Cooking Simple, Part II

Yesterday I promised I would let everyone know how my "creations" turned out. The pasta with the pork was pretty darn good, if I say so myself. It had a tad less sauce than I would have liked, so next time I'll use a smaller baking dish and less noodles. The bread was also decent, but I forgot to slash the loaves before baking, so they sorta came out in some funky shapes. But, I thought the flavor was good, and what's better than fresh bread straight from the oven?

Tonight, I've got to do something with eggplant. Here's what I'm thinking...I'm going to slice the eggplant into 1" thick "steaks," brush them with olive oil, and dust them with salt and ground black pepper. Then I'm going to throw those bad boys on the grill and cook them. Once the eggplant is done, I think I'll cube it up and throw in the Cuisinart with a can of chickpeas and some olive oil, maybe some garlic (haven't decided yet). Susan also bought a pound of hamburger, so taking a cue from an article I read in Saveur magazine on hummus, I'm going to brown the hamburger in a little olive oil, maybe some garlic thrown in, and just a hint of cinnamon (sounds weird, I know, but its a very interesting flavor with meat). I've also got some pita bread dough rising as we speak, so I'm going to bake those up (first time ever...I hope they turn out), and then scoop some eggplant/chickpea stuff on top of warm pita round, and then spoon a dollop of the hamburger on top. That's the plan...we'll see how it turns out!