I’ve a bad habit. Often I don’t pay attention when our vegetable delivery is scheduled and I don’t notice that there’s something on it that we don’t usually eat. Last week was one of those weeks. In this week’s delivery was an eggplant.
Now don’t get me wrong, I love baigan bharta but somehow I just can’t get that delicious smoky flavour in it that restaurants seem to do. It just ends up tasting bland and a little slimy.
But this week I am determined to make use of this eggplant. We waste too much food as it is. And so I preheat the oven to 425°F, poke a bunch of holes in the eggplant with a fork and toss it in the oven for 50 minutes. By the time I take it out, it’s deflated a bit and has grown very soft.
After it cools, I cut it open and remove the peels. They come of very easily.
I toss the eggplant in to a food processor along with some garlic, salt, pepper, chilli powder, cumin, smoked paprika, olive oil, and the juice of 1/2 a lemon. To that I add a bit of tahini (sesame paste). Some of my friends from outside Canada (and obviously the middle east) weren’t familiar with tahini so here’s a look at it:
The last step is simple, blend it until it’s a smooth paste like you see below:
It’s delicious served with warm pita bread or vegetables or as a spread on a sandwich or wrap. It’s so delicious I think I could just eat it with a spoon with nothing else. I wish I had some of the bread from Saturday’s library visit.
The whole process took less than an hour to do including roasting the eggplant. It took less than 20 minutes for three of us to make it all disappear. And this week? We actually added an eggplant to our order so that we could make this again.
Go Outside Today 
Looks good, especially for chips, like hummus.
I love eggplants! I can eat them plain or roasted! Mmmm. I’ll have to try making this Baba Ganoush though because I have a whole jar or Tahini I’ve only used once! Looks so yum!
That looks delicious and so easy to make! I like to make hummus.
Me too – both are favourites in our home.
That looks so easy!
I didn’t realize there was such interest in making this. I should’ve given the recipe. You can find it here: https://www.mediterraneanliving.com/recipe-items/baba-ganoush-mediterranean-eggplant-dip/ – hope you enjoy it!
I used to love Eggplant – especially Baba Ganoush! Nowadays I’m allergic to it and will swell like a balloon if I come near it… 😔. Eggplant is also amazing to either batter and deep fry or as part of a curry.xx
I’m just the opposite. As a kid I really disliked it but now I like it. What a shame to have developed an allergy to something you love!
I’m so glad you like it now as it is such a versatile little fruit. Tell me about the allergies – I keep raking them up! ☺️
Ooh, I’m always looking for more things to do with eggplants. I properly cooked one a little while back and realized that every restaurant I had ordered it from in the past had done it wrong and that they’re DELICIOUS.
I feel like the bad attitude I had about veggies for the first thirty years or so of my life is owed to my never having tasted them cooked well. My mom cooked a lot of great things when I was a kid. Veggies were not one of them. They were always cooked to death so you didn’t even need teeth to eat them. Broccoli was the first thing I discovered I liked. It didn’t actually taste and smell sulphurous when cooked and usually didn’t have Velveeta on top of it either!