Summer Garden Curry Baked Eggs

It’s harvest season … a time of year I absolutely love. I personally don’t have much of a garden (other than the massive container garden on my patio which is mostly flowers and herbs this year), mostly because I find myself too busy to tend to it and partly because I live in a forest. I had to cut down a couple large trees that died this year, though, so I’m thinking NEXT year that space will become a garden.

But my parents always have a HUGE garden and I have friends that love to garden too … and that means I get lots of garden gifts at harvest season. We went camping with my parents for a folk festival and they brought a box full of garden goodies. I got a nice big eggplant, a few zucchini, several onion, tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers. A box full of happiness.

As I was puzzling with what to do with my eggplant, the thought of Shakshuka came to mind. If you’ve never had Shakshuka, it’s a delightful Moroccan dish where eggs are poached in a spicy tomato-based sauce. My friend Melissa over at ChinDeep introduced me to Shakshuka … I remember being smitten with it the moment I saw it … and then when I tasted it, I thought I’d gone to heaven! Anyway, I thought it would be really fun to make a shakshuka style dish with eggplant, so I cut up my eggplant and slathered it with a slurry of turmeric and olive oil, then roasted it in the oven, then put it in a spicy curry sauce with tomatoes and summer squash and peppers and spices. (I was tempted to grill the eggplant, but didn’t want to wait for the grill to heat up.)

My eggplant style shakshuka turned out soooo wonderful, and I had enough sauce for several breakfasts this week, which makes me incredibly happy. If you don’t want to bake the eggs, you can also do a “shakshuka scramble”, just scrambling the eggs together with the sauce right in the pan. That tastes wonderful, too. Oh, and if you roast a large eggplant (like I did), you’ll have some roasted eggplant leftover … which is fabulous in salad (recipe coming soon).

Oh and by the way, if you don’t care for eggplant, just replace it with zucchini. It’s not quite as buttery tasting, but it will still be wonderful. I promise.

Summer Garden Curry Baked Eggs

• Prep Time: 15 minutes
• Cook Time: 45 minutes
• Total Time: 1 hour
• Yield: 3 - 4 servings 1x

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Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

For the turmeric roasted eggplant:

• 1 large eggplant, peeled & cut in 1/2-inch slices
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil
• 1 Tablespoon tomato juice
• 1/4 teaspoon EACH: turmeric, garlic powder, cumin

For the baked eggs:

• 1 teaspoon olive or avocado oil
• 1/2 teaspoon EACH: turmeric, cumin, chili powder
• 1/4 teaspoon EACH: cinnamon, salt
• 1 small onion, peeled & chopped
• 2 – 3 cloves garlic, peeled & chopped
• 1 small crookneck squash or zucchini (about 2/3 – 3/4 cup, chopped into chunks)
• 1 cup of turmeric roasted eggplant, cut into chunks
• 1 pint fresh garden (or canned) tomatoes, chopped
• 1 jalapeno pepper (or more, to taste)
• 3 – 4 eggs

For the top: crumbled feta or goat cheese, fresh oregano leaves

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Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 400 F. Peel and cut the eggplant into 1/2 inch slices. In a small bowl, stir together the olive oil, tomato juice and spices. Brush the eggplant with this mixture. Set the eggplant slices on a large baking tray coated with cooking spray, put the tray in the oven and roast for 15 minutes or so or until the eggplant are tender.
2. Add the teaspoon of oil to an (oven-proof) medium frying pan and then add the spices. Let them toast in the oil briefly, stirring, until fragrant, then add the onion, garlic and summer squash. Saute until the onion is soft and translucent and the squash is tender. Stir in 1 cup of the turmeric roasted eggplant (reserving the rest for another use) along with the tomatoes and jalapeno. Cook and stir for about 10 – 15 minutes to let the flavors blend and the sauce thicken. Add jalapeno as desired for heat.
3. You can now either make wells in the sauce directly in the pan and crack eggs into it … or you can spoon the sauce into individual oven-safe bowls and make a well in each. Crack an egg into each hole. Bake at 400 F for about 15 minutes or until the egg white is fully set but the yolk is still tender/liquid (or to your liking).
4. Before serving, sprinkle with crumbled feta or goat cheese and fresh oregano leaves. Enjoy!

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Notes

RECIPE SOURCE: http://www.sumptuousspoonfuls.com/

© Copyright 2016, Sumptuous Spoonfuls. All images & content are copyright protected. Please do not use my images without prior permission. If you want to publish any of my images, please ask first. If you want to republish this recipe as your own, please re-write the recipe in your own words or link back to this post for the recipe.

This recipe was shared at Foodie Friends Friday, Gluten Free Friday and Let’s Get Real.