Crawfish al Pesto on Eggplant "Pillows"

Peggy

Aug 9

This recipe grew out of a delicious spaghetti squash alfredo dish I created some time back. At first I had my doubts on crawfish for this, but it came out DELICIOUS! I made a batch of my Oven-Fried Fish coating and baked off the eggplant first, as you would for classic Eggplant Parmigiana. The crunchy coating on the eggplant very quickly loses its crunchiness, so serve this quickly and don't hold it over for any reason. This sinfully rich dish was so good I will definitely be doing this again! It freezes nicely, too, getting even tastier upon re-baking! The eggplant will lose that crunchiness from freezing, but the dish still tastes fantastic when reheated.

This recipe is suitable for all phases of Atkins and Keto, and for Primal folks that consume occasional dairy products. This would not be suitable for Paleo followers.

INGREDIENTS:

12 oz. eggplant, sliced into eight ½" slices

3 oz. plain pork rinds, crushed fine

6 T. homemade mayonnaise

Dash salt

4 T. butter

1 large leek, ends trimmed off, washed well, sliced or chopped into small pieces (about 1½ cups)

¼ recipe Jennifer Eloff's Condensed Cream of Mushroom Soup

¼ c. Parmesan cheese, grated

1½ T. homemade pesto sauce (or commercial)

8 oz. frozen crawfish tail meat, defrosted (or shrimp)

½ c. heavy cream

½ c. water

1 c. grated mozzarella cheese

2 T. chopped parsley for garnish (optional)

DIRECTIONS: Preheat oven to 450º. Lightly oil a baking sheet. Cut the eggplant into ½" slices. Baste all surfaces with the mayonnaise using a brush. Spoon crushed pork rinds over each slice, coating well. Place the coated slices on the oiled pan and pop into oven, baking at 450º for 20 minutes.

While the eggplant bakes, prepare the topping. Melt the butter in a large skillet. Add leeks and saute until tender. Lower heat to medium. Add the mushroom soup, the Parmesan, crawfish meat, cream and water and simmer over low heat until eggplant is done. It will thicken as it cooks. Add the pesto and stir. Be sure to stir the mixture often during cooking so the flavors will blend.

When the eggplant is tender, remove from oven, top each slice with 2 T. of the mozzarella and then spoon 1/8 of the topping (about 1/3 cup) onto each slice of eggplant. I made the mistake of putting 1 T. under and 1 T. over the topping and popped the pan back into the oven while my garlic toast cooked in the broiler to melt the cheese on top. But it didn't completely melt by the time the toast was done. So in future, I'll put all 2T. of the cheese underneath the bubbly hot topping so it will melt nicely for me. Garnish tops with chopped parsley and serve at once.

NUTRITIONAL INFO: Makes 8 servings, each contains:

355 cals, 30.5 g fat, 6.06 g carbs, 1.88 g fiber, 4.18 g NET CARBS, 14.8 g protein, 421 mg sodium

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