Grilling Eggplant

Eggplant can be delicous when made on the grill.



Slice the eggplant 1/8 - 1/4" thick. Brush with olive oil. Place on a medium hot grill. Flip after about 4 minutes. Grill other side for about three minutes.

The slices should have grill marks and be soft.


This recipe is so simple that there just isn't much to write about it.

We've used grilled eggplant as a side dish, or as the "meat" in sandwiches, with slices of fresh tomato, basil and a pesto mayonnaise.


Here is a healthy meal we enjoyed with tasty grilled eggplant as the main course. Pasta with pesto and a fresh green salad with Italian dressing make wonderful accompaniments:

Blue Cheese Stuffed Burger topped with sauted mushrooms and served with Roasted Vegetables

My husband likes blue cheese, so I adapted this recipe, from the Blues Burger in Taste of Home's "Backyard Grilling" book. These burgers are so good, you aren't going to need any condiments. The slight sweetness of the BBQ sauce coating is a wonderful accompaniment to the strong, salty blue cheese flavor.

Blue Chess Stuffed Burger

For Burger:
1 lb lean ground beef
1 cup chopped parsley
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp dried pepper flakes
1 tsp black pepper
1/4 tsp chili powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/3 cup BBQ sauce

Burger toppings:
1 container crumbled blue cheese (you will not use the whole thing)
1/2 lb of fresh mushrooms, sliced
2 tablespoons of butter
2/3 cup BBQ sauce
3 rolls/hamburger buns
Mix first 7 ingredients in a bowl.


Mix first 7 ingredients in a bowl well, needing them together until the parsley is evenly distributed. Shape into 6 thin patties. On 3 of them, place a spoon full of blue cheese in the middle of the patty. Place remaining patties on top and press edges firmly to seal. Grill over medium-hot hear for 3 minutes on each side. Brush each sides with BBQ sauce when it is facing up on the grill. Grill burgers 10-12 minutes longer, or until meat is no longer pink, basting and turning occasionally.

While waiting for burgers to cook, saute sliced mushrooms in a pan using a little butter. When burgers are done, top them with the sauteed mushrooms.

When the burgers are almost done, I recommend slicing and slightly toasting the buns on the grill.








I served the dish with fabulous roasted vegetables. This turned out really well and was a fabulous way to incorporate vegetables fresh from my garden.

Roasted Vegetables
2 small yellow zucchini, sliced
1 medium green zucchini, sliced
4 large beets or 8 small beets, sliced
4 medium carrots, sliced
1 cup new potatoes
1 package of whole mushrooms

3 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
2 tsp black pepper
2 tablespoons dried basil
3 tablespoons rosemary


Pre-heat oven to 350.I put chopped beets, zucchini, new potatoes and carrots into a casserole dish. In a small bowl I mixed the other ingredients and dribbled it over the chopped vegetables. Cook in oven for 45 minutes or until vegetables are to your liking. These came out beyond delicious. The beets were my favorite part, though I would have to say I love carrots roasted more then I like them prepared any other way.










Some things I learned from this...beets are dark and even darker when roasted. I had a little panic when I opened the oven and though I had burnt all the vegetables. It turns out they were perfectly cooked. I probably will repeat the toasted vegetables as a side anytime it is cool enough to stand having the oven on this summer.