Lately, I’ve been enjoying a relatively new food blog by Rebecca of  From Argentina with Love.  It’s a lovely blog that gives her experience in Argentina and mouth-watering recipes, and mesmerizing photos. 

In one post, she wrote a story about how she and her husband got into an accident with a truck driver.  Interestingly enough, later, the truck driver shared his lunch with them — marinated eggplant, which his wife had made for him.  Rebecca described it as the best eggplant she’d ever tasted.  I very much loved the story and the look and sound of the meal that I decided to make it.

Well, I’m sad to write that my marinated eggplant dish did not turn out well at all.  It seemed relatively simple enough to make, but I apparently took some wrong turns on my cooking adventure road.  I cooked the eggplant too long and I think I left the fire too high that the poor eggplant practically fell apart.  It didn’t look appetizing at all and unfortunately it tasted even worse.  I kept it in the fridge for five days before finally acknowledging that it really belonged in the garbage. 

Later, Rebecca posted another interesting and easy-sounding eggplant recipe — Berenjena Asada/Grilled Eggplant.  I could handle that, I thought to myself.  I set out to make it.  This time, it was smooth sailing for me.  No problems.  And my grilled eggplant tasted delicious!  Yes!

I’m definitely going to try making the marinated eggplant again.  I’m pretty sure that I’ll do a better job the next time around.

Paz

Grilled Eggplant

From Argentina with Love

2 eggplants, washed and cut into 1/2 inch thick rounds

coarse salt

crushed red pepper

oregano

olive oil

Put the eggplant rounds in a roasting pan and sprinkle abundantly with salt.  Let them ‘sweat’, and then drain them.  Drizzle generously with olive oil, and sprinkle with oregano and crushed red pepper.  Place on the grill, over indirect heat, until soft in the center — they will appear juicy and have grill marks.

The marinated eggplant that was not meant to be.  I will try to make it again. 

In the meant time, go here to see what it’s really supposed to look like.

Three eggplants and a yellow squash

The other day, my mother brought home two huge bags of fruit that she bought at the Farmer’s Market. There were a few vegetables, which I wasn’t familiar with and she wasn’t around for me to ask what they were.

I enlisted the help of Melissa, who took a look at the photos that I’d e-mailed her and immediately replied, “They all look like eggplant to me — different (heirloom) varieties.”

Eggplants? That’s funny; they didn’t look like the eggplant with which I was familiar — dark, purple, almost black in color — the kind that I’d see in the vegetable section of the grocery store or supermarket. Until then, I’d never seen white, green, or light purple eggplants. Interesting.

Now, how would I prepare my eggplants? I’d never done that before. I didn’t want them to just look pretty sitting in the fridge and then eventually spoil. What to do? What to do?

I happened to check out Simply Recipes, and by coincidence there was a recipe for Eggplant Relish, staring at me from my computer screen. Now, I knew what I’d make with the eggplants.

This recipe is another winner. It’s simple and tasty. I decided to serve on top of toasted French baguette slices. Next time, I’ll try bread sticks. The nice thing about this recipe is that you can also serve%2