Lentil and Vegetable stuffed roasted Sweet Potato Boats

At Easter, entertaining is easier with recipes you can prepare ahead of time.  This makes a filling vegetarian meal with some of our leftover spiced Lentil Salad  (a fabulous Belinda Jeffery's recipe already featured on our blog - so versatile and delish! )  http://feedyourinnercook.blogspot.com.au/2013/02/red-lentil-fragrant-spiced-salad-with.html

All I did was match it with another wonderful Belinda Jeffery's recipe for roasted Kumara (or Sweet Potato) boats.  Belinda Jeffery lives in Northern New South Wales and her Australian cookbooks are filled with delicious, nutritious, seasonal food ideas - fresh and fabulous - so inspirational - love them!   https://belindajeffery.com.au/

Best wishes for a Happy Easter with family, friends, good simple food and no stress!  No chocolate either!  Cheers!  Colleen

Preparation   2 hours (sweet potato cooks in oven for 1 - 1/2 hours) so not really hard work
Cooking        30 minutes
Feeds           4   or more depending on how many sweet potatoes you cook

Ingredients
some Red Lentil spiced salad (refer above link)
3 - 4 sweet potatoes  medium to large size- peeled.  Cook as many as you need.
1 eggplant    medium/large

added options  (amounts depend on how many sweet potatoes you need to fill
dried chilli flakes
red capsicum strips drained and chopped  (or fresh finely sliced)
green beans - diced
baby spinach leaves
Parsley, mint etc - chopped
salt and pepper to taste
may need extra curry powder or cumin - to your taste

topping options
pine nuts
pumpkin seeds (pepitas)
diced fetta cheese

Method
Preheat oven to 180 celsius.
Place peeled and lightly oiled sweet potatoes on a foil/baking paper lined oven tray (that has a slight lip).  Do the same with the eggplant ensuring you have pierced eggplant several times with a fork.
Pierce the sweet potatoes a couple of times with a strong skewer.
Eggplant will only need 50min to an hour.  Check and remove when soft.
Bake sweet potatoes for 1 - 1 1/2 hours until cooked.  Check with a skewer.
Remove from oven and allow to cool slightly.
Using a spoon scoop out much of the cooked sweet potato - leaving a casing to hold the stuffing - will look a bit like a boat
In a large bowl - combine the scooped out sweet potato, lentil salad mix, mushed eggplant, spinach leaves, capsicum etc with salt, pepper and optional herbs and spices.  Taste and adjust to your preference.
Spoon into the sweet potato casing boats generously.
Top with pine nuts or pepitas and optional Fetta.
Bake in 180 celsius oven until warm and golden on top.
Serve with green salad etc.

Optional to do ahead ready to assemble later on
lentil salad
roasting the sweet potatoes and eggplant
scooping out and refilling the sweet potato boats.

Enjoy ! Colleen