BellonaTimes wrote:
Nice, but how do you keep your eggplant (Eggplant Hotpot) from 'melting' as you wait for the carrots to go tender? I tried to make a chunky tomato sauce with eggplant and bell peppers but that veg disappeared into a collection of black peels and goopy seeds. It was good but not terribly chunky. This recipe (saute fresh plum tomatoes, 1-2 sliced peppers, 1 chopped yellow onion, 2 cloves minced garlic, and diced eggplant in two Tbsp olive oil; season with no-salt Italian herbs and serve with pasta or on toasted Italian -- or Cuban -- bread) is also good with zucchini, btw.
Eggplant naturally degenerates into mush. 8)
Ways around it:
* If you salt the eggplant and let it drain for half an hour, then wash the salt off, it gains a meatier texture and refuses to rehydrate. This was the classic way of preparing it back when the juices were bitter, before modern varieties hit the market. If making steaks, after you wash it off, baste it in soy sauce.
* Fry it with oil, which it will soak up like a sponge, which will keep the water out to some degree.
* Know that it's going to do that going in, and adjust your other ingredients accordingly. Carrots are woody, so they take ages to cook. That means you need either to make them into little cubes, or slice them thinly like a stir-fry, so that they cook through before the eggplant is done, or just do them first.
* Avoid rapid boil and vigorous stirring. The mechanical action of the bubbles shatters soft ingredients (like eggplant and silken tofu).
