Aubergine.
The slow cooking vegetable. Plus, my recipe for Roast Aubergine with Herby Yogurt.
Welcome to ingredient, where once a month I take a deep dive into some of my favourite seasonal and store cupboard ingredients. This month I’m focusing on aubergines: the bulbous, almost black fruit from the nightshade family that soaks up flavour-infused cooking oils like they’re going out of fashion.
Additionally, at the bottom of this post you’ll find my simple, summertime sharing recipe for Roast Aubergine with Herby Yogurt. If you’re a paid subscriber, I’ve got a aubergine-as-an-appetiser thing I’m recreating from my travels and an easy, Italian-centric way to enjoy aubergines on a weeknight poised to land in your inboxes later in the month.
To receive these recipes, plus access all of the recipes from past newsletters as well as my Kitchen Cupboards interviews, you can upgrade your subscription here. And, if you fancy exploring the archives for more inspiration, last August we were focused on salty, savoury anchovies:
I’d read all the warnings about cooking aubergines at home before I attempted to tackle one. You had to salt it to make sure it does not come out bitter, that they absorb an insane amount of oil, and if you undercook it it will be terrible. It sat there on my kitchen counter looking at me, bulbous, purple, waiting to be fried.
The humble aubergine was not a vegetable I grew up with as it was something my parents never bought and cooked at home. My only contact with it was when Mia threw one out of Lilly’s New York apartment window for a dare in the Princess Diaries books, and even then my pre-teen self had not yet joined the dots that the ‘eggplant’ in question was in fact an aubergine; I’m pretty sure I’d almost finished the entire series before I found out what an ‘eggplant’ actually was.
This often bulbous, often such a dark purple it is almost black fruit is the sponge of the culinary canon. Absorbing almost everything it comes into contact with it’s related to the tomato (they’re both nightshades), though if you’ve ever grown them you’ll know that their plant looks more like their other relatives of the pepper and the potato, than the tomato plants running riot in our gardens right now.
Whilst varieties differ wildly in size and shape, they all run the gauntlet of somewhere between dark purple and pure white, and when cut into their very pale yellow, green-tinged, spongy flesh is always super absorbent, taking on whatever flavours they’re paired with meaning that they show up in all sorts of cookery in all sorts of guises.
Most recipes will tell you that oil is the key to absorbing flavour into aubergines, and in most cases they’d be right - always use way more and a much better quality oil than you’d think, as it is what stops the flesh being dry and still spongy - oil is what will reduce the firm flesh into silk. Keep this in mind for any recipe that calls for you to fry aubergine or roast it, and this is what you should be doing in almost all situations if you are breaking the skin before applying heat.
I’ve found the exception to this rule is when it comes to braising and steaming. Only 1 tbsp of oil goes into this delicious Aubergine and Tomato Curry I’ve adapted from purveyors of healthy fast food Leon’s excellent book Happy Curries (which they kindly gifted me when it came out) because the aubergine takes in the beautifully spiced sauce as it gradually collapses into the pot.
And of course, a whole aubergine cooked until the skin is dark and blistered and the flesh has collapsed over the barbecue creates a puree which is a beautiful thing; I envy those of you with gas burners in your kitchens so you can achieve that effect year-round.
Even if you don’t add oil initially it will probably be along at some point: baba ganoush, the smoky aubergine dip which is the usual thing to make with said charred and collapsed aubergine is often enriched with a dash of extra virgin, and I’ve just remembered it has been too long since I made this Syrian preparation of baked lamb where aubergines are grilled plain to form a base for a rich tomato and lamb sauce, but where the molten fat from the lamb collapsing into the aubergine as the whole thing bakes in the oven adds that almost always essential oil element.
I have seen Asian recipes where the aubergine is steamed, before a flavoured, usually soy-based sauce is added as a dressing: this is one of the few styles of preparation I can think of where an excess of cooking or finishing fat might be avoided whilst still retaining an excellent flavour.
I was always taught to balk at citing Wikipedia as a source at school, but I do urge you to check out the Eggplant entry if not for anything else other than the brilliant selection of real-world (rather then professionally styled) photos of how aubergine is prepared and enjoyed across different cultures.
