Kebab wrapped in eggplant baked in tomato sauce

This recipe remind me about my husband cousin, she is such a talented artist. Her painting are amazing. I met her and her family for the first time last year when we traveled to Germany. We probably just spent 3 hours at her family home before we continue our journey to France, not much time off course but their hospitality were so amazing. I love them since beginning. But too bad, I didn’t speak Farsi and the other hand she is not speak English, she speak Germany fluently so I need much help from my husband to translate almost every ting she said.

She served dinner for us, she cooked a lot of Persian Food. And one of my favorite menu was Kebab wrapped in eggplant with tomato sauce. Oh, my I felt regret not asking her how to cook those menu at that time. Everybody were busy ate delicious foods. Until couple days ago, I harvest some eggplants and tomatoes from my garden. And *cling* I decided to make those menu. Good thing about Internet, I search and found recipe from my beloved blogger, mba Elra –

And here is the recipe , and to my taste, I add several ingredients. And please with my experience I suggest you to using a fresh tomatoes , well.. you still can use can tomato but believe me you won’t find the “sexy” taste when you use can food.

Kebab wrapped with eggplant in tomato sauce

Main Ingredients:

4 eggplants (sliced lengthwise to 1/8 inch)

salt

olive oil

2 bell peppers (I used green and red pepper, sliced into 1 inch strips)

kebab meat (see below)

1 batch of tomato sauce from 10 big fresh tomatoes (chopped or simply just put into food processor) - see note

Fresh oregano leaves (optional)

Fresh basil leaves (optional)

Directions:

1. Salt the eggplant and let sit for 30 minutes.

2. Rinse the salt from the eggplant and pat dry.

3. In a large skillet, fry the eggplant lightly just enough to soften them. Drain on a paper towel to get rid the excess oil.

4. Place some of the tomato sauce in the bottom of a baking dish.

5. Place one slice of eggplant across another and place some of the kebab meat in the middle.

6. Wrap both sides of the lower eggplant up and over followed by the sides of the outer slice of eggplant.

7. Place the eggplant wrapped kebab parcels into the baking dish and top with more tomato sauce, slices pepper. Put tooth pick between the eggplant so, the eggplant wont feel off during baking.

8. Spread fresh oregano leaves and basil if use

9. Bake in a preheated 375F oven until the tomatoes and peppers are nice an roasted and the sides are bubbling, about 45-60 minutes.

Spiced Lamb Kebab Meat

Ingredients:

1 pound ground lamb or beef meat

1/2 cup herbs such as parsley, mint, cilantro (chopped)

4 cloves garlic (chopped)

1 onion (chopped)

1 tablespoon ground cumin

1 tablespoon ground coriander

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon curry powder

1 teaspoon paprika powder

salt and pepper

Directions:

1. Mix everything, cover and let sit in the fridge while you prepare the eggplant.

Follow this step by step on how to make the eggplant parcels

For Tomato Sauce:

10 big tomatoes, put into foodprocessor or you can use 1 (28 oz) can  whole tomatoes, roughly chopped

¼ cup finely chopped onion

3 cloves garlic, finely chopped

½ cup chicken stock, or chicken broth, or water

1 tbs olive oil

salt and pepper

Directions :

Heat the olive oil in a large pot over medium heat, add onion, and fry until soft, add garlic and fry for another minute. Add the tomatoes including the juice, stir, pour the chicken broth or the chicken stock, season with salt and pepper. Cook for about 15 minutes. Taste and adjust seasoning as needed. Turn of the heat.