Delicious Eggplant Sandwich with French Cheese (and a Secret Spicy Ingredient)

I've said it once, will say it again and again: eggplants are such a challenging veggie to work and cook with. From the preparation until the matching, everything that has to do with it looks for me as a very challenging task. However, as in many challenges I have to deal with in my life, the answer is not to give up and to keep trying, experimenting and learning how to be a better cook, one recipe at a time.

I was not sure what exactly I want from this eggplant, therefore, I began in the classical way, by frying it on the open stove. It goes relatively fast, you only need to pay attention to turn the eggplant every couple of minutes, to burn equally on all sides.

Ingredients

1 medium-sized eggplant
4 cloves garlic, finelly chopped
3 tablespoon olive oil for the frying pan, plus 1 teaspoon for the finishing
50 gr. butter melted
1 tablespoon za'atar (I got from a Middle Eastern friend a big quantity of za'atar from Syria, which is like no other za'atar I ever had before and I am glad I can keep testing its qualities in different recipes)
1 tablespoon lemon juice
50 gr. Parmesan, as garnish

Directions

When the eggplant is cooked on all sides, peel it and mash it slowly.

Meanwhile, in a frying pan at 250C, add the olive oil, the garlic, melt the butter, add the za'atar. Mix it well for a couple of minutes. Add the eggplant and the lemon juice and keep mixing it for another couple of minutes.

Pour the content in a bowl, add some extra olive oil and mix slowly. Add

Prepare the toast and spread one layer of French cheese - actually any kind of soft cheese works, including Gorgonzola which is a bit spicy and hard but might interact perfectly with the eggplant - and a generous spread of eggplant.

The final result is a rich, fulfilling and also healthy meal which can be savoured as a part of the dinner. Recommended to be served warm, as it melts deliciously with the cheese.

Preparation time: 15 minutes

Cooking time: 20 minutes

Serves: 3

Baked Eggplant with Cheddar Cheese

My and eggplant...we have a very complicated story between us, but I keep doing it as much as I can, especially when my hungry imagination is ready to add some spices that may challenge my first (bad) impression about it. 

This time, I wanted to test my new Zwilling, a present from a dear friend, and decided that, among other things that I am planning to prepare, eggplant is the easiest, affordable one. Especially when some spices, courtesy of Spice Kitchen UK, part of their Brand Ambassador Program are added. The result was surprisingly tasty, rich in flavors and made it into a good side dish for a milky-/cheese-based meal. I will only add some fresh cucumber and tomato salad, for a touch of freshness and call it a good meal! 

Ingredients

- 1 medium-sized eggplant
- 3 cloves garlic, finelly minced
- 1 pinch salt
- 1/2 teaspoon Fenugreek
- 1/2 teaspoon Berbere which are a combination of many spices, such as red chilli, garlic, black peppercorns, cardamom, onion. It also has fenugreek, but I personally wanted a stronger presence of this spice, therefore I added it as a separate ingredient too.
- 1 tablespoon lemon zest
- 2 slices of Cheddar Cheese - you can also use Edamer Cheese and any other hard cheese variant.

Directions

Roast the eggplant on the stove at 250C, turning it on all sides at least for 45 minutes. Peel it well, careful to clean all the black parts. Slice it and put it into the baking pan. Warm the oven at 250C, at least 10 minutes before starting the baking. Add the lemon zest, the salt, the spices, the garlic. Be sure that you turn the eggplant on both sides to smear the ingredients properly. Add the cheese on the top.

Bake it for around 45 minutes. 

Serve it warm. The spices and the lemon zest add a complex, sweet-sour taste and consistency to the eggplant. 

Preparation time: 15 minutes

Cooking time: Roasting: 45 minutes. Baking: 45 minutes

Serves: 2

Bon Appétit!

