How to Cook Eggplant

Eggplants come in many different shapes, sizes, and colors. The most common type of eggplant is the one with purple color and long stem. Some people often shy away from cooking eggplant, but actually cooking eggplant is not difficult. There are many ways to prepare and cook eggplant dishes.

Table of Contents

Prepare Eggplant

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Wash the carrots. Check the fruit body for any brown spots or bruises. If the eggplant has a shiny rind, you can eat the whole rind, although some types of eggplant have a tough skin. Use a vegetable peeler to peel the eggplant if necessary. Young tomatoes can be eaten with the skin on, but with old and overripe tomatoes, the skin will be a bit bitter. Cut off the whole stem.

Leave the skin on if you want to bake the eggplant whole in the oven or on the grill. In addition, if you want to shave the eggplant to make mashed eggplant, you should leave the skin on.

Cut the carrots depending on how you prepare them. Depending on the dish, the eggplant should be cut in half lengthwise, cubed, diced or sliced. Or you can cut the eggplants according to personal preference, but it should be noted that if you are making grilled tomatoes, they should be cut into large chunks so they don’t fall on the grill.

If the dish needs to be made from pureed eggplant, the simplest way is to not cut the eggplant, but to bake the whole egg.

Sprinkle salt over the eggplant flesh. This step helps to remove the bitter taste of the eggplant. Sprinkle with salt also helps the eggplant meat not to be crushed, and not easy to absorb fat. Leave the salted eggplant whole for about 20-30 minutes.

If you want, you can skip this step. The eggplant will still taste good, but the flesh will be less firm and a bit more bitter.

Oven Baked Eggplant

Preheat oven to 230°C. You may need to fold the foil or spread a little grease on the baking pan. Or you can use a baking tray liner if you have one (though it’s okay to grease it).

If you want, you can peel the eggplant and cut it into pieces. You can cut and process carrots in the following ways:

Cut into 20mm squares. Toss the eggplant cubes in the garlic, piu oil, salt, and black pepper mixture. When the eggplant is coated with the seasoning, put it in the pan.
Roast whole eggplant. While baking, you should use a fork to poke the eggplant skin a few times so that the eggplant doesn’t explode due to the steam that builds up inside. Then you can take out the eggplant meat to puree.
Cut the eggplant lengthwise and coat with some piu oil and ingredients like diced onion, pepper, grated cheese, breadcrumbs and other seasonings.

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Bake the eggplant for about 20 minutes or until the eggplant is tender. If processing cubed tomatoes, then after 10 minutes you should stir the eggplants. If the oven isn’t cooking evenly, rotate the baking tray so that the tomatoes are both crispy and soft.

If baking whole, use a fork to pierce the skin of the eggplant. It will be a bit difficult to pierce at first, but if it’s easy to stick a fork in later, the eggplant is done.

Fried Eggplant

Heat 2 tablespoons of piu oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. If you don’t have piu oil, you can use avocado oil, coconut oil, grapeseed oil or palm oil instead as these oils are also healthy. ^{[1] X Research Source}

Do not use too much oil because in the next step we will also oil the tomatoes. If too much oil is used, the finished tomato will become mushy.

Chop the eggplant and spread the piu oil on both sides. Cut the eggplant into 1.25 cm thick pieces or depending on the dish you want to process. Sprinkle with a little salt and pepper or season with your favorite seasonings.

If you like, you can coat the eggplant with breadcrumbs or Parmesan cheese. You will need about 1/3 cup of breadcrumbs and 1-2 tablespoons of Parmesan cheese for a medium eggplant. Mix the bread crumbs or cheese, then dip each eggplant piece, rolling the slices back and forth before placing the eggplant in the pan.

Place each piece of eggplant in a pan of hot oil. Each side of the eggplant needs to be fried for about 5 minutes or until golden brown. Do not take your eyes off the eggplant pan, or the eggplant will burn black. If necessary, keep flipping the eggplant until it’s perfectly browned.

Do you want your fried eggplant to have a richer and fresher taste? Add a little more soy sauce (remember to leave some for dipping). Or you can add whatever seasoning you think would go well with eggplant.

When the eggplant is brown evenly, turn off the stove. Place the tomatoes on a paper towel to absorb excess oil. Allow to cool for a few minutes and then enjoy.

Fried eggplant with soy sauce, Ranch sauce (made from fermented buttermilk, salt, garlic, onion, herbs, spices mixed with a sauce) or eaten alone is also very delicious. Fried eggplant is a delicious accompaniment to any meal and offers a refreshing twist on traditional eggplant dishes.

Grilled Eggplant

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If using a gas grill, preheat it first. Select medium heat and place the grill on top. If grilling with charcoal, make sure the coals burn evenly and hot enough.

Make sure the grill is clean. Pour a little vegetable oil on a paper towel and wipe each grill slot. This step also helps prevent the eggplant from sticking to the blister.

If you want, you can peel the eggplant and cut it into pieces 1.25cm thick. For small tomatoes, you can cut them in half lengthwise instead of slicing horizontally. Brush a generous amount of piu oil, melted butter or cooking oil on each side of the eggplant to enhance the flavor and prevent the eggplant from sticking to the grill.

If not, you can roast eggplant whole or cut in half over medium or high heat for about 15-20 minutes until the skin of the eggplant turns black. Occasionally poke holes in the skin of the eggplant so that the heat can penetrate the center.

Sprinkle dry seasoning, salt and ground black pepper over the eggplant to make the dish more delicious. Or you can spread an oil-based marinade over the tomatoes instead of oil or butter. Any kind of vegetable marinade goes well with eggplant.

Arrange eggplant on foil or place directly on the grill. If roasting chopped tomatoes, it is best to arrange them on foil because that way the pieces of eggplant will not fall into the slot. Not only that, the foil also helps to hold the oil so that it is easier to spread the oil on the coffee.

Punch a few holes in the foil so the heat can get through faster.

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Bake for about 8 minutes or until tomatoes are soft and crispy. Remember to turn the eggplants occasionally to cook evenly. When grilling eggplant on charcoal or with a gas grill, place the eggplant on the grill directly over the flame. Remember to cover the gas grill, and the charcoal grill is not needed.

When done baking, turn off the heat, remove the foil and place the eggplant on a plate. Let both the eggplant and the foil cool down before touching.
Eggplant can be added to salads, stir-fries or eaten without dipping sauce. Or you can leave the cooked eggplant to make soups or stews.

Advice

You should not overcook, but also should not bake raw because raw eggplant is difficult to eat and not delicious.

Warning

The white eggplant skin is often difficult to eat, so peel it off if you want to use it to cook.

Things you need

Salt and pepper for seasoning
Colander
Tissue
Oil (piu oil is best)
Knife
Spice
Silver paper
Clamp (optional)
Baking tray (if you want to roast eggplant)

Steps