Vegetarian Lebanese Eggplant Moussaka with Chickpeas
Eggplant is twice-cooked to melting perfection in this easy, rich Vegetarian Lebanese Eggplant Moussaka with Chickpeas (garbanzo beans).Eat hot straight from the oven. Alternatively, eat cold the next day when the flavours have developed. Perfect with pitta bread and as part of a mezze. For a more substantial meal, serve with couscous, rice or pasta.
Ingredients
- 1 cup cooked/canned chickpeas (⅓ cup dried chickpeas)
- 3-4 eggplants (aubergines)
- sunflower oil (or other oil for frying eggplants)
- 1 medium sized onion
- 6 garlic cloves
- 2 cups tinned tomatoes (whole or chopped)
- 2 tablespoon tomato paste
- 2 teaspoon dried mint
- salt
- pepper
Instructions
- Soak & Cook Dried Chickpeas. Ideally start this stage a day ahead. If using canned chickpeas, ignore this step and skip straight across to Step 2.Soak. Put the water into a bowl and add the bicarbonate of soda, stir to dissolve. Add the dried chickpeas. Make sure that the chickpeas are well covered with the water, as they will swell during the soaking. Soak the dried chickpeas for at least 12 hours. Boil. Boil the chickpeas (making sure always covered with water) until cooked. This takes about 1 hour to 1 hour 30 mins.
- Cut the eggplants (aubergines) into roughly 1.5cm (0.5 inches) cubes. Peel and finely chop the onions and garlic cloves.
- Put oil into a frying pan, preferably a sauté pan, so that it is about 1cm in depth. Heat the oil. I heat the oil until I can see it shimmering very slightly on the surface. Frying the eggplant cubes in batches, I make sure that the cubes are not tightly packed and keep to just one layer in the frying pan. I fry the cubes until they start to change colour and go brown on one or two sides.
- Using a slotted spoon, I remove the cooked aubergine (eggplant) from the frying pan and drain each batch of cooked eggplant using a colander or sieve to remove some of the excess oil.
- Separately, I put olive oil in a frying pan and add the chopped onions, together with a pinch of salt. Cook the onions over a medium heat so that they soften, to the point of starting to “melt” and lose their shape. Add the chopped garlic and continue cooking for a further couple of minutes, stirring to ensure that the all the garlic is gently fried.
- Add the tomatoes (if using whole tomatoes chop these first), mint (if using) and tomato paste to the onion mixture. Stir and continue to cook for about 20 minutes or so over a low heat. Add salt and black pepper to taste.
- Add the chopped eggplants and cooked chickpeas (or canned if using) to the tomato mixture. Stir so that all ingredients are mixed well. Taste and adjust the seasoning as needed. If the mixture starts to look too dry, add a little water to maintain the rich tomato sauce.
- Put the mixture into a baking dish. Bake the chickpea and aubergine stew for about 30 minutes.
Nutrition
Calories: 445kcalCarbohydrates: 27gProtein: 6gFat: 38gSaturated Fat: 4gPolyunsaturated Fat: 2gMonounsaturated Fat: 31gSodium: 231mgPotassium: 896mgFiber: 10gSugar: 13gVitamin A: 330IUVitamin C: 16mgCalcium: 72mgIron: 2mg
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