Passion for Elena's Cooking Corner: Alinazik, Aubergine Purée with Ground Beef and Garlic Yogurt

Today’s cooking adventures will focus on making the Turkish Alinazik which is a specialty of the Gaziantep province. This dish is usually made from char-grill smoked and spiced eggplant puree toped with tender lamb. For my dish I used ground beef which is as equally delicious. Get ready to mix the ingredients:

For the topping:

250 g ground beef or lamb

1 onion

1 tbsp cooking oil

2 peppers (you can get different colour ones, I used red and green)

2 medium tomatoes

½ tsp black pepper

1 tsp salt

For the aubergine purée:

6 aubergines

1 tbsp butter

1 cup Greek yogurt

2 gloves garlic

1 tbsp chopped parsley

1 tsp salt

To finish off with a tbsp butter and some paprika

Chop the onion in small pieces. Peel the tomatoes and cube them. Remove the seeds from the peppers and chop finely. Pour the oil in a cooking pan and sauté the ground beef until the fat begins to develop. Add the chopped onion and stir, season with salt and pepper. Add the tomatoes and peppers and mix together. Cook for about 10 minutes.

Crush the garlic and mix into the yogurt. Wash the aubergines. In my recipe I grilled them in the oven until slightly burnt, you can also burn them by placing directly on a gas burner to char the flesh. They must be soft and thoroughly blackened. Let the aubergines to cool and peel the dark skin as best as you can. Squeeze the excess water, and cut up with a knife and mash slightly. You can put the aubergines in a sieve and keep for like 10 minutes so that the juices run out.

To assemble the dish gently heat the aubergine purée in a pan, add salt and butter. Take the serving dish and spread the purée over it. Spread the garlic yogurt over the middle and finish it off with a warm layer of the ground beef. Sprinkle the dish with chopped parsley. The remaining butter with paprika should be heated in the pan and drizzled over the dish. Enjoy! Until next time. xoxo ES

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