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Easy & Healthy Vegetarian BBQ Treats

Summers are here and all across America, there is the happy sound of grills being fired up! But contrary to popular belief, BBQ isn’t just about meat! These vegetarian barbecue suggestions will prove to you that there are many great tasting recipes to be rustled up on your barbecue grill.

Our healthy suggestions that really involve the BBQ cooking process and are not just a range of salads.

Grilled Eggplant Recipe Or Aubergine

All it takes is 30 minutes of preparation and 10 or 15 minutes of cooking to complete this recipe and you’ve got a fantastic accompaniment to any grilled meat.

Ingredients:

•            2 Eggplants or Aubergines

•            A sprinkling of salt

•            Olive Oil

Directions:

Having chopped off the stalk, slice the eggplant length ways so that each slice is about half a centimeter thick. Place the slices in a colander and sprinkled with salt so that’s you remove any of the bitter juices and ensure that you get a sweet result. This will take about 30 minutes.

Once the tears of sweat have appeared on the eggplant flesh rinse the colander under running water and then pat the eggplant dry with a tea towel. Now brush each side of the eggplant with olive oil and slap them on to the hot plate for about 15 minutes flipping them every minute or so.

Once the 15 minutes have elapsed you’ll see that the texture of the aubergine has changed completely, the slices appear thinner and the colour is close to grey and partially translucent. There should also be a few brown speckles of caramelizaton signifying that they are now ready to eat, taste them and they’ll be beautifully sweet!

Marinated Haloumi

This recipe requires some hours for marinating so give yourself some time but the bonus is that once the marinade is prepared it also doubles up as the sauce.

Haloumi is a hard cheese traditionally made in Cyprus and is ideal for the barbecue grill because of higher-than-normal melting point compared to other cheeses.

Ingredients:

•            1½lb Halloumi cut into 1 cm thick strips

•            6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

•            1 ½ tablespoons balsamic vinegar

•            4 plum tomatoes skinned seeded and diced

•            1 red onion finely chopped

•            2 tablespoons lemon juice

•            1 tablespoon chopped fresh basil

•            Salt and freshly ground black pepper

•            Black olives (optional)

Directions:

Mix up all the ingredients and marinate the cheese for 4 hours. Place the cheese slices into a barbecue basket and place on barbecue grill with hot coals and brush on the marinade a few times.

Hot coals will help the surface of the cheese go brown and crisp and a barbecue basket gives a little extra spread of surface should your Halloumi soften too quickly.

When the Halloumi takes on a light suntan (about 10 minutes), remove from the grill, place in a serving bowl, dress with the black olives and pour over the remainder of the marinade.

Served as part of a salad or in a pita bread, you can’t go wrong.