Healthy Test Kitchen
Karniyarik (Stuffed Eggplant)
The eggplant in this dish bakes up to be melt-in-your mouth soft.
Ingredients
1 small eggplant
1/4 pound beef/lamb (You can also try using chicken thighs)
1/4 green pepper
1/2-1 tomato (about 1/2-1 cup), or 1/2-1 cup canned tomatoes
1/4-1/2 onion
1/8 cup parsley (or not)
2 tsp tomato paste
3/4 tsp tomato paste + 1/4 cup water.
Instructions
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Cut eggplant in half. Slit each half through the middle. Sprinkle with salt. Set aside.
3. Pat eggplant dry. Drizzle each eggplant half with 1/2 tsp olive oil. Bake for 30 minutes. (Avoid the temptation to cook it longer. It will cook more once you add the filling.)
4. Saute onion. Add beef/lamb, salt, and pepper. Brown. Add diced tomato and 2 tsp tomato paste. Add parsley.
5. Place eggplant into casserole dish with rimmed sides.
6. Stuff eggplant. Add bell pepper for topping.
7. Pour mixture of 3/4 tsp tomato paste and water on top of eggplant.
8. Bake 20 minutes (or less--20 minutes might be too much). (Some recipes call for covering it. Others do not.)
Inspired by Give Recipe, ozlemsturkishtable, Williams-Sonoma, SBS
Note: Do not peel the eggplant. Frying the eggplant does not make it taste any better than baking it. The eggplant itself is soft and delicious. The beef/lamb turned out a bit dry. I only used 1/4 onion and 1/2 cup tomato. More tomato couldn't hurt. I also used 1/2 cup beef chuck/lamb. One recipe called for seasoning the lamb with 1/2 tsp chili flakes and 1/8 tsp cumin.