Eggplant and potato curry

Long time no see, blog of new recipes!  After becoming deathly bored of everything I normally eat (much of which is a variant of the few things you can find here, much of which I eat 4 or 5 days in a row because it’s infinitely more practical), and only a few days away from finishing a draft of my thesis, it’s time to learn something new.  I want to expand my range on vegetable-laden meals, for health and variety.  Where’s easily the world’s awesomest repository of vegetarian meals that are actually meals? The Indian subcontinent.  Now, to begin aimlessly experimenting until I learn how to do enough wrong that it’s time to get taught by someone who knows something.

For a first pass, last week’s dinner was this chana masala from Smitten Kitchen.  I’m not writing it up as it came out fine and I did nothing different.

On today’s agenda is eggplant and potato curry.  I suppose I could call it Baingan-Aaloo Ki Subji from the recipe that I’m more or less following, but that would be insulting to India.  This recipe came out fine to my ignorant taste buds—a good start on this adventure.  (This post is likely to be revised over time.)

Calorie Estimate: around 2400?

Ingredients

• 2 onions, diced however you like
• 6 japanese eggplant (or whatever equivalent by total size), cubed 1/3″-ish
• 2 large potatoes, diced 1/4″-ish
• 1 can chopped tomatoes
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• oil to coat the bottom of the pot (I use my dutch oven)
• 1.5 T ground cumin
• 1 T coriander
• 1.5 T ground red pepper
• 1 t turmeric powder
• 1T garam masala
• 2 cinnamon sticks
• plenty of salt to taste
• juice of 1 lemon

Preparation

I had success chopping as I go, just keeping an eye on the heat and adding a few ounces of water as necessary to keep things under control.  It’s gonna stew at the end for 30 minutes, so it’s not essential that all veggies of a type get in at the same time.

1. Warm oil in a deep pot.  Soften onions.
2. Add in the spices.  Stir to coat well.  Cook the spices with the onions for a few minutes.  It will start smelling wonderful at this point.
3. Add in the  can of tomatoes, diced potatoes, and the eggplant.  If you notice, this is a huge recipe, so add in handfuls and stir every couple handfuls.  This is easier if you’re adding as you chop.  Also, if it’s getting too dry, add a little water.  The veggies will give up theirs soon, so not too much, but it helps if you’re about to burn the spices, which would be a disaster.As you’re adding the vegetables, keep in mind the single most useful piece of advice I ever got from a cooking show, Avec Eric with Eric Ripert:  “don’t salt the dish, salt the vegetables.” You know about how much salt a cooking onion needs, a potato, etc., but do you know how to salt 5 quarts of stewing vegetables all at once?(As an aside, there are probably only two cooking shows I actually recommend as being spot-on with the mix of useful to you right now, beautiful, aspirational, culturally interesting, and entertaining too: Avec Eric and Molto Mario with Mario Batali.)
4. Stir everything often until the spicing is really thoroughly mixed in with the veggies and everything is starting to cook.  Once it’s all getting together, turn down the heat to low and simmer covered for 30 minutes or so.
5. Turn off the heat, uncover, and let some of the water escape and get reabsorbed.  It should be moist but not soupy.
6. Stir in the lemon juice for some brightness and tartness.
7. Eat!

Because of the potatoes, you can maybe  do without  bread or rice, but that’s up to you!  I’ve got a small spinach naan in my toaster over right now!  Also, a little cool, tart yogurt on the side, mixed on the spoon, is nice.

Winter Squash Ratatouille

Just had a great Sunday dinner with my friends Jon, Diane, and Sharri and her housemates.  Jon and Diane made a nice salad, sunchokes, and a great apple pie (not too sweet, and Vietnamese cinnamon?!).  Sharri made a chicken–a delicious free-range bird with a garlic, apple cider, and other wonderful things glaze.  And I made this take on ratatouille.  This is the first recipe I’ve come up with prettymuch from whole cloth in a while, and it was quite a success, with the help of a fortunate mistake (adding the eggplant “too early”, or so I thought) and my friends (“lots more garlic!”).

One thing I’m starting to learn about vegetable dishes like this one is taste very often!  The amount of vegetable matter and it’s native variability makes it hard to get the seasoning just right.  Taste often and season slowly.  Add salt and pepper slowly over the course of cooking, as the flavors develop.  When you’re close, stop, wait awhile, and taste again.

Calorie Estimate: 1900 (lots of improv was going on, check this next time)

Ingredients

• 1 really large onion, diced
• 12 cloves of garlic, minced
• 3 or 4 tablespoons of butter
• 3/4 can tomato paste
• 1 butternut squash, peeled, seeded, 1/4″ dice (about 2 lbs worth)
• 2 very small eggplant (about 1 “italian” eggplant), 1/3″ dice
• 1/2 lb fresh chanterelle mushrooms, bite size pieces
• 1/2 oz dried lobster mushrooms
• 6-10 T diced celery
• 2 cups water
• 2 T red wine vinegar
• 1 T balsamic vinegar
• 1 T or so fresh rosemary, chopped
• salt and pepper to taste
• truffle oil to taste (less than 1 t, added slowly and tasting often)

