Eat your way to beautiful, nourished skin with this baked Quinoa Stuffed Eggplant recipe from the “Eat Beautiful” cookbook.
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Happy February! This month is all about love and I wanted to start the month talking about loving yourself through nutritious food choices. My love of new cookbooks certainly isn’t slowing down anytime soon. There’s nothing better than cracking the spine of a new cookbook and flagging pages of recipes that I can’t wait to try. I added Eat Beautiful to my cookbook collection a couple weeks ago. This cookbook couldn’t have come at a better time!
As someone who is reinventing her eating habits, I was thrilled to find a cookbook that could – not only provide healthy and delicious meals – but help my skin glow, too! I have flipped through this cookbook, cover-to-cover, multiple times now to flag recipes that I want to try. I may end up cooking this entire cookbook! Every meal sounds so delicious! And the photography makes you want to dive right into the dishes. This cookbook is beautiful, indeed!
One of the first recipes to catch my eye was for Baked Eggplant. Eggplant gets stuffed with a quinoa mixture made with spinach, garlic, and shallots. The original recipe for this dish calls for two eggplants. Each eggplant is equivalent to one serving. However, I found that half of an eggplant was more than enough for me! So I used one eggplant, ate half for lunch, and saved the other half for lunch the next day. I made a couple other adjustments to the original recipe, but this stuffed eggplant certainly turned out to be amazing!
Ingredients
- 1 eggplant, sliced in half lengthwise
- 1 tbsp. olive oil
- 1/2 cup whole grain quinoa
- 1 cup low sodium vegetable broth, plus a few tablespoons
- 1 shallot, chopped
- 1 large garlic clove, chopped
- 2 generous handfuls of baby spinach
- 1/2 oz. grated Parmesan cheese
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400º.
- Line a baking sheet with foil. Then, place eggplant cut side up onto the baking sheet.
- Drizzle with olive oil and bake for 20 minutes or eggplant has softened.
- While the eggplant roasts, add quinoa and vegetable broth to a pot. Bring to a boil and then reduce heat. Allow to simmer for 20 minutes, or until liquid has been absorbed and quinoa is fully cooked.
- When the eggplant is done roasting, carefully scoop out the inside with a spoon.
- Add the scooped eggplant to a blender with the chopped shallot, garlic, and spinach.
- Pour a little vegetable broth into the mixture and blend until smooth.
- Mix spinach mixture with the cooked quinoa and spoon into each eggplant skin.
- Grate a little parmesan cheese on top. Then, broil for a couple minutes, or until eggplant starts to brown.
- Remove from the oven and top with more Parmesan cheese before serving.
- Garnish with chopped baby spinach, if desired.
I made extra of the quinoa mixture to eat with grilled chicken during the week. However, this vegetarian eggplant dish is perfect on its own! The roasted eggplant has a nice, meaty bite. If you’re a big garlic lover, like I am, you’ll be thrilled with the flavor that comes out in this dish!
If you’re looking to love the skin you’re in a little better, I definitely recommend checking out the Eat Beautiful cookbook. These recipes may nourish your skin, but they’re also healthy and wholesome. Your entire body will benefit from these delicious recipes!
PIN FOR LATER
9 Comments
This looks delicious. I never really know what to go with eggplant except parm so I’m totally going to try this
I’m the same way with eggplant. So glad I found this recipe! It’s definitely changed my baked eggplant game! Enjoy!
I love eggplant. I need to try this!
It was really good! I hope you enjoy this dish!
This looks perfect for dinner
It’s a great Meatless Monday meal! 🙂
Oh my! This sounds and looks AMAZING!! Pinned this to try later, thank you.
XO
Thanks so much for pinning! I hope you enjoy this recipe. 🙂
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