Shakshouka / Poached Eggs in Tomato Sauce

Over the last two-years or so we have been rarely eating roti /chawal - sabji for dinners. While the weekends are generally eat-out days, the week-nights are reserved for trying quick and simple recipes. The most important thing about these recipes need to be their approximate calorie values. We try to be in the 400 - 500 cal goal for week-nights (to make room for the weekend binging). And in that endeavour, we stumbled upon this interesting protein rich recipe of eggs and chick peas.

Its said to be an Iranian dish and like all middle-eastern dishes, it had that right balance of spices that really suits our palette. If you are bored of eating daal-sabji and want something healthy -Try this tonight in your kitchen.

Ingredients (serves 2)

4 eggs

5 plum tomatoes - blended

1 tbsp tomato purée

3/4 th cup chickpeas - soaked and boiled

2 medium size onions, finely chopped

3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped

Red / Yellow/ Green bell pepper - roughly chopped

1 tsp tomato ketchup
100gms paneer - crumpled

7-8 Jalapenos slices, further chopped

Coriander for garnishing

Freshly ground black pepper

Olive Oil

Salt

Method

1. Take a bit of olive oil in a pan and sauté garlic and onion. Add bell peppers when onions are soft

2. Add chick peas and stir for 3 mins

3. Add tomato purée as well as blended tomatoes and let it cook for 10 - 15 mins till the sauce thickens

4. Add tomato ketchup, salt, pepper as per taste

5. Transfer this to a baking dish, add the paneer and bake it for 5 mins at 250 degrees

6. Take out the dish, make space for pouring eggs into the dish, and crack the eggs directly into the cavities

7. Bake for another 7 -8 mins, till white part of egg settles down and yolk is slightly runny. You can bake for a couple of minutes more if you like your eggs well-done

8. Garnish with coriander and jalapeños

Serve with Pita chips and Bloody merry to enjoy this Tomatoe delight :)