weekly_food_challenge | Challenge 31: Recipe from a loved one

I really loved the challenge this week - it inspired me to cook something I haven't cooked in a long time and also to spend more time in the kitchen than I have been lately and I really enjoyed it!

My mum was born in Malta and she would cook Maltese dishes fairly regularly when I was growing up. One of my favourite dishes that she made (and that I regularly make) is a pasta sauce, but I already used that in a previous challenge (admittedly about six years ago!) where the theme of the week was Italian - you can see the recipe here.

Anyway, one of my mum's favourite dishes to cook is stuffed aubergines with Maltese style potatoes (in Maltese: bringiel mimli bil-patata fil-forn). And I think it is pretty yummy too and it brings back fond memories of my youth. :) My recipe is cobbled together from my memories of how she used to cook it and from a couple of Maltese cookbooks.

This serves 2 people, very generously (which is the Maltese way...)

Ingredients
For the potatoes
Olive oil
2 medium-sized baking potatoes, peeled and sliced into 1cm - 2cm slices
2 small onions, peeled and sliced
2 garlic cloves, sliced
1 tsp dried mixed herbs
1/2 tsp fennel seeds
Salt and pepper
250ml stock (vegetable, chicken or beef)

For the stuffed aubergines
2 small aubergines or 1 large aubergine
1 onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 tbsp tomato puree
250g minced beef (or you can use minced pork or a mixture of pork and beef. Or indeed you could use Quorn mince to make this veggie.)
1 large egg, beaten
Salt and pepper
Some bread crumbs or dried semolina
Some grated cheese (optional)

Method
1 Pre-heat the oven to 180C (fan-assisted).
2. Firstly, prepare the potatoes. Pour a small amount of olive oil into a baking dish - I used my cast iron casserole dish, but any oven-proof dish large enough for the potatoes and aubergines to fit in will do. You don't need to cover it, so it doesn't need to have a lid. I use a small amount of olive oil and a pastry brush to spread the olive oil around. You just want to stop anything sticking to the bottom.
2. Layer the potatoes onion and garlic in the dish. It doesn't have to be very neat, but I usually try and do potato, onion, potato, onion, potato, with some garlic slices in there somewhere for good measure.
3. Sprinkle the mixed herbs, fennel seeds and some salt and pepper over the potatoes.
4. Pour the stock over it all.
5. Put it in the oven and set the timer for 45 minutes. The idea is to cook the potatoes for a long time.
6. While the potatoes are in, start preparing the aubergines.
7. Parboil the aubergines for 10 - 20 minutes (depending on how large they are) until they have started to soften a bit (but don't worry, they don't need to be completely cooked through at this point). I like to remove the green stalk-y bit before I start cooking.
8. Drain the aubergines and slice in half length-ways (you could also slice them prior to boiling, particularly if they are large).
9. Scoop out some of the aubergine innards, but leave a nice bit round the edge - between 5mm and 1cm.
10. Fry the onion in a pan over a medium heat for about 5 minutes until the onion starts to soften. Add the garlic and tomato puree and stir. Add the minced beef and cook until it is starting to brown. Add the aubergine innards and cook until the meat is done and the aubergine innards have broken down into mush.
11. Leave the meat mixture to cool down a little bit - about 10 minutes or so.
12. Add the eggs and the salt and pepper and stir the mixture well.
13. Spoon the mixture into the aubergines. Sprinkle the breadcrumbs/semolina on the top and then sprinkle on the grated cheese (if using - I left it off because of lactose intolerant husband).
14. Hopefully, the beeper for the potatoes will go off soon, if it hasn't already. Once it does, remove the dish from the oven.
15. If the potatoes have started to dry out, add some water to the dish (the potatoes are meant to be moist, not really brown like English roast potatoes - although, you usually get a few brown ones on top (yum)).
16. Carefully place the aubergines on top of the potatoes. Turn the oven up to 200C, put the dish back in and cook for 30 minutes.

After which time, you should have something which looks a bit like this:
Stuffed aubergines on a bed of potatoes