Preparation

1. Make a mushroom broth.  Rehydrate dried mushrooms in 2 cups of water (I used lobster ’cause they’re awesome).  In the simmering liquid, add a diced slice of onion (thumb-width wedge), finely-diced celery, and 1 finely-diced chanterelle.  For this dish, add red wine vinegar since the acid will help counter the sweetness of the squash.  Some salt and pepper, a bay leaf if you’ve got it (I didn’t), and simmer slowly for an hour.
2. Dice the onion, garlic, and veggies before you start cooking.  To a big pot over medium heat (an enameled cast iron dutch oven would be awesome), add the butter.  Then, add the onion and garlic.  Soften, but don’t brown for 5-7 minutes or so.
3. Add in the tomato paste about 1/2 can.  Mix it around until it coats everything.  Try to brown it a little, 5 minutes or so.  Later on in the cooking, if it needs more paste, it’s okay to add it then.
4. Add in the squash, eggplant, and mushrooms, then the broth.  Stir everything together.  Salt lightly at this point to help pull the moisture out of the vegetables.  I thought adding the eggplant this early was a mistake, since it really broke down by the time the squash finished 45 minutes later, but it turned out to be key to the velvety texture.  Unlike regular ratatouille with zucchini, the butternut squash is much sturdier, and so the broken down eggplant binds this dish very nicely.  If the eggplant had some texture left, it may have conflicted with the toothsome squash.
5. I kept stirring for most of the cooking time, since we were hanging out in the kitchen, but it could probably cook covered with the occasional stir.  Pretty early on, I added about 1 T of chopped fresh rosemary. More wasn’t necessary later on, although it might’ve made a nice garnish if I was serving the food plated instead of family style.
6. Toward the end of cooking (about 45 minutes), add truffle oil, slowly, stirring and tasting often.  You want to stop the instant you become aware of its presence.  Truffle oil is a secret that adds a lot of character, but it can quickly dominate.  Also, dial in the salt and pepper at this point.
7. A few minutes before letting it rest, add 1 T of balsamic vinegar for a touch of color and the flavor.
8. Be sure to let the dish rest for at least 15 minutes so it really comes together.

Chicken panino with Sicilian Caponata

I’ll republish this with a caponata recipe next time I make it.  Seeing as I wasn’t exactly in the mood to cook yesterday, I went with Trader Joe’s store-bought Caponata (not bad–all the ingredients are actually food, but it’s sweetened with sugar, which I didn’t notice while shopping) boosted with a tablespoon of Classico Pesto (honestly quite good and cheap, if a little salty).

Calorie Estimate: 800

Ingredients

• Toasted focaccia bread (or other suitable soft bread)
• 4 T-ish caponata (eggplant, celery, tomatoes, oil, onions, olives, capers, wine vinegar, salt)
• 1 T pesto
• 2 oz “fresh” (store-bought, soft) mozzarella
• 3 oz poached/grilled/baked chicken

Preparation

1. Cook chicken in a suitable manner.  I went with poached in salted water for about 15 minutes because I didn’t need to add much flavor or oil directly to the chicken since there’d be plenty of flavor in the caponata and focaccia.
2. Mix caponata and pesto together.  Heat in the microwave.
3. Make a sandwich.  Err, umm, make an open-faced sandwich if your bread is too thick like mine.

Ratatouille

Taken from Cooking for Engineers.  This is hearty and delicious while also being very healthy and low calorie for the flavor and volume of food.

Calorie Estimate for the batch: 1500

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1 large onion, diced
• 2 T tomato paste
• 6 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 C chicken broth
• 1 large zucchini, 1/4 inch dice
• 1 large eggplant, 1/4 inch dice
• 1 large green pepper, 1/4 inch dice
• 2 large portobello mushrooms, 1/4 inch dice
• 1 can diced tomatoes
• 1 T (+) Herbs de Provence
• fresh basil if you’ve got it
• salt (1T ish) and pepper (1-2 T)

Preparation

1. Heat oil in large soup pot.  Add garlic and simmer for 1 minute.
2. Add onions and simmer for 4-6 minutes
3. Add tomato paste, stir around until it coats onions.  Toast until paste starts to darken, 2-5 minutes.
4. Pour in broth.  Stir well. Bring to a simmer.
5. Stir in eggplant, zucchini, peppers, and mushrooms.  Simmer for 12 or so minutes, stirring often.  Eggplant will release a lot of tasty moisture.
6. Add can of tomatos.  Add in seasonings at this point.  Stir in and cook for a minute or three more until it looks like you want it to.

Eggplant and Shrimp with Garlic and Fish Sauce Paste

Idea from Melissa Clarke.

Eggplant Tomato Sauce with Tortellini

This sauce pairs very well with cheese tortellini – the sauce has some bitter (eggplant) and acidic (tomato, capers) flavors that go with the richness of the cheese.  I could see this dish be great with some pork roast cooked with plenty of garlic until it was falling apart, but that’s where the lazy part comes in…

Ingredients

1 eggplant

3 cloves garlic, minced

2 T Italian parsley, minced

2 T basil, minced

1 T capers

28 oz. can crushed tomatoes

2 T olive oil

cheese tortellini

To Do

1.  Peel and cube the eggplant.  The eggplant has excess moisture that is best removed before cooking, so either salt it – generously sprinkle salt on the eggplant and let sit between paper towels for ~15 minutes, brushing any excess salt away after – or microwave it for a few minutes first.  I’ve never tried to microwave it, but apparently it works.

2.  Saute the eggplant in the olive oil over medium heat for ~10 minutes, until soft throughout and golden.  Add the tomatoes and bring to a simmer.  Add the garlic and let simmer for ~5 minutes until you’re ready to serve.

3.  Meanwhile, cook the tortellini.  A couple of minutes before serving, add the parsely, basil, and capers to the sauce.