Mediterranean Meatballs, Baba Ganoush, and Fake Tabouli

Baba Ganoush
4 large eggplant
5-6 small cloves garlic
1/8-1/4 cup tahini (to taste)
little fresh lemon juice (if you have it)
salt
1/8 cup olive oil

Rinse eggplant, pierce skin a few times to release steam, place on foil-lined cookie sheet. Roast Eggplant at 450 for 40 minutes or so. Remove from oven, let cool a bit, slice open, and put all the soupy innards into a bowl or directly into your food processor. add other ingredients and blend well. Modify amounts of everything to taste.

Fake Tabouli (Quinoa replaces gluten-full couscous.)
3 cups Quinoa cooked, salted
1 small red onion, diced
3 tomatoes diced
1 bunch flat leaf parsley finely chopped
1 cucumber diced
add to taste:
salt
olive oil
white wine vinegar
fresh lemon would be nice here also
optional: fresh peppermint, green onions, green bell pepper, cook quinoa with some broth as part of the liquid

after Quinoa has cooled down, dump in other ingredients, stir, taste

Mediterranean Meatballs
makes 25-30 balls, 3-4 balls per serving
3 lbs ground beef of choice
1 medium onion (i used some white and some purple) - diced
1 large clove garlic -chopped
handful of chopped flat leave parsley and mint
1 cup gluten free bread crumbs (I used pecan rice crackers and oats)
3-4 tsp salt
tsp black pepper
2 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp cumin
1-2 tsp cilantro (or fresh!)
2 tsp paprika
2 tsp tarragon
1 tsp allspice or clove

cook onion and garlic in a pan with a touch of olive oil until translucent. Mix meat and all spices and crumbs together in large bowl. (not all spices are required. I recommended at least having cinnamon, cloves, allspice, or tarragon to create a unique flavor.) Add onions. Mix, press into golf-sized balls. You can also roll them flatter into tubes. cook on high heat rotating 1/4 turn when each side is browned.