I think I was in my late 20s when I first tasted eggplant. A neighbor of Greek ancestry invited me over for some moussaka. I liked it, but I still didn’t start cooking eggplant. It seemed just too big and mysterious! When I became more involved in Chinese cooking I starting occasionally using eggplant in my cooking. This infrequent use continued through my Japanese period and into my French period. Probably, if it wasn’t for my recent effort to expand the number of vegetables I eat, I’d still be only sporadically cooking eggplant.

I don’t know why I never ate eggplant as a child; there’s no one around anymore I can ask. I have always though it amusing that this large, purple vegetable was called an eggplant, although some eggplants may look like an egg. The eggplant of my youth were about the size and shape of an American football. During my Chinese period I used long, slender eggplants with a light purple skin that seemed to have few seeds. When I switched to Japanese cooking I switched to much smaller and thinner eggplants with a very dark purple skin. In the last five years, I’ve seen and used eggplant of all different shapes and shades—even some that were white and about the size of a large goose egg. Some varieties even had stripes.

The French and the British often disagree about many things, but they do agree that the correct name for an eggplant is aubergine. Outside the English speaking regions of North America, no one calls them eggplants. Although the British used the term first in the middle of the 1800s, and the Oxford English Dictionary defines the aubergine as “The fruit of the Egg-plant, Solanum esculentum, resembling a goose’s egg in size and shape, and usually of purple colour; also called brinjal,” I would be reluctant to try to order a “eggplant” in London today.1 The term “aubergine” first appeared in print in Britain about twenty-five years later,2 undoubtedly derived from the French which itself was derived from the Catalan albergínia. The Catalan term came from an Arabic term which in turn came from a Persian one.3

Unlike the introduction of the tomato to Paris, where the exact date is known, the date of introduction of the eggplant to France is only a guess. It was mentioned in a number of fourteenth-century Catalonian recipes, but its acceptance into France was much later. By the time of the Revolution, it appears that the eggplant was only known in the southern regions of France.4 The earliest recipe for eggplant that I could find in my collection of French cookbooks dates to 1852.5

Looking at recipes in cookbooks that covered the next 125 years, I found that there appears to be only two types of eggplant recipes. In books that had an eggplant recipe, there was one or more versions of an eggplant that was cut in half lengthwise and stuffed. The other type of recipe I commonly found was for cut-up eggplant pieces dipped in a batter and deep-fried. It is not until the appearance of nouvelle cuisine in the last third of the twentieth century does a larger variety of eggplant preparations begin to appear. Although there are now more types of preparations, there also seems to be a plethora of eggplant purees presented as eggplant “caviar.” I noticed early on in my search that there didn’t appear to be a recipe for eggplant soup, even in books with hundreds of soup recipes.6 It was only late in my search that I did found example of an eggplant soup.7 I still haven’t found a dessert using eggplant.

Some of the recipes I found for eggplant called for the flesh to be salted for some period of time and then rinsed. Some of the recipes said that the salt would remove the bitterness; others said that it would reduce the water content; most recipes gave no reason. I’ve not noticed a significant difference in flavor when eggplant has been salted versus when it hasn’t, but because the raw eggplant has a spongy texture made up of cells containing water surrounded by intercellular air pockets, salt will cause some of the cellular water near the surface to be released. The air pockets will absorb liquids, such as cooking oils, initially during cooking. When the eggplant is further heated, the structure collapses and the retained liquid, whether oil or water, is released and the texture turns to mush.8

Eggplant will oxidize somewhat quickly after it is cut because of an enzyme called polyphenoloxidase. This enzymatic browning can be delayed by chilling the eggplant to below 4 °C or by blanching the cut pieces in boiling water.9

The sources for the recipes included with this text are mostly recent, printed in the last ten years. My attempt is to present a variety of eggplant recipes and not just stuffed or deep-fried versions. As is my habit, I did include at least one recipe from older sources.

• aubergines à la bordelaise
   eggplant and bread crumbs

• aubergines en pizza
   eggplant in the form of a pizza

• aubergines frites
   fried eggplant

• aubergines rôties
   baked eggplant

• chartreuse d’aubergines violettes
   molded eggplant

• flan d’aubergines au chèvre
   eggplant and goat cheese custard

• gratin aubergine au parmesan
   baked eggplant slices with Parmesan cheese

• mesclun nouveau aux aubergines et crevettes
   mixed green salad with eggplant and shrimp

• millefeuilles d’aubergines
   eggplant, cheese, and tomato stacks

• purée aubergines et chèvre
   pureed eggplant and goat cheese

• rouleaux d’aubergines à l’origan
   rolled eggplant

• salade d’aubergines au citron confit
   eggplant salad with preserved lemons

• soupe gratinée d’aubergines
   baked eggplant soup

• tartare d’aubergines
   eggplant tartar

• tempura d’aubergine
   eggplant fritters

• terrine d’aubergine au basilic
   eggplant and basil terrine

Although I came to appreciate the eggplant only as an adult, and fairly recently, it has become one of my favorite vegetables. I like its flavor, and I find it fun and challenging to work with.