From BonAppetit.com…
In the olden days, when we used to order takeout over the telephone, my aunt always told the restaurant to please deliver to apartment “1E, as in eggplant.” And ever since then the bulbous purple fruit has always held a special place in my heart.
A place of fear. The eerie nightshade—did I mention it’s also a berry, a BERRY!—has tried to vex me out of cooking it again and again. (Is it any coincidence that the Italian name for eggplant, melanzana, comes from a Latin phrase for “apple of madness”?!?) The way it soaks up all the oil in the pan, seemingly begging for more, always ends up a mushy, oily mess. Until I consulted with our test kitchen and learned a thing or two about how to cook eggplant, and now I finally feel like I’ve got the upper hand.
“Eggplant wants to soak up things,” test kitchen director Chris Morocco says. “It needs fat, and yet it can quickly turn greasy. But it can take tons and tons and tons of flavor.” In his new recipe for spicy braised eggplant noodles, it soaks up an umami blast of tomato paste, gochujang, and miso. His advice: Don’t hold back.
Here are more tips that changed my outlook on life. Well, at least my eggplant outlook.
