Instructions

1. 1

   Wash the eggplants, leaving the stems on, and trim the green sepals with scissors. Using a vegetable peeler, peel off lengthways strips of skin, leaving a strip in place between each one, to create a striped pattern. Soak in a bowl of water with the salt so that they stay pale and absorb less oil when fried.

2. 2

   Meanwhile, peel and finely dice the onion and garlic, deseed and finely dice the pointed peppers for the filling, finely dice the tomatoes and finely chop the parsley.

3. 3

   Heat the oil for the filling in a frying pan, toast the pine nuts in it, stirring, until golden and take them out. Sweat the onion in the pan until translucent, add the minced lamb and fry, stirring, until browned and crumbly.

4. 4

   Add the garlic, peppers, red pepper paste, tomatoes, salt, pepper and pepper flakes and simmer uncovered until the liquid has almost evaporated.

5. 5

   Take the pan off the heat and mix the pine nuts and parsley into the filling. Take the eggplants out of the salted water and pat them very thoroughly dry with kitchen paper so that the oil does not spit.

6. 6

   Heat the oil for frying in a large frying pan and fry the eggplants in it over a medium heat on all sides until browned and soft enough to give when pressed; keep turning them and work in two batches if space is tight. Drain on kitchen paper.

7. 7

   Preheat the oven to 200 °C top and bottom heat. For the sauce, stir the tomato paste with the hot water and the salt until smooth; cut the tomato for the topping into 8 slices, and halve the pointed peppers for the topping lengthways and deseed them.

8. 8

   Lay the eggplants side by side in a baking dish of about 30 × 20 cm, slit each one lengthways along the top, leaving 1 cm intact at both ends, and carefully open up the pocket with two spoons. Pile the filling in and top with a tomato slice and half a pointed pepper.

9. 9

   Pour the sauce into the dish around the edge and bake on the middle shelf until the sauce is bubbling and the peppers on top are soft.

10. 10

    Check the filling of one eggplant in the centre: the minced meat should be cooked through with no trace of pink and at 70 °C; if not, bake for a few more minutes. Leave to rest briefly and lift the eggplants onto plates with the sauce.

11. 11

    Tip: Birinc bi şehriye — White Rice with Toasted Vermicelli and a small bowl of Mast — homemade yogurt go well with this. For a lower-fat version, brush the eggplants all over with oil and bake them on a baking tray at 220 °C top and bottom heat on the middle shelf for about 25 minutes until soft. Minced beef works instead of minced lamb, and some families use roughly chopped walnuts instead of the pine nuts.