my last memory of eggplant was through asian cuisine, and it had been cut into thin diagonal strips, sauteed in garlic and ginger, served over a pile o rice. now that i have learned about the different cultivated eggplant varieties i am excited to realize that the ones served in US markets have strange musical stage names such as Black Magic, Black Beauty and Black Bell. the one i had eaten at the restaurant must have been the chinese variety- breed? are eggplants of a certain breed? :
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i’m surprised i didn’t cook with eggplant until last night but i learned a few things:
-it keeps for awhile in the fridge! we had cut into it and served on a homemade pizza a few nights ago and it was still fine n dandy for my stir fry last night
-the purple oblong aesthetics are exciting, but if you peel it (which apparently you don’t need to or you can just peel some alternating strips for the black beauty), it just ends up looking like a brown mushy phlegm (tasty phlegm!)
-there are albino eggplants which i haven’t tried
-you should use a different type for eggplant parmesan
-you need to cut into cubes and SALT it for an hour before use:
“Salting, also known as purging, accomplishes two goals: it pulls out juices that carry bitter flavors, and it collapses the air pockets in the eggplant’s sponge-like flesh, thus preveniting it from absorbing too much oil and getting greasy.”
http://www.finecooking.com/articles/how-to/cook-eggplant-to-perfection.aspx?pg=2
the ginger nibbler 