In Season: Eggplant

Posted by Grace Kang, August 31, 2009 at 3:30 PM

While most of us are familiar with the large, purple variety of eggplant, the award for most twee specimen goes to the Fairy Tale eggplant. They are so small, you can roast them whole, making them in a snap, bypassing the salting step. If you're in the mood for a more substantial vegetarian dish, eggplant is a star with its substantial, meaty flesh. Pureed, the vegetable also makes for a great dip or spread à la baba ghanoush.

Look for firm eggplants with a smooth texture and unbroken skin. Store them in a cool, dry environment, but put them in a warmer section (the front) of the fridge if you're not going to eat them within a week. Salting the prepped eggplant before cooking helps to reduce the sometimes bitter flavor older eggplant may have, and gets rid of excess liquid. Remember to wash off the salt afterward!

Eggplant is notorious for the amount of oil it absorbs when fried so I've included recipes that explore other methods of cooking, as well as helpful preparation tips (including more details on the salting technique). After the jump, eggplants for everyone!

Eggplant Recipes

Do you have any eggplant dishes you love to make?

8 Comments Favorite this! (0)

Tags: In Season, eggplants

8 Comments:

Thanks for the great recipes. I picked up some tiny eggplants at the farmer's market last week and roasted them, them put them into a frittata. Yum!

Lisiegrin at 3:53PM on 08/31/09

I love making baked eggplant parm -- instead of frying the slices, I bake them in the oven. I've also started making a baked eggplant: hollow eggplant, cube flesh, mix with diced tomatoes, onion and breadcrumbs, stuff back into hollows and bake. Easy and delicious! Also good placed on the grill.

Of course, there's always my Filipino grandmother's standby: roast eggplant whole, let cool, peel skin, chop flesh and serve topped with diced tomatoes and green onions, with a drizzle of soy sauce. Yum! I ♥ eggplant!

Lorena at 4:30PM on 08/31/09

I love grilling eggplant, there are so many great ways to serve it once it has been grilled (or you can do it under the broiler too).

Katerina at 4:37PM on 08/31/09

we've been making a lot of eggplant rollatini this summer

http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2009/08/eggplant-rollatini-recipe.html

j at 5:18PM on 08/31/09

I made an easy eggplant salad last night.

Roast some eggplants and some garlic. When both are totally tender, scrape off the eggplant skin and mash the flesh together with the peeled, roasted garlic. Add salt, pepper, butter and chopped cilantro. Chill and serve.

The longer you chill the salad the better it tastes.

spartana07 at 9:17AM on 09/01/09

I love making penne alla norma. This is a traditional Sicilian dish, and involves roasted eggplant with penne in a pink tomato sauce with a little bit of red pepper flakes for heat. It is absolutely delicious, and brings me back to my trip to Sicily every time I eat it!

seditalia86 at 10:43AM on 09/01/09

The microwave is great for cooking eggplant - you get a great silky texture and only need a fraction of the oil.

Here's one of my recipes for a South Indian eggplant curry and here's Mark Bittman's adaptation of it (from this article). It's really good, I promise :)

charm city cupcake at 11:53AM on 09/01/09

My kids made me type this because they can't spell it:

RATATOUILLE

akk328 at 1:34PM on 09/01/09

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