Stuffed veggies are an easy thing to love. It’s a cooking method that takes a healthy and humble vegetable and elevates it both in flavor and presentation. It’s one of our favorites ways to cook eggplant and squash and peppers… and even tomatoes. You can play around with fillings, using different kinds of meat (or none at all!) and ingredients that speak to the current season. We love a versatile meal and veggie boats are just that.
Here we’ve taken a few small eggplants, scooped out the insides and cooked them up with ground turkey, tomatoes, and some savory herbs with cheese melted over the whole shebang. And you guys, it is so good. The eggplant becomes soft and tender and absorbs the wonderful flavor of the filling. As it bakes in the oven, the juices release from the vegetables and each little boat comes out of the oven juicy and full of flavor. We like to use ground turkey where you can and this cooking method ensures that it stays moist. (Because what is worse than dry turkey?) But if turkey isn’t your thing, ground beef or even some Italian sausage would both be wonderful substitutes here.
This makes for a fairly hearty meal, though it’s not heavy; it’s not going to weigh you down for the rest of the evening. It’s just an all-around satisfying meal and a really, really tasty one. Full of veggies and lean ground turkey, it’s also pretty darn healthy! (You can always cut back on the cheese in the recipe if you’d like, though we’re game for a little caloric sacrifice in the name of a crispy, cheesy topping.)
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