Here’s an easy and very yummy recipe I just made and am posting here to share, to help you include more vegetables into your diet. One of my commitments this new year is to eat more of a plant based, mediterranean style diet. I’m a carnivore at heart, and I don’t think I could eliminate meat completely, but I’ve also always had a deep love affair with veggies and I can quite easily transition my plate of food to one that has more veggies on it than meat.
So I bought an eggplant, and I brought it with me to the cottage for our New Year’s get-a-way for two. It looked so beautiful and purple in the grocery store, I couldn’t resist. But, I hardly ever cook with eggplant. What do I do with an eggplant? I called my daughter who often cooks vegetarian meals and she suggested I make an eggplant dip. “It’s sooo good”, she said. So, off to google I went and this is what I came up with.
BTW, the picture above is a stock picture of the dip because by the time I thought of taking a photo of the one I made, my husband and I had already eaten half of it! So good! The caramelly sweetness of the roasted vegetables is addictive.
This is not Baba Ganoush. This is a chunky roasted vegetable dip, full of healthy vegetables and fresh herbs (no tahini added). It would also work really well as a delicious sandwich spread.
The list of ingredients I used:
1 good sized eggplant, peeled and cubed into 1 “ pieces
2 bell peppers, seeded and cubed into 1 “ pieces
1 medium onion, peeled and cubed into 1” pieces
2 cloves garlic, minced
a sprinkling of fresh thyme ( I used a light sprinkling of dried thyme because I didn’t have any fresh with me)
about 3 Tbsp. olive oil. Add more if needed
about 1/4 cup good quality tomato sauce ( or 1 Tbsp. Tomato Paste)
1/8 – 1/4 tsp red pepper chile flakes
salt and pepper to taste, I used about 1/2 tsp salt and about 1/4 tsp freshly grated black pepper
This is how I made the dip:
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
Line a cookie sheet with aluminium paper to help clean up for later.
Start by roasting the eggplant, bell peppers, onions, garlic and fresh thyme. Use the salt and pepper here. Roast in the oven for about 35- 40 minutes, turning once at the half way point. Roast until the vegetables are soft with some brown spots on them. This is what gives the dip a beautiful caramelized flavour and sweet taste. Some of the water will release during roasting which further helps to concentrate the flavours.
When done, take out of the oven and cool for 5 minutes.
Add the vegetable mixture to a food processor. Add the tomato sauce and chile flakes and pulse a few times. I like my dip chunky so I just lightly pulsed the mixture but if you want a smooth dip, blend a little longer.
That’s it. So delicious. We ate ours with whole grain sesame/rice crackers.
Enjoy!
Jacine