I Love Eggplant

Some recipes in celebration of eggplant season

I really, really love eggplant. I would say it’s my favorite vegetable but I recently learned that it’s technically a fruit?

Over the years, it is the vegetable (or fruit?) that has shown up on my dinner table the most frequently. It’s likely because we, South Asians, do it the most justice; and the reason for that is history.

Unlike tomatoes and onions, eggplant is actually indigenous to South Asia (it didn’t reach Europe until the 13^th century). It started off as a wild fruit that was later tamed for production. The earliest recipe on how to prepare an eggplant in India is 8000 years old!

I never paid attention to eggplant growing up. It wasn’t cooked that often in my home – I don’t think my parents liked it very much. But it was frequently prepared at my dadi’s, mostly in the form of dahi baingan, thinly sliced eggplant fried folded into lightly whisked yogurt.

So why am I dedicating this Substack to eggplant? It’s been on my mind since my trip to Pakistan in the spring because it kept popping up regardless of the region I was in, which spoke to its adaptability and popularity. It is also peak eggplant season in the US, which runs from July to September, which is sort of perfect considering, at least in my mind, it is the ideal vegetable to bridge summer and fall. And lastly, I read this fascinating deep dive by Madhulika Dash into dahi baingan and the history of eggplant recipes in India.

How to Cook It?

Since my earliest exposure to eggplant was in the form of dahi baingan, where it’s fried until it acquires a beautiful deep brown hue and a slightly bitter taste that infuses incredible flavor to yogurt, I’m most comfortable having it fried.

It’s probably the reason I love pasta alla norma so much where fried eggplant soaked up in olive oil is the star of the show. A similar tactic is employed in the popular Afghan recipe, borani banjan where the eggplant is fried before being steamed with a lightly spiced tomato and onion base.

Of course, how long you cook the eggplant varies. In the Hyderabadi favorite, bagara baingan, the eggplant is slightly cooked before being coated in a complex masala paste of coriander, cumin, sesame and poppy seeds and a generous helping of tamarind water.  In the version I shared below – a modern riff on the dish by my friend’s mother, Nevine – the eggplant is sliced crosswise and simmered in tamarind water rather than fried.

Regardless of how you long you cook it, in South Asian recipes, we do not salt the eggplant to draw out excess water. I however, on occasion do it especially when preparing dahi baingan, and I do find that it does help with the texture.

Recipe: My Grandmother’s Dahi Baingan

Recipe: Nur’s Borani Banjan

Recipe: Nevine’s Bagara Baingan

Recipe: Izzah Cheema’s Aloo Baingan (Tea for Turmeric)

Recipe: J. Kenji López-Alt’s Pasta Alla Norma (Serious Eats)

Another popular way of preparing eggplant is to roast it, which is how baingan bharta, probably one of the more popular North Indian restaurant offerings, is prepared. You roast the eggplant on an open flame before mashing it, and stirring it into a spicy tomato and onion curry.

While I was visiting Ahmad Pur in South Punjab in April, one of my hosts, Zoya, prepared an interesting variation of bharta, kacha bharta, where she folded in roasted, mashed eggplant into whisked yogurt flavored with sliced onion, green chilies and some coriander powder. It was a lovely mix of two more popular baingan recipes – dahi baingan and baingan ka bharta. It was like a desi baba ganoush.

In the Philippines, I frankly cannot get enough of tortang talong, an eggplant omelette, where a roasted eggplant is coated in a beaten egg mixture and fried. It’s not the type of dish that you typically found in Filipino restaurants – I learned about it from Miguel Trinidad and Nicole Ponseca’s gorgeous cookbook, I Am a Filipino: And This is How We Cook – and it’s become my go-to comfort food in the country.

Recipe: Izzah Cheema’s Baingan Bharta (Tea for Turmeric)

Recipe: Kristina Razon’s Tortang Talong (Serious Eats)

Recipe: Martha Rose Shulman Baba Ganoush (NYT Cooking)  

What Am I Up To?

I have been super sick these past couple of weeks, which has slowed me down quite a bit. I’m on the mend but need to start wrapping up our parental leave to go back to Manila later this month. While we are bummed to be wrapping up this chapter with our friends and family in the US, I am eager to introduce baby Haris to our senior cat, Marouf, and precious pup, Suji.

I am close to wrapping up Grace M Cho’s Tastes Like War: A Memoir, and cannot recommend it enough! Next on my list is Rebecca May Johnson’s debut Small Fires, which is receiving fantastic reviews. Both of these books are helping refresh how I think about personal narratives and food, giving this genre much needed nuance and gravitas.  

On the cookbook front, Durkhanai Ayubi’s cookbook, Parwana: Recipes and Stories from an Afghan Kitchen, is one of the best cookbooks I have come across in a long time. I honestly wished it received more press when it was first released – truly a hidden gem.

Lots to be inspired by as summer comes to a close. Until next month.

Maryam