Pinar Ozhal

Karnıyarık, literally means slit belly :) My hometown in Southeast Turkey boasts with many recipes. We even dry them to cook them in various ways during the winter. It is a bit of an effort to put this dish together but my oh my! It worths every minute! If you are an eggplant lover, try this recipe. Eggplants striped peeled and slit lengthwise, slowly browned and softened with olive oil on a pan. Ground beef cooked with onions and green peppers, mixed with garlic, parsley, tomatoes, black pepper, cumin, pinch of cinnamon, hot pepper flakes and a generous amount of parsley. Now scoop that luscious beef into the slit bellies of eggplants. Oh and if you happen to have extra peppers, pan fry them until semi soft and fill their bellies, too. Cook some finely chopped tomatoes and pour around the stuffed bellied vegetables. Cook all together covered on stove top or uncovered in the oven. Serve with some butter noodles/pasta or pilaf and listen to the slurps and yumms of the diners. Chris loves this recipe a lot, a lot! @ Capitol Hill

Mother Nature keeps amazing me. I have almost done nothing for my Bostan since I broke my wrist last October and yet a ton of plants survived the winter and are now thriving and continuing to feed us.