Stuffed Eggplant Rolls

When Tim and I were dating (1000 years ago when we were in high school), we had a favorite place to go have dinner.  Skippy’s Diner. Not the most romantic place, but for not a lot of money, you could stuff yourself.  Priorities.

Sadly, Skippy’s is no longer with us, but I’m pretty sure that at this point in our lives, we couldn’t handle the meals there anyway.

We would start the meal with six pirogues in butter and onions.  Each.  Then, he would have chicken parmesan and I would have eggplant parmesan with a side of spaghetti.  Each.  We would somehow manage to top all of this off with dessert as well.  And we never gained a pound.

Just thinking about this meal now makes me gain 100lbs.

But reminiscing about this meal got me thinking about how to still enjoy it, but make it healthier and a lot lighter.

These eggplant rolls take the place of both the eggplant parmesan and the pasta.  Still working on the pirogues!

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup brown rice
• juice of 1/2 a lemon
• 1 cup roughly diced Roma tomatoes (not seeded as you need their juice)
• 1/2 cup diced onion
• 1/2 cup diced green pepper
• 1 teaspoon oregano
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic
• 1/4 cup nutritional yeast
• salt and pepper
• 1 eggplant (medium to large)

Directions:

1. 1. 1. Cook the rice according to the package directions, but add the juice of half of a lemon to the cooking water to make the rice more risotto-like.
      2. After you get the rice started, wash the eggplant and, with a mandolin, slice it about 1/4 inch thick.  If you go too thin, it won’t hold up later on in the recipe.  Salt each side and put the slices in a colander to drain out all the bitterness (about 1/2 hour).
      3. Meanwhile, put a splash of oil in a pan and saute the tomatoes, onion and green pepper about 5 minutes.  Add the garlic and oregano, saute 30 seconds-1 minute, then turn down to low and let everything simmer, covered so the tomatoes continue to break down (you are making a mini-tomato sauce here).
      4. While you are making the “sauce” put a large pot of water on the stove and have it just below boiling.  When the eggplant has drained out all the bitterness, turn the pot up to boil, rinse each slice and drop them into the boiling water for 2-3 minutes until they start to turn green and get soft.  I had to do this in batches since the eggplant will float on top of the water.  You don’t need a deep pot for this, but a large one.
      5. Add 1 cup of the cooked rice to the tomato mixture and mix in the nutritional yeast.  You can add a bit of water if the mixture seems too dry to stick together, but my tomatoes were juicy enough that I didn’t need to.
      6. Place a generous tablespoon on the large end of the eggplant about an inch from the bottom and roll it up.  Put it in a lightly oiled baking dish, seam side down. 
      7. At this point, you can place some tomato sauce (homemade, or store bought) down the center of each roll, but don’t cover them completely. 
      8. Cover and bake at 350 till completely warmed through and eggplant is completely tender (about 20-30 minutes from everything being room temperature to start) I got about a dozen of these rolls from this recipe, and did not use the two outside slices of eggplant since they were all skin.
      9. Serve on a plate with additional sauce or on a bed of my cashew basil sauce, either warm or room temperature.

   Enjoy!

    

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