Experiencing with Eggplant

Eggplant is one of those vegetables which are prepared in my house every couple of months but no more than once the year. It is my way to say that, in fact, I don't like eggplant as much and if not for some books which make everything simple and tasty, I would not want to deal with it at all. In fact, not long ago, there were years since I was tasting any bit of eggplant. Trying new recipes and putting my tastebuds on trial is an interesting experience anyway, therefore after a couple of weeks of thinking I decided to finally use that eggplant languishing in my fridge.

For one hour, I tried to combine one moderately sized eggplant with different tastes and ingredients. The results were satisfactory, but it was more burned smell than necessary. Not sure if I would try anything soon - maybe, finally some Babaganoush one day - as for now, I am just gathering various experiences about this mysterious and not always easy going vegetable.

Here is my short cooking story:

I started by washing the eggplant and cutting the head. Next, I've sliced it into thin rounds, allowing a fast and efficient frying. I heated 3 tablespoons olive oil in the pan at 250 for 5 minutes prior to the frying. 

I tried to use different ingredients for each batch of eggplants. I fried 3 of them at once, allowing enough space to absorb the oil. In one case, I only added a pinch of sea salt. In another I added some Osem soup seasoning. In another I added some small slice on yellow cheese on the top. Black or Cayenne pepper are also good solutions. 

From the pan, I set the eggplant slices to rest on some absorbing paper to take the oil excess out. 

As side dips, my choice was relatively simple: some plain fresh yogourt and a very spicey soy sauce. 

Despite the smoke smell, it was a relatively easy dish, with a variety of tastes. I had them in a simple way, without anything else but fresh cherry tomatoes and some avocado. 

A great meal for a lazy evening at home after a full day of work, whose creation requests a bit of imagination and taste creativity.

Learning to prepare eggplant, testing another recipe from Tori Avey

I have a very complicated relationship with eggplant. I started to eat very late in life and my first experience was a disastrous allergy. Since then, I cautiously tried to prepare it in several ways, without too much success. But I hardly give up, especially when it comes to prepare food, so I gave one more chance with a very tempting recipe by Tori Avey. 

I used a medium eggplant, sliced it and salted abundantly it with kosher salt. I also added some drops of lemon. Let it to rest on a paper. After 15 minutes, the drops of water were visible on the paper. I let it to rest for 20 minutes, in total, and rinsed the salt with cold water for 5 minutes.

I coated each slice in eggs white, previously beaten till it goes creamy. In a pan, I poured 1 tablespoon of walnut oil and waited a while till it gets hotter. The recommended temperature is 200C. I fried it on both sides, for around 6-7 minutes each. On some slices I spread some Cayenne pepper for more hotness. 

I followed the author's recommendation to do not have more than 4 slices of eggplant simultaneously in the pan, because it diminishes the overall temperature and it might take more time till it's getting ready, but after the first batch it went very fast anyway and in less than 20 minutes I was ready. 

And when it was ready, I could not stop eating it! I left some pieces for later and share a little bit in the house. Served cold is not that good and eggplant anyway should not be let too much to wait after preparation.

I made a little salad, with fresh tomatoes and rocket, plus fresh yoghurt, and it suited excellently the beginning of the summer mood. No allergy this time, perfect taste, low calories and not too much oil. Can't wait to seize a new occasion to test this recipe once again. 

Bon Appétit!

Simple veggie recipes for the Nine Days

After the fast of Tisha B'Av, Sunday will end up the Nine Days at the end of which the consumption of meat is restricted. Thus, the need to find out healthy and tasty recipes that will make people enjoy Shabbat.

Even I am not a Vegetarian, especially during the summer I enjoy eating without meat because I do not need to work too much the recipes. Peeling some onions and carrots, plus some pepper and champignons, the olive oil and I have good food for a hungry gang. 

My bio chickpea flour, the beginning of a new relationship

As I wanted to try something more sophisticated, I tried my hand with a personal version of this wonderful recipe I've found a couple of weeks ago on Food Wanderings, an impressive professional blog. I replaced the eggplants from the original recipe with zucchini. It was my first encouter with the chckpea flour - yes, I know, I am a beginner in so many respects - and most probably I will continue to use it for more variations of the recipe. I only tried with one single slice of eggplant and maybe I should repeat the recipe once again, with eggplant, but probably later in autumn.

