I LOVE eating stuffed veggies- Portobello mushrooms, acorn squash…and here, eggplant! Eggplant is sort of like a perfect “boat” shape for stuffing, isn’t it? It’s actually a beautiful feminine, curvy shape, and I love how eggplant has been used in lots of cultural cuisines. I ate it when I was traveling in India, Turkey and beyond.
My Spicy Beauty Stuffed Eggplant Recipe is a perfect, yummy and beautiful entree to work into your mix!!
Indigo Beaut: Eggplant
Also known as aubergine, eggplant is known for its nutrition density, meaning that it has a very high nutrient to calorie ratio – not that we need to be counting!!
To keep things interesting in our kitchens, eggplant comes in all sorts of varieties, sizes and colors. This is awesome, since I encourage you to try out all the variety of fruits and veggies under the sun to get a wide range of nutrients in.
Adding these and other dark purple foods into your diet will help protect your brain and nervous system because they contain an antioxidant know as anthocyanin [1].
On a deeper level, eggplant is a deep indigo color, which is the color of our third eye, which supporting is said to help us live fearlessly, and feel inspired by our vision of purpose. You can learn about more of these energetic benefits in my The Beauty Detox Power book.
Eggplant gives us those important beauty B-complex vitamins such as pantothenic acid (vitamin B5), pyridoxine (vitamin B6) and thiamin (vitamin B1), niacin (B3).
These essential vitamins are not readily available in the body, so we must get them from the fresh foods that we eat to help facilitate fat, protein and carbohydrate metabolism.
Eggplant also contains phenolic compounds, such as caffeic and chlorogenic acid, and flavonoids, such as nasunin. If you’ve never heard of these nutrients, that’s okay. Just know but they can be powerful but beneficial.
Nasunin, for example, is a potent antioxidant and free radical scavenger to help protect your beautiful glowing skin. And with all this talk about helping to protect our brain and nervous system, studies have shown that it may protect cell membranes in your brain from damage [2].
Give your mind and body the boost it needs by clicking here!
I love eggplant and it works well in my body and it hopefully does in yours. Eggplant is in the nightshades however, so if you have an autoimmune condition or another condition and choose to avoid it, and use acorn squash or zucchini to stuff instead. We all respond to foods differently, so listen to your body, as always.
Now it’s time…let’s check this fun stuffing recipe out! :)
Check out the full recipe…
Spicy Beauty Stuffed Eggplant Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 eggplant
- 2 Tbsp. coconut oil
- 1 Yellow onion
- 1 Red bell pepper
- 1 green zucchini
- 2 handfuls of spinach
- 2 Tomatoes
- 1 cup quinoa preferably rinsed and soaked overnight
- 2 cups water
- 2 tsp Cumin
- 1 tsp cayenne pepper
- 1 Lime
- ½ cup chopped parsley
- Sea salt to taste
- Freshly ground black pepper to taste
Instructions
- Prepare eggplant by cutting in half lengthwise and removing some of the inside to later fill.
- Preheat the oven to 425ºF. Drizzle eggplant with coconut oil, salt, and pepper, and place on a baking sheet in oven for about 20-25 minutes.
- Add 1 cup of quinoa to 2 cups of water. If quinoa is still crunchy when water evaporates, add ¼ cup of water until fluffy.
- Chop onion, bell peppers, tomato, zucchini and spinach. Saute in pan over medium heat with coconut oil and season with salt and pepper.
- Mix finished quinoa and sauteed veggies in mixing bowl with lime, cumin, cayenne, salt, and pepper.
- Take eggplant out of the oven and fill with the quinoa and veggie mixture. Garnish with parsley. Enjoy!
Power Tip For The Ajna Chakra: I have access to infinite inspiration and power, because I am one with the whole.
Let me know how you do with this dish, and don’t forget to add it to your Dinner Recipes Pinterest Board!
In love and health,
Kimberly
[2] Antioxidant activity of nasunin, an anthocyanin in eggplant peels.
LOVE this, from every ingredient down to the name! Spicy beauty is exactly the way I hope people will describe me one day… ha! But really, this looks incredible.
Thank you kymberly for all your great work .
Thanks so much David! ;)