Eggplant and Feta Cheese Pasta

Vegetarian for 2 days in a row? I'd better cook some meat tomorrow or my steak-loving boyfriend might start complaining.

Recently I've developed an interest in vegetarian food.. In the past, when I heard vegetarian, my first thought would be "Aw hell no! Gimme my cheeseburger nao!!" But now I find that there are so many creative vegetarian recipes out there to choose from and they all look equally delicious!

Here's a recipe that I made up and turned out to be pretty good. I know, I surprised myself too.

Had some eggplant left over from the previous culinary adventure so I decided to use it to make pasta. Thought eggplant would go well with cashews and chilli flakes but didn't know about the feta cheese. Hmmm.. I guess cheese goes with anything.

The eggplant cut into cubes, drizzled with olive oil, seasoned with salt and pepper, and put into the oven.

Coming out looking like this! Mm.. I could eat them just like that.

After that I pretty much just cooked the pasta, dumped all the ingredients I wanted into it and stirred =)

Ingredients:

• 1 Eggplant
• 1/4 cup Olive Oil
• 2 cups large spiral pasta, or whatever pasta you have in hand really
• 1/2 cup Cashew Nuts
• 1 clove Garlic, minced
• 1/4 tsp Chilli Flakes
• 1 tbsp chopped Parsley
• Juice from 1/2 a Lemon
• Feta cheese, to your taste
• 1/4 cup Parmesan Cheese
• Salt and Pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 175 degrees C, then cut the eggplant into small cubes. Don't cut it too small because they will shrivel into nothingness as you bake. Drizzle with some olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Pop in the oven for about 40 minutes, and be sure to turn the eggplants in the middle so they're cooked pretty evenly.
2. In a bowl, crumble feta, add cashews, olive oil, lemon juice, chilli flakes, garlic, parmesan and some pepper. Mix well and set aside.
3. When the eggplant is almost done, start cooking your pasta.
4. Once cooked, drain. In the same pot, add feta mixture, eggplants and parsley. Mix well and serve immediately.