Tomato, Eggplant and Feta Penne

What do you do with an eggplant? I didn't know what to put it in, other going to the deli for baba ganoush, musaka or grilled. Eggplant is simple to fry. And lower cholesterol, more on that in a moment.

Just need a few other ingredients and grill things real fast and throw it together and pretend it's all fancy.

In case you've never dealt with eggplant, wash it and chop it like a potato -- seeing as both are night-shade plants and part of the same family.

It has a bit of a spongy consistency, but when it cooks up it shrinks.

As you can see, list of ingredients are a few tomatoes
a small can of tomato paste
an eggplant
1/4 cup of cilantro
1/2 cup of feta cheese
a few grilled sausages

Boil 3 cup of penne at the same time as prepping other stuff.

Cube up eggplant to throw in the frying pan until fried up good.

Chop in tomatoes and paste, cilantro and sausage to fry it up good. Crumble up the feta into the mix and stir into penne noodles.

Just a FYI of awesome random facts from good ol'Wikipedia because eggplant is pretty nifty.

The plant is used in cuisines from Japan to Spain. It is often stewed, as in the French ratatouille, the Italian parmigiana di melanzane, the Turkish karnıyarık or musakka, and Middle-Eastern and South Asian dishes. Eggplants can also be battered before deep-frying and served with a sauce made of tahini and tamarind. 


The fruit is botanically classified as a berry, and contains numerous small, soft seeds, which are edible, but have a bitter taste because they contain nicotinoid alkaloids; this is unsurprising as it is a close relative of tobacco.

Studies of the Institute of Biology of São Paulo State University, Brazil, have shown eggplant is effective in the treatment of high blood cholesterol.


There's some other nifty history and fun so check it out if you like. Other than that, it's pretty tasty.

All else you need is some good company and a bottle of red wine.

Bonne appetite!

Rocket Fuel for the Mind

Barely awake some mornings, everyone seems to have their favourite reboot. Not for one for routine, I decided to see which wake-ups worked best for comparison. As I work in customer service, I need to hit the floor running and thinking.

Usually my brain protests until 10AM so I tend to resort to some conventional and unorthodox methods if I need to get up earlier.

Matcha green tea - epic brain spark-plug ignition... Ten minutes later I'm running top-speed mentally. In fact anything exotic from Tea-opia is amazing but I can't really afford their stuff yet. Weirdly de-caffeinated green tea is absolutely amazing for the long haul I've found but other stuff works too.

Shot of Cappuccino - cherished  hang-over remedy. Takes a little longer to kick in but erases it better than Gatorade. Thank-you Italian barristers.

Water - un-spectacular, but effective too. Moistens up the vocal chords and splashes the face mentally. H2O simplicity.

Sparkling or non-alcoholic orange or cranberry juice - something in it just sparkles and wakes things up so fast. Yay for citrus.

Cookies! okay so not the best thing for breakfast, but in a rush, nothing wrong with a shot of chocolate and sugary fun.

Hemp seeds - high in protein and omega oils. No, they're not going to get you high so don't even imagine trying to smoke the non-bud. Hemp seeds sure have a lot of energy in them though.

Exercise - gets the blood and adrenalin flowing, Sit-ups, push-ups, or yoga stretches, it's awesome. Commuting in traffic on a bike is a whole other story for another day.

Orange Pekoe / English Breakfast / Oolong Tea - if it's black, it's stronger than some coffee. Irish blends are still my favourite.

Oddly after finding out how much sugar there was in an energy drink, Coke, Jolt, Red Bull, Mountain Dew, Monster, Rock-Star, stuff with straight B12 and Yerba in it... etc. I haven't really drank many more. They got me through long days of college assignments and photography, yet for what it does to the body, not worth it afterwards for the delayed burn-out.

Coffee - Timmy's sets a standard, but I cannot imagine the XL amount; Star Bucks is yummy; Second Cup has some really nice blends too. Even McDonalds is surprisingly good; Mac's 7-11 and Denny's are engine de-greaser but keeps the mind going.

Currently, Kicking Horse and Good Earth win with me. Forget triple espresso, there's a Good Earth drink called a High Test. Take an Americano and throw a couple of shots of espresso in it. EPIC but I don't drink them often. Making double shot of Kicking Horse at home is amazing.

Which is where this really is heading. Apparently even a new study found out people who are up later and sleep in later are more at risk of heart disease, obesity and not having any fun later in life or somewhat grumpier than early birds.

So other than long haul truck drivers, business-people, and students, it's all in moderation. Apparently guidelines of 3-4 cups of coffee or 6-7 cups of tea or something are the max a person should drink as I remember it. Those ruddy energy drinks are recommended to not be more than one per day but I've seen jittery friends on their 2-3 shots. Either way, caffeinated stuff is diuretic in a bad way aka dehydration so add a liter or two to your intake of simple H2O so necessary to survival.

Whatever the rocket fuel ignition.... take care of the body by getting enough sleep in the first place and getting stuff done before it's late at night. On that note, I'm off to sleep.

--PLR--