cooking | The Lazy Homesteader

Some years are corn years and some are melon years. This year is the year of the eggplant. I keep seeing pictures of beautiful aubergines all over Facebook, from the West coast all the way to New York. Local Kitchen has called it “Eggplantocalypse 2012,” a term which totally cracks me up.

It seems like eggplant is either a love-it or hate-it fruit. I think a lot of people want to love it, because lets face it, eggplant is beautiful.

I received this amazing Nubia eggplant in my CSA share last week.

The problem is eggplant tends – heavily – toward the bitter. Coupled with its weird texture, it just becomes hard to palate.

Eggplant also has a thick, rubbery skin. Unless I really feel sentimental about its pretty color, I usually peel it completely. I will at the very least peel half. In general, the skin is a bit too tough to really enjoy.

I’ve heard all about salting eggplant to help remove the bitterness, but honestly, I don’t like this process. I’ve never felt it helped all that much, plus it takes too long.

I recently read a novel in which a French man taught a young South American boy to cut and cook an eggplant. The Frenchman told the boy to remove the seeds. The boy forgot, but cut the eggplant so beautifully, the man did not care.

This got me thinking, “How would one remove the seeds from an eggplant? Why would you, since they are totally edible.” But then I remembered that eggplant is a member of the nightshade family. It’s the same plant family as tomatoes and peppers. The pith and seeds of bell peppers are bitter.

I decided to try it. I sliced my eggplant length-wise and used a spoon to scrape out as many seeds as I could.

Then I chopped it and cooked it up in some ratatouille.

It was sweet and delicious.

Could it have been a fluke!? Rick suggested I try it again to prove my theory. So I did, again and again.

All summer long, we’ve been enjoying sweet eggplant… without salting it.

Suddenly I’m hearing my three-year-old say, “I love eggplant.”

I felt like I discovered a whole new way to get kids to eat eggplant! Wait, no… I know how to get people to eat eggplant!

It’s magic!! I know how to remove the bitterness from eggplant!

I searched online to see if anyone else knew about this. There wasn’t much, although I did discover that eggplant is also related to tobacco and that is why the seeds are so bitter.

There are a few applications when seeding an eggplant is not really desirable, like eggplant parmesan or for a pizza. For those recipes I use a Japanese eggplant instead, as they tend to be less bitter to start with.

For everything else, seeding is the way to go for me.

Easy Lunch-Time Summer Pasta with Eggplant

1 eggplant
1/2 small zucchini
1 bell pepper, any color
1 large heirloom tomato
olive oil, salt and pepper
pasta, any shape

Slice, peel and seed eggplant. Seed and chop pepper, halve and slice zucchini and chop tomato. Combine and toss all with olive oil, salt and pepper in a shallow pan. Roast in a medium-hot oven (375-400°) for 20-30 minutes, until the vegetables are crisp-tender, being careful not to over cook. If the eggplant roasts too long it will become mushy.

Meanwhile, boil pasta in salted water until al dente. Reserve 1/3- to ½-cup pasta water and drain. Toss cooked pasta with roasted vegetables and reserved pasta water. Enjoy.

And, here’s the proof…