What to do With Eggplant

So you might be wondering what I am going to do with all the eggplant that are going to grow from the dozen growing seedlings and the other dozen or so waiting to sprout or germinate.

Eggplants have a wonderful flesh that is soft and tender but also has enough body to keep its identity during cooking, many people describe the texture similar to meat and the flavor is very mild so it's great at picking up flavors from other ingredients. Usually I use a mixture of cooked ground pork, eggplant, mushroom, etc. seasoned with pepper and nuoc mam to stuff cucumber and zucchini which are then baked, the flavors are utterly delicious at the same time savory and refreshing. There's also a lovely Greek mousaka dish that uses a ground pork and beef mixture, eggplant, potato, parmesan cheese, a béchamel sauce, and spiced with cinnamon and allspice. For a simple side dish just microwave long thin Asian eggplants till soft then split open the skin and sprinkle over top a green onion and olive oil mixture. I also love eggplant parmesan on a toasted hoagie roll but haven't personally made the dish.

Stuffed vegetable dishes are probably my favorite because they use lots of vegetables which is useful when you have lots of things ripening at once.

Here's a couple of dishes I'm curious to try by the food blog greenkitchenstories:

• Involtini di Melanzane - which has pistachio, feta cheese, capers, and bulgar wrapped in sheets of eggplant with a hot tomato sauce and feta cheese sprinkled overtop.
• South Indian Pickled Eggplant - looks like a delicious spicy eggplant pickle.