After staring at my small mountain of zucchini, I decided to give this recipe a try. This has quickly become a new favorite. It tastes even better on day 2 or 3. Pin It Now!

Marinated Eggplant

I always enjoy having a variety of prepared veggies in my fridge. These can be enjoyed as a standalone snack, or added in to another dish. With marinated eggplant, they are delicious on sandwiches or served on top of a crusty bread. Pin It Now!

Eggplant & Lamb Moussaka

With the cooler weather we've been having, my kitchen preferences have started to shift back to cozy, comfort foods. The last snow day we had was when I decided moussaka would be the perfect dinner. This is very easy to make and the leftovers are delicious. I cute the recipe in half, which would serve about 3-4 adults, but am posting the full sized recipe here. For the half recipe, using a loaf pan worked well.

Pin It Now!

Roasted Vegetable Couscous Salad

I had friends come over for dinner and I wanted to make a few dishes ahead of time since I was hosting them right after work, leaving me with 2 hours before they arrived. I have always loved pearled couscous and knew I wanted to add roasted vegetables to it. I tend to love all types of grains mixed with roasted vegetables. This recipe can be made a day ahead of time, just let it come to room temperate before serving. You can skip the fresh thyme and rosemary if you don't have them on hand and this will still be a great dish.

Pin It Now!

Roasted Eggplant, Tomato and Cucumber Salad

I recently discovered this salad through a friend. I told her I wanted to make a new and exciting salad and she immediately recommended this. Thank goodness for friends with good taste in food! This is currently my favorite food. I've made this salad multiple times over the past 2 months and everyone who has tried it loves it. The flavors are fresh and and exciting and the herb dressing and yogurt sauce combined make the perfect accompaniment to the vegetables.

You can play around with how spicy you make it based on how many serrano peppers you use. This salad is very filling and can be served as a light main course. I love pairing this with some freshly baked za'atar flatbread. It's my perfect summer dinner. If you are against using your oven during the summer, you can also fry or saute the eggplant. Sauteing work, but the end result is a little messier looking. The taste will still be wonderful. This salad make great leftovers too, so even if it's just 2 of you eating this, go ahead and make the full recipe. I hope you enjoy this as much as I do.

Pin It Now!

Moroccan Eggplant Salad

Eggplant based dips and appetizers are some of my favorite snacks. Growing up I would eat tons of baba ganoush and my mom's eggplant dip in between meals. So when my mom told me about a new eggplant recipe she tried out, I had to make it for myself. This eggplant salad is a healthy yet very flavorsome and satisfying salad. I serve it as a side dish or salad, but have also been known to eat it as a main course with some pita bread. The original recipe calls for very little olive oil, but I felt that the salad was too dry and added a little more. This salad will still be good the next day if you have any leftovers.

Pin It Now!

Baked Eggplant and Ground Beef

My mom has been making this recipe for quite a while. My dad and I are both huge eggplant fans, so this dish is always a hit with us. The main ingredients are similar to mousakka, but this recipe is seasoned differently. This feeds about 6 to 8 people. It also reheats well and I have happily eaten the leftovers many times. This is one of my family's go-to dishes for gluten free meals. It is very filling and does not need any kind of starch to be served with it.

Pin It Now!

Burnt Eggplant with Garlic, Lemon & Pomegranate Seeds

Last year my mom bought a cookbook thats I have been dying to try out. It's called Jerusalem: A Cookbook and has all sorts of delicious recipes in it. I started off with something simple since some of the recipes call for lots of ingredients and time. This recipe itself is really easy, but it take time to let the flavors soak in. I started making this late one evening and I wasn't able to finish it until the following day. The authors describe this dish, which I would classify as a dip, starter, or spread, as baba ghanoush without the tahini paste and with a sprinkle or pomegranate seeds.

Pin It Now!

Roasted Eggplant and Tomato Stacks

I've been wanting to try an eggplant stack recipe for a while now. I've been bookmarking various recipes, but it took until now for me to finally try one. I am a huge eggplant fan, so this dish was right u my alley. I made this recipe as a vegetaran friendly main course, each person having 2 stacks. The feedback was mostly great and really helpful.

The skin on globe eggplants tends to be tough, which I did not think about when making these the first time. Peeling the skin either before roasting or after roasting would remove this tougher texture from the eggplant stacks. You could also use skinny Japanese eggplants and smaller tomatoes and make mini stacks as a bite sized appetizer. Or you could layer the ingredients in a pyrex dish and make a casserole/gratin with the same delicious flavor.

The roasted tomatoes are delicious and tasted great even on their own. I roasted the end bits of the tomatoes so I could try them before making the stacks. Pure garlicky goodness. I had never roasted tomatoes before, but I am kind of hooked now.

Pin It Now!

Eggplant Dip

I'm lucky to have a mom that loves to cook, and is really good at it. My sister and I grew up in a home where our friends always knew they would be offered tons of homemade goodies. If you were invited over for dinner, you knew it would be something delicious (and there may be a doggie bag of leftovers). So, yes, I have been spoiled with good food my whole life. That's probably why I wanted to learn how to cook. I'm not saying I don't slack off and settle for the easy way out sometimes, but I have learned to appreciate good, home-cooked meals.

Besides experimenting with foods that I love eating, my other method for developing my cooking skills and recipe collection is stealing some of my all time favorites from my mother. When I was in elementary school, my mom bought the school cookbook (parents submitted recipes and a book was sold as a fund raiser). That's where this eggplant dip recipe came from. Even though it originated in the early 90s, this is still one of my favorite dips. I'm pretty sure this was the only recipe my mother ever made from that cookbook, but I am so glad she did. Since I was a kid, I have been able to gobble down half of this dip in one sitting. I used to scarf down so much of it that I could hardly eat any other part of my dinner.

I don't change the flavor in this recipe, just some of the methods. The original is made with fried eggplant, but to save time (you end up cooking eggplant in batches since it won't fit in 1 pan) and make this a tiny bit healthier, I roast the eggplant. The skin can become a little tough if these roast too long, so keep an eye on your oven and roast until they're fully cooked and no more. You could probably also peel the eggplant before roasting, but I'd rather not. Make sure the eggplant gets fully roasted, since it will taste awful if it's undercooked. This dip will get better by the day, so it's best to make it ahead of time. It's still great right out of the pan, but it always tastes better the second day.

Pin It Now!