Shish spiced cauliflower fritters, butternut squash and aubergine, served with a crunchy fresh salad with lemon juice

We've made a simplified Palestinian recipe of 3 veggie sides that you can eat alone or use together to make a delicious plant based mezze. This is the perfect recipe to help your family branch out into the world of plant based cooking!

Overview:

Ingredients:

Cauliflower fritters

• 1 large cauliflower
• 30g parsley
• 2 eggs
• 120g flour
• 6 tsp shish blend
• 30g chopped parsley
• 2- 3 tbs olive oil for frying fritters

Butternut squash

• 2-3 tbs olive oil
• 1 medium butternut squash
• 2 medium aubergines cut in half
• whole head of garlic
• 75g tahini
• juice of 1 lemon
• 1 sprig fresh mint

Salad  

• 1 whole cucumber
• 4  large tomatoes
• 1 red pepper
• 2 green chilies
• 5 spring onions
• 1 clove garlic
• 30g parsley
• leaves from 5 sprigs of mint.

Method:

Butternut Squash

1. Cut butternut squash in half scrape out seeds, chop off top of garlic -  season both with salt, pepper and rub over with olive oil. Tightly seal garlic in foil and bake both on a baking tray in a hot oven for 50 minutes. 190degrees.
2. Charred aubergines give a lovely smokey flavour to the dish but it ain’t easy to do!  Put both aubergines directly onto 2 different gas hobs and cook for 15 mins taking care not to burn.  Or if you don’t have a gas hob cook on a hot griddle pan for 40 mins turning every now and then until cooked through.
3. Leave to one side to cool down then scrape out the squash & squeeze the inside of garlic into mixing bowl. Roughly chop the aubergines and mint, add to bowl with the lemon juice and tahini and combine everything together. 

Salad

1. Chop tomatoes, cucumber and red pepper into small cubes and place in a bowl. Add finely chopped parsley, mint leaves, spring onions and chillies and then add grated zest and juice of one lemon.  Carefully combine all ingredients. 

Cauliflower Fritters

1. Cut up cauliflower into florets add to a pan of boiling water and cook for 5 minutes.  Drain and save a cup of the cooking water.
2. Meanwhile make the fritter batter - sift flour into a mixing bowl and add the shish blend.  Whip the eggs and cooled water and add slowly to the flour mixture stirring well to make a smooth batter then carefully spoon in the cauliflower and parsley.  
3. Heat oil in a frying pan and place rounded spoonful of batter mix into  pan and fry for 2-3 mins on each side. You may need to do 2 batches depending on size of the frying pan.