The final result, for zucchini: my works are not always worth an exhibition, but eatable though

Pasta c(o)urse

We rarely miss a week without pasta. In fact, I would like to, but the little hungry monsters do not and I should follow their wishes.

But, it is not enough to prepare the simple pasta with cheese recipe. They expect some garlic, tomatoes, special spices and new recipes ideas every week.

This time I tried something amazing (for me): eggplant with fried almonds. And, of course, some small pieces of garlic.

The taste was indeed completely new and revolutionary but children do not like revolutions and I was punished to do my "classical" recipe next time.

Maybe my readers will appreciate more the gift of creative cooking.

Neapolitan Eggplants

Openly speaking, at the first sight you don't know exactly what it is all about in this picture...Also openly speaking, I didn't know exactly what wonderful food I am eating when I had the first bite of this.

I started to cook eggplants only a couple of months ago - due to an unhappy allergic experience a couple of years ago - but since then I love to introduce it on my menu at least every month.

This week, for the Shabbat menu, I wanted something new and thus, I tried another recommendation from The Classic Kosher Cooking, by Sara Finkel (p.142).

I did some changes but overall I kept the main narrative.

What do you need:

2 moderate eggplants

1 teaspoon salt 

1/3 cup oil

2 small red onions finely diced

3 gloves garlic, minced

1 cup grated Emmentaler

I cut the eggplants in half lengthwise, sprinkle with salt and put in the oven for around 30 minutes. After, I cut out the pulp, chop it and fried together with the oil and onion for 10 minutes. I added the cheese, the garlic and the salt for another 5 minutes, then put together in the oven and bake for 30 minutes. The taste is so wonderful that you don't know exactly what you are eating. 

A real pleasure!

Eggplants with couscous and mozzarella

 The following recipe is a creative cocktail between the recipe found in this good book about Mozzarella and this tasty recipe from Israeli Kitchen: eggplant stuffed with fruit bulgur.

You need, for four persons:

2 medium eggplants, sliced and fried

2 packs of fresh mozzarella, sliced

250 gr. boiled couscous, with salt and rosmarin

100 ml. olive oil

Add the mozzarella, couscous and oil to the fried eggplants and fry together for approximatively 15 minutes. 

That's all!

Baba Ghanoush: Need a new try

I used to be a very spoiled kid: when I wanted something, I didn't neet too much time to waite for. Professionally wise, when I wanted to reach something, I set up objectives able to be fulfilled, based on my experience and my skills.

With cooking...well, it is a different story. First, I need more experience. Second, I need more attention and focus. Third, all I want is to put some new skills on trial, while trying to make my happy family happier. 

The first objective is to get more experience, using the relative window of opportunity of enjoying, for the first time in my life, the free time to spend with my family. 

The last week, I wanted to try the Baba Ghanoush, following the recipe from the same book I am reading and following carefully, at least for the next month or so. 

The first step was to go buying:

2 big eggplants, of around 750 gr.

Tahini paste - out of which I used around 80 ml.

Garlic - 3 finely chopped cloves

1 bunch of fresh parsley

Olive oil

1 lemon - to be turned into juice

Black pepper

The longest time was dedicated to cooking the eggplants - almost one hour, at the oven heated at 250 degrees. After, the flesh is separated from the cover and put in the mixer, together with the garlic, tahini, pepper, salt and pepper. After another 10 minutes, you have a paste, where do you add and mix the rest of the ingredients. With some fresh pita, you can have a taste of the colourful Middle East.

My problem was that I had too much eggplant and not too much Tahini, for example. Or garlic.

Also, you need to eat it very fast, after maximum two days, as eggplants need to be consumed fresh.

Will try once again soon! Maybe another recipe and with some advices guidance. And looking for a place in Berlin to have a tasty experience...