A rustic-looking and fabulous-tasting recipe for roasted stuffed eggplant with fennel and white beans. Serve it with a light soup or a generous piece of crunchy bread and you have a heavenly vegan dinner.
While winter seems to be the time when we allow ourselves to enjoy some heavier comfort foods, like Mac and Cheese, Vegetarian French Onion Soup, Mushroom Ragu Tagliatelle, or a Gingerbread Hot Chocolate Mug, there is also room for some healthier vegetable-filled dishes that can be equally warming and comforting. Root vegetables like celery root, parsnips, and carrots come together beautifully in this Moroccan-inspired root vegetable soup with chickpeas and lentils and sweet potatoes are the star in this Three Bean Chili. Add fennel to any salad and it will refresh a gloomy winter day. Cooked fennel, on the other hand, is sweet, soft, and buttery.
Whether you are looking to lighten up your meals before the holidays or you are looking for a different type of comfort food, this Stuffed Eggplant with Fennel and White Beans will surely hit the spot.
Here are a few tips to make this delicious recipe:
- Pick eggplants that are fat, meaty, and plump, with smooth skin and firm to the touch. They work best for in this dish
- Use a sharp knife to score the eggplant in a diamond pattern. When scoring the eggplant, make sure to avoid breaking into the skin
- Bake the eggplant's flesh cut side down to help them caramelize. You will end up with a wonderful golden color. You'll know they're are done when the flesh is soft. Raw, hard eggplant is a big NO, NO!
We chose thinly sliced fennel, white beans, thyme, oregano, and fresh grape tomatoes for these stuffed eggplants. If you would like to try a Tex-Mex flavor profile instead, follow the suggestions below:
- Swap white beans for kidney beans or black beans
- Swap fennel for thawed frozen corn
- Swap dried herbs for prepared chili powder
- Swap balsamic vinegar for your favorite salsa
Time-Saving tip: you can roast the eggplants 2-3 days ahead of time and keep them in the refrigerator until ready to use. All you have to do is heat them in the oven at 300F for 5-7 minutes or until warm.
Other Fennel Recipes
- Braised Fennel With Apricots & Figs
- Stuffed Eggplant With Fennel & White Beans
- Persimmon Fennel Salad
- Pickled Fennel & Carrots
- Fennel, Blood Orange & Hazelnut Salad
- Fennel and Chickpea Stew
- Warm Roasted Fennel Salad for Two
Check out our other eggplant recipes.
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Stuffed Eggplant with Fennel and White Beans
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 4 1x
Description
A rustic looking and fabulous tasting roasted stuffed eggplant with fennel and white beans. Serve it with a light soup or a generous piece of crunchy bread and you have a heavenly vegan dinner. Check out our other vegan dinner recipes under 300 calories
Ingredients
- 2 medium to large eggplants
- 2 tbsp plus 1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
- 1 fennel bulb, sliced thin (we used a mandolin)
- 1 tsp oregano
- 1 tsp thyme
- 1 tsp garlic powder ( you can sub for minced garlic)
- ¼ tsp salt
- 1-15 oz can white beans (or cannellini beans), rinsed and drained
- 15-20 grape tomatoes, sliced in half
- 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
- Fresh Chopped parsley to garnish (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper
- Slice the eggplants lengthwise, score the flesh in a diamond pattern, without poking the skin. Brush 1 teaspoon of the oil on each eggplant half and place them cut side down on the parchment paper. Bake for 30 minutes, or until the eggplant is tender
- In the meantime, heat 1 tablespoon of the olive oil in a large non stick skillet. Add the fennel, oregano, thyme, garlic powder and salt and cook over medium-high heat for 5 minutes, until it starts to caramelize. Add ½ cup water and continue cooking for another 5 minutes, until the fennel starts to soften
- Add the beans, grape tomatoes and balsamic vinegar and cook for an additional 5 minutes
- Top the roasted eggplant with the fennel and white bean mixture and serve warm
- Prep Time: 10
- Cook Time: 30
- Category: dinner
- Method: Roasted
- Cuisine: Italian vegan
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 eggplant half
- Calories: 223
- Sugar: 6.1
- Sodium: 521
- Fat: 7.7
- Saturated Fat: 1.1
- Unsaturated Fat: 6.2
- Trans Fat: 0
- Carbohydrates: 32.6
- Fiber: 9.5
- Protein: 9.2
- Cholesterol: 0
Gita Freed
I made this recipe and it was great! However, one of my eggplants was bitter (part of the problem with dealing with eggplant). How do you resolve that problem? Also, I slightly mashed the scored eggplant flesh and mixed it with the sauted vegetabes- works very nicely!
Vicky & Ruth
Hi Gita, thank you for your comments. That is one of the problems with eggplant, sometimes they are bitter and there is no way to know. The only thing we have noticed is that the less seeds an eggplant has the sweeter it is. But they're is no way to tell how many seeds they will have before cutting them. We like the idea of mashing the eggplant flesh with the vegetables. We are glad you enjoyed this recipe
Kay
Take the seeds out ! They are bitter, very bitter.
Vicky & Ruth
We are so sorry, some eggplants are more bitter than others. Unfortunately, there is no way to tell just by looking at the eggplant.
Petra Liverani
Thank you for this recipe, I'll be checking out more - this was the first I've found which came up when I googled for a recipe using eggplant and fennel which I'd just bought. Made this tonight using borlotti beans instead of cannellini and rosemary instead of thyme because they were what was at hand and served it with toasted wholemeal wraps. Also baked the fennel (as pieces) in the oven with the eggplant and added it to the tomatoes, etc at the end. It was very nice but would have been better if I hadn't cooked the eggplant and fennel quite so much - can't get used to how quickly the fancy new oven cooks.