II. More Stuffed Foods

Vegetables are stuffed in a variety of ways and in the most alluring and intriguing manner. You see a beautifully simmered piece of vegetable, and you are clueless as to what there is inside. Is it just the pulp, or is it something else? The only way to know is to dig in, and you will be pleasantly surprised. That was exactly the intention of the medieval cook, whose last instruction in a recipe for badhinjan mahshi (stuffed eggplant) was to arrange the stuffed eggplants on a platter, and leave them whole as if they had never been stuffed (Anwa’ al-Saydala).