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Photo: Paul Ponraj / Flickr

This is a spicy dish and rather filling one too. A variety of vegetables can be used to stuff the brinjals in this recipe, including sweet potato, lima beans, broccoli and cauliflower. One ingredient which is essential though is tomato, so whatever you do, include tomatoes in the stuffing. You will need six brinjals to serve six people. Use ripe and firm brinjals that have shiny, smooth skins. Allow for a preparation time of an hour and a cooking time of an hour.

Ingredients for stuffed brinjals

6 medium brinjals (sliced in half lengthways), salt, 100 ml of melted butter, 2 cloves of garlic (very finely chopped), 1 cm of fresh ginger (finely chopped), 1 small onion (finely chopped), 2 ml ground coriander, 5 ml garam masala, 6 green beans (cut into 2 cm pieces), 250 grams peas (frozen), 2 carrots (finely chopped), 1 large potato (finely chopped), 410 grams of tinned tomatoes (skinned, drained and roughly chopped), 45 ml coriander leaves (finely chopped), 15 ml mint leaves (finely chopped), 30 grams lentil flour (also called chana), 2 ml ground cumin, cayenne pepper (a pinch or two), 60 ml water and 55 grams of butter.

Prep

Brush a large oven proof dish with some of the melted butter and pre-heat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius.

Prepare your brinjals by scooping out the pulp with a melon scoop so that the shells are 1 cm thick. Sprinkle the shells with salt and place them on paper towels with their fleshy sides down. Finely chop the pulp.

Make the curry

Stir fry the garlic, onion and ginger in a heavy based frying pan for a minute with 50 ml of the melted butter. Add the brinjal pulp, curry powder , ground coriander, salt and pepper. Stir fry the ingredients for 6 minutes before adding the carrots, potato, tomatoes, beans and peas.

Turn the head down and simmer the ingredients for 6 minutes, stirring every now and then. Take the pan off the stove and add the coriander and mint leaves. Rinse the brinjal shells and then dry them well. Drop the vegetable mixture into the brinjal shells. Smooth the tops down.

Fry and bake

Combine the lentil flour, water, cumin and pinch or two of cayenne pepper to form a paste. Spread this paste over the tops of the filling in each brinjal in an even manner. Fry the stuffed brinjals until they are slightly browned on the bottom. Fry two at a time, using the rest of the melted butter.

Arrange the stuffed brinjals in the buttered oven proof dish. Dot the 50 grams of butter over the tops and cover the dish with aluminium foil (or a lid). Bake the dish for half an hour. Then remove the foil (or lid) and bake for another quarter of an hour or until the vegetables are lightly browned and cooked.

Remove your spicy stuffed brinjals from the oven and allow them to cool a little before serving them.

Tags: cooking, food, recipes, vegetables