Allison Malec is a Marketing Manager at Clarkson Potter, a division of Random House, and is an editor at The Recipe Club. She lives in New York City, and loves to cook, bake and eat. She loves anything sweet, especially Momofuku Milk Bar’s Compost Cookies, Ben and Jerry’s Oatmeal Cookie Crunch Ice Cream, and Vanilla Mr. Softee cones with rainbow sprinkles.

Eggplant is one of those vegetables that I often bypass in the supermarket aisles, because I’m never really quite sure what to do with it. Sure, I’ve roasted it a few times, and made eggplant Parmesan on occasion, but I was in serious need of a new eggplant dish. Voila! The Epicurious Cookbook (Clarkson Potter, October 2012) to the rescue. In this recipe, eggplants are roasted, scooped out, and mixed with vegetables to create a light and healthy salad. The dish is enhanced by a creamy yogurt sauce and crunchy pita chips.

Roasted Eggplant Salad with Pita Chips and Yogurt Sauce
Recipe from The Epicurious Cookbook
Yield: Makes 8 servings

For Salad
3 large eggplants (3 pounds total)
6 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 green bell peppers, cored, seeded, and finely diced
2 roasted red peppers, peeled, seeded, and diced
2 tomatoes, seeded and diced
15 yellow or red cherry tomatoes, quartered
4 garlic cloves, chopped
½ cup finely chopped flat-leaf parsley
¼ cup finely chopped fresh chives
2 tablespoons finely julienned fresh basil
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
1⁄8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

For Yogurt Sauce
2 cups nonfat plain yogurt
½ cup peeled and diced cucumber
1 jalapeno chile, seeded and diced
1 tablespoon chopped fresh mint
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
2 teaspoons olive oil
½ teaspoon salt

For Pita Chips
4 whole-wheat pitas, each cut into 12 wedges
Vegetable oil cooking spray
2 tablespoons grated reduced-fat
Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons poppy seeds
1 tablespoon sesame seeds
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Make Eggplant:
Preheat the oven to 450°F. Line a baking sheet with foil. Poke holes in the eggplants with a fork. Roast until they collapse, 35 to 40 minutes. Cool slightly. Cut the eggplants open, scoop out flesh into a bowl, and discard skins. Mix the flesh with 4 tablespoons of the lemon juice. Let sit 10 minutes. Place the flesh in a fine-mesh strainer and press gently with a large spoon, squeezing out moisture. Chop the eggplant. Mix in the peppers, tomatoes, garlic, parsley, chives, basil, oil, and remaining 2 tablespoons lemon juice. Add salt and pepper.

Make Yogurt Sauce:
Mix ingredients in a bowl.

Make Pita Chips and Serve:
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Coat one side of each pita wedge with cooking spray. Sprinkle each sprayed side with the Parmesan, seeds, and black pepper. Bake on foil until crisp, 6 to 7 minutes. Serve the eggplant salad with pita chips and yogurt sauce on the side.