All Photos © Christine Elise McCarthy 2015
To see images of my past posts & get links to the recipes – look on my Pinterest board – HERE.
Uh-oh! Wouldya look at that! The AMAZING make-up company, Too Faced, has selected my book to give away in the summer essentials giveaway! All you gotta do is go on Instagram, follow me at @christineelisemccarthy and then navigate to @TooFaced on Instagram, find this image on their wall & follow the rules to enter. DO NOT enter on MY Instagram page. Only entries on the Too Faced page will be considered. A signed copy of my book, a bikini & Too Faced’s ENTIRE summer line! CRAZY! And the contest ends tomorrow (June 23, 2015), winner announced June 24, 2015 – so enter NOW! And remember – go follow me on Instagram, then go follow Too Faced there & enter through their page. Good luck!
So – I had jury duty today. That is the hallway at the court. Everyone dreads jury duty but I work freelance & literally cannot afford to miss a day of work – let alone a week. So – I had to miss work today to go down & asked to be rescheduled – which just means that, if I am working in December – I lose at least another day’s pay. Such a fucked system. But, anyway – they let me out at noon so I decided to make the best of being downtown & met my friend Rose for lunch at Grand Central Market. Here is what that LA wonder looks like:
Pizza was SUPER thin & delightful but it was so friggin’ hot out – neither Rose nor I could eat more than half of the tiny 8″ pizzas. So – I have some for later! 🙂
Across the street to the west from Grand Central Market is another LA landmark – Angel’s Flight. It is not currently in service, however.
Even more interesting – across the street to the east is the Bradbury Building – most famous as a location in Bladerunner. Look how incredibly gorgeous it is!
CLICK THIS PANORAMIC ONE TO BLOW IT UP.
And there you have it! My downtown Los Angeles adventure today & a chance to win lots of make-up & a bikini & a signed copy of my book!
The recipe next. It isn’t really a recipe. It is an idea & I have been talking about it a lot lately & eating it even more frequently. These eggplant pizza towers. Not really pizza but born of my wanting a tortilla pizza but without tortillas.
I slice up & eat an entire small eggplant alone but quantities of everything really depends on how many you are feeding, how hungry they are & then personal taste as to the sauce-cheese ratio. So – an informal recipe will follow. Also – these would be nice served on top of pasta tossed with a red sauce. I cannot recommend Rao’s highly enough.
Grilled & Baked Eggplant Pizza Towers with Fresh Mozzarella & Basil Chiffonade
INGREDIENTS
About 1 eggplant per person – sliced about 1/4-1/2 inch thick & lightly salted
Fresh mozzarella – enough to put a few slices on top of each slice of eggplant
Red sauce of your choice
Fresh basil
DIRECTIONS
Heat the oven to 350 degrees.
I grilled the slices on my stove top grill first to char them a bit. Just to get some grill marks on them & cook out some moisture. I did it on the grill dry & it took about 5-7 minutes – flipping the slices occasionally. You can do this on your burners on the stove or in a grill pan or on a real grill – with or without oiling the slices.
OR – you can opt to bake the slices naked for 15-20 minutes to get them less thick & mushy.
Whatever you do – cook out some moisture & try to grill a little flavor onto the slices.
Top with sauce & cheese – quantities up to you.
Bake at 350 on a cooking sheet topped with parchment paper (THE BEST – nothing sticks) or treated with cooking spray or olive oil. Assemble each eggplant slice with sauce & cheese & cook them in a single layer – stacking them into towers when you put them on the plate.
Meanwhile – to make the basil chiffonade – simply stack several leaves of basil, roll them into a tube & slice the tube up. Voila!
It should take 10-15 minutes for the cheese to melt & begin to turn golden but all ovens are different so eyeball it & take them out when they look good to you.
Stack your little eggplant pizzas & garnish with basil. Yum!
Delightful-Delicious-Delovely 