, who writes the brilliant Turkish cuisine-centric newsletter Mezze here on Substack recently published a brilliant post sharing some great tips on cooking your aubergines to perfection I found really informative:
To salt or not to salt, that is the question?
Now, before we move onto my first aubergine-centric recipe of the month, we need to discuss salting.
So many aubergine recipes tell you you need to salt the aubergine first to remove bitterness. I’ve done this for a client who insists upon it and let me tell you if you’ve never done it: salting aubergine slices, rinsing off the salt and then patting as much liquid as you can out of them before frying is such a faff they might just put you off cooking with aubergine for good. I certainly hope to never have to do it again.
Thankfully, in most cases you no longer have to bother.
That bitter quality has been bred out of most common aubergine varieties at least in the UK and the US, rendering this step pointless; I’d only consider it if you grow heirloom varieties at home or you find that the aubergines where you live are particularly bitter. That’s a relief!
You see that tomato, aubergine and pomegranate salad at the top of the wrap around photo that forms both the front and the back of One Pan Pescatarian’s cover? If you’ve got a copy you can find it on pg 118 in the vegan section, as it happily sits on a bed of coconut yogurt which I think adds complexity to proceedings.
I was still living in East Dulwich, in South London at that point, and I needed a break from my desk. I also fancied nothing that was in the fridge for lunch, and whilst it was quite the slog to walk all the way up Lordship Lane to reach the big Sainsbury’s at the top of the hill, I was exceptionally lucky that what used to be my beloved trinity of William Rose Butchers, Moxton’s Fishmongers and Bora & Sons incredible greengrocers were right at the end of my road.
I took a walk, and whilst the salad started with bunches of herbs and a one of the big trays of Kent tomatoes Bora & Sons sold on the pavement and which I just could not stop buying as I was not able to grow my own at that point (let us ignore the irony of my buying Kent produce in the middle of London, what do you think Chegworth at Borough Market was before they happily made way for an exceptional Asian grocers?) the thing that made it not just another tomato salad was the externally crisp, internally tender cubes of roasted aubergine that added bite, heft, texture and interest.
This time the herbs have been whipped into Greek yogurt, and I’ve kept the aubergine pieces - still roasted with lemony coriander seeds, make sure they’re fresh here otherwise they will just taste dry and pointless - a little larger so this is more of a composed salad platter to bring to the table as part of a feast, rather than a sunny lunchtime bowlful to enjoy by itself.
Oh and I think my friend Hannah, the brilliant home cook and restaurant PR who I featured in my most recent Kitchen Cupboards has got under my skin with her aversion to adding black pepper to absolutely everything as we seem want to do in the European canon: I’ve finished the dish with a lift of Aleppo pepper flakes instead which adds a peppery brightness both on the tongue and on the eye, without imparting enough heat to really make it part of the dish.
Roast Aubergine with Herby Yogurt
Serves: 2-4 as a side dish, Preparation time: 20 minutes, Cooking time: 30 minutes
For the Roast Aubergine
2 large aubergines
3 tbsp light olive oil
1 tsp coriander seeds
sea salt
large clove of garlic
For the Herby Yogurt
280g Greek yogurt
juice of 1 small lemon
large handful fresh mint
large handful flat leaf parsley
small handful fresh basil
sea salt
extra virgin olive oil, to serve
Aleppo pepper, to serve
Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees. Cut the green part of the top of the aubergines and slice into thick, finger-length chunks. Toss together in a large bowl with the oil, coriander seeds, a pinch of salt and the garlic clove, not peeled, but gently bashed with the flat edge of your knife. Keep tossing until all of the oil is absorbed.
Transfer the oiled aubergine pieces to a large, parchment-lined baking tray and roast for 30 minutes, after 20 minutes turning the pieces and removing the garlic clove.
Once you’ve retrieved said garlic clove, combine it with the skin removed, the Greek yogurt, a splash of lemon juice, the herbs and a pinch of salt in a high powered blender. Blitz until you have a relatively smooth sauce, and season to taste with more salt for a savoury edge, and lemon for acidity and brightness.
Spread the yogurt sauce across the bottom of a serving platter and top with the tender, roasted and slightly browned aubergine pieces. Drizzle with any remaining lemon juice, a generous amount of extra virgin olive oil, and scatter over Aleppo pepper with abandon. Serve.