Kofta Balls in a Vegan Tomato Cream & Eggplant Sauce

Indian or Middle Eastern food generally, has never appealed to me.  The smell of curry or other exotic spices of that nature were never appetizing ones, so I was skeptical when my boyfriend’s cousin offered us up these veggie, yellow turmeric-hued kofta balls a few months ago.  I initially did the taste test just to be polite, but I absolutely fell in love with them!  I look forward to them every time we visit him, and he was generous enough to give me the book he found the recipe in (The Higher Taste Vegetarian Cookbook).  My boyfriend tried his hand at creating them the other night and they were amazing, along with a vegan tomato cream and eggplant sauce I came up with at the last minute.  The pinkish color of the sauce doesn’t look great with the greenish tone of the balls, but they taste delish!

KOFTA BALLS

2 cups cauliflower, shredded in food processor

2 cups green cabbage, shredded  in food processor

1 ½ cups chickpea flour

1 tsp cumin

1 tsp curry powder

3 cloves garlic, minced

1 cayenne pepper, minced

2 tsp sea salt

½ tsp black pepper

¼ cup olive oil for frying

• After shredding cauliflower and cabbage together, pour into a bowl and mix together the remaining ingredients
• Roll mix into golf ball sized balls and set aside (should make around 2 dozen balls)

VEGAN TOMATO CREAM AND EGGPLANT SAUCE

1 cup eggplant, chopped

½ cup raw cashews

2 tomatoes, chopped

¼ cup water

1 tbsp nutritional yeast

1 tbsp fresh basil

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 cayenne pepper, minced

1 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp sea salt

Dash black pepper

• Combine all ingredients in a blender EXCEPT for the eggplant, and blend until thick and creamy
• Remove from blender, add eggplant pieces and pour over kofta balls