You say eggplant, aubergine or brinjal, I say baigan

I have a feeling that this NaBloPoMo is going to turn into 30 days of random and useless tidbits about me!

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In Trinidad (and possibly Guyana), we refer to eggplant as “baigan”, and oddly enough, this is my favorite fruit. (Yes, it is a fruit people!) In traditional West Indian cooking, there are 3 main ways to prepare eggplant but I usually just experiment with my own ideas, not because I don’t like it the traditional way, I most certainly do, but because if I mess up the dish, no on can tell!

Recently I’ve been completely in love with Desi-style eggplant, or brinjal, it tastes awesome, well, if you love eggplant and indian spices it does, otherwise it likely tastes like crap. One thing that I’ve noticed though is that the skin could be somewhat bitter, or sour, depending on your taste buds, so if you’re thinking about trying it out for the first time, in whatever dish, you may want to remove the skin.

So, once I had my father in law over for dinner (as my mother in law was out of the country) and I made brinjal for him, with rice because I can’t make roti, and he was totally impressed with the almost authentic taste of it! Yay me! Last night I made some of the easy breezy brinjal, and thought I’d share the recipe with you. If you try it, please let me know what you think!

Simple Indian eggplant recipe

Thoughts from Farhana

As-salaamu’alaykum wa Rahmatu Llahi wa Barakatuhu my dear sister,

It looks like a lot of people are going to do the NaBloPoMo thing. I can’t even imagine what I’d have to say every day! Good luck

I’ve read some where, that the smaller the eggplant the less bitter. Maybe there is some truth to it.

Wa’alaykum as-salaam
Love Farhana

Thoughts from Shantanu

OMG! Not many desis love baigan… The only preparation I can tolerate is my wife’s recipe for ‘bharta’.

Thoughts from Tasmiya

I love ringra! (that’s what this Desi calls it).

And I can’t make rotis either. The shame!

Thoughts from shaz

Shantanu… seriously? I always thought they did! I am actually Trinidadian though, so maybe that explains it?

I know Tasmiya, the shame in truth! haha

salaam Farhana, that’s for the tip! and the well wishes.

Thoughts from Mona UmIbrahim

Salams. I love eggplant too. In arabic it’s called batinjan. One way we make it is we make some slits all around it and put it under the broiler, every 10 minutes turn it. Then we scoop out the inside, add garlic paste, lemon juice, salt, a spoon of yogurt, and sometimes sesame paste (tahina) and mash it well. Then we drizzle with olive oil and eat with pita bread. Another way is dicing it along with potatoes, zucchini, onions, and tomatoes, a little water, sauteing with olive oil over low heat until tender. I don’t know how to make pita bread if that’s any consolation to you

Thoughts from shaz

Baba Ghanouj right Mona? I actually love it like that as well! we make it similar but with peppers and call it ‘baigan choka’.

Thoughts from Specs

Hey..we call it baingan in Urdu too! Wow...i’ll start leaving comments in Urdu now. hehe…

Theek hai?

Thoughts from sf

I love brinjal, in swahili we call it bingriani,hehehe. I cook eat atleast once a week. My MIL used to cut it like fries, fry it for a little bit, fry some sliced potatoes. Then in a blender, blend an onion, some tomatoes,green chillies,garlic. In a separate skillet, add little bit of oil, put the blended stuff, add turmeric,some salt, curry powder, when it’s cooked, put in the fried brinjal and potatoes. You can have this with rice and fried fish! YUmmmmmy!