raw vs. cooked eggplant

[swingbolder]

Help me out, guys.

Is raw eggplant yummy or is it too bitter or otherwise unpalatable (like raw broccoli IMO).

I found a pizza recipe that uses eggplant for the crust and am wondering if I should try it.

Anyone eat raw eggplant here regularly?

[Lay-Lay]

Rp said it is a good subistute for bacon. I have yet to try it. My craving for bacon passed before I could make it.

[berrymarymac]

I am curious about this as well!!

...bacon? wow, lol...never thought about that!! But I never liked bacon. :rolleyes:

[swingbolder]

Okay, I just looked in Alissa's book. She recommends soaking in a bowl of salt water and then dehydrating. I can see how that'd give you a nice crusty, or bacony texture. The soaking is probably done in order to rinse some of the starch out.

Anyhoo, I'ma try this recipe and let you all know how it turns out.

[greenfeline]

Yes eggplant is good soaked and marinated and even better dehydrated!
The soaking in salt water is to extract the bitterness, which it does!
I tried something like the eggplant bacon and it was awesome!!!! I might peel the eggplant next time though because it was really hard to chew through the skin after dehydrating.

[Rawkinlocs]

There's an eggplant "bacon" recipe posted here if anyone wants to do a search for it.

Swingbolder: I've never had cooked eggplant but I've had it raw in the "bacon" recipe, in the eggplant pizza and just marinated in nama shoyu and other spices.

It wasn't bitter but I remember a post here once where someone had made the bacon and complained of it being bitter and it was discovered she didn't peel it. But perhaps the soaking does help...I don't know because I've never had it unsoaked to know it was bitter otherwise.

I made the "bacon" recently and I just had a slice of it on onion bread and it was actually pretty good, so I'll make more just to eat with my onion bread as a "BLT" like RawVeganMom used to do! :)

Other than that, I don't particularly care for eggplant that much, but it's okay if you LIKE eggplant! (hope that made sense!) :p

[juliebove]

I can't really answer your question since I've not tried raw eggplant. I just find it interesting that you find raw broccoli to be bitter. I don't think it has much flavor at all in the raw state. I can eat it that way. I don't want to eat it, but I can and it doesn't bother me. But cooked? :eek: If even a speck of cooked broccoli gets in my food, forget about it! To me few things are more vile than cooked broccoli. Both the aroma and the taste.

[light&happy]

Try marinating broccoli florets in olive oil, lemon juice, lemon zest, minced garlic, and celtic sea salt and pepper, then dehydrating until warm and tender. Taste just like sauteed broccoli!

Also good with nama shoyu and olive oil, garlic, ginger and red pepper flakes. Really yummy :o

[JEN]

There is a recipe for eggplant tacos in this blog
http://mawintheraw.blogspot.com/2006_05_01_mawintheraw_archive.html
and another for eggplant ravioli in this site
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tofu/167667607/in/set-1762675/

I have made the eggplant tacos and they are great, but I havent tried the ravioli yet, although Im sure I will one day.

[fikustree]

It depends on your eggplant in my experiance. If you got your eggplant from the farmer's market your backyard it will be good, different then any other veggie IMO. If it is bigger and/or from the store throw it in a colander with salt and let it sit for an hour or so.

[spicyfull]

I loved cooked eggplant. I made a medely of cooked vegetables called Ratitouge. Then there was eggplant parmesean with CHEESE and tomato sauce, they were fried first.
They are not starchy............They would give the bulk of meat in a vegeterian dish. The soaking in salt water is for only imparting flavor of salt. They also float, they are air and water........

[Sharon in Colorado]

It wasn't bitter but I remember a post here once where someone had made the bacon and complained of it being bitter and it was discovered she didn't peel it. But perhaps the soaking does help...I don't know because I've never had it unsoaked to know it was bitter otherwise.



Ha - that was me. I tried 3 batches and it had a funny taste to me. Couldn't get it to taste good, I thought it was what I marinated them in.

I finally tried peeling as Rawkinlocs recommended and it improved in flavor. Then I put the off tasting batch out at a rawluck and low and behold people actually enjoyed it.

So it may be one of those things, like cilantro, mushrooms, durian... it's alove/hate thing.

P.S. I used some old eggplant faken on my pizza flats - made pretty good faken, lettuce and tomato pizzas.

[juliebove]

I remember seeing eggplant being soaked on a cooking show. And my MIL always soaked hers. So when I first began cooking it, I soaked it. But then I saw on another cooking show that with the strains available today the bitterness is bred out of it so it was no longer necessary to soak it. So I stopped soaking it. And I tried several different varieties. I was living in NY at the time, on Staten Island and it was readily available even in the Quickie-Mart type places because the population where we lived mainly Italian.

The main thing I made with it was eggplant rollatine. It was baked in the oven. The eggplant was sliced horizontally, sauteed long enough to soften, then rolled around a cheese/egg/vegetable filling such as you'd use in a layer of lasagna. The rolls were then placed in a pan, smothered with tomato sauce and more cheese, then baked. Turns out I was the only one in the family who liked this dish and I tended to pick around the eggplant. So I guess I really didn't like it that well.

My MIL frequently made eggplant parmesan. I did like that, but she used so much cheese, sauce and breadcrumbs that she could have put an old sock in there and fried it and I would have liked it.

Could be if you are buying oranic and/or heirloom eggplant they soaking really is necessary. I also recall that you need to place it on towels after the soaking to get all the excess moisture out of it. I does retain moisture! I remember how much oil it would suck up when fried.

[smasty]

I make eggplant jerky that is faboo! It's a staple in my diet. I marinate thick eggplant slices in lime/nama shoyu/bit of olive oil/water/red pepper/yacon syrup and dehydrate. I like it chewy, but if you dehydrate it long enough it becomes very crispy. Eggplant could take on a lot of different flavors based on the marinade.

[Secret Heart]

Wow, that's cool the eggplant/marinade/dehydration idea. I generally don't like cooked eggplant and received on ein my CSA veggie box today and despaired as to what to do with it.

I'll check under the banana for the eggplant "bacon"...so I can marinate it in either shoyu or salt water and then dehydate? I can dehydrate until crispy then I presume and put it on whatever? Can I eat it as is too...not in a sandwhich or whatnot?

Thanks!

Heather

[swingbolder]

Wow, thanks everyone for all the suggesions. I can't wait to try some of them. Esp. that broccoli recipe light&happy suggested. I will give it a try, bc I really used to love cooked broccoli back in the day.


I make eggplant jerky that is faboo! It's a staple in my diet. I marinate thick eggplant slices in lime/nama shoyu/bit of olive oil/water/red pepper/yacon syrup and dehydrate. I like it chewy, but if you dehydrate it long enough it becomes very crispy.

This sounds delicious, would you mind sharing proportions for the marinade?

[swingbolder]

Well, I tried the pizza recipe.

It was great . . . EXCEPT for the eggplant part! I peeled it, sliced it thinly, soaked in salted water then dehydrated for about 6 hours. They were too chewy and bitter-tasting, and I ended up eating all the rest of the pizza parts except for the eggplant.

So now I know, no raw eggplant for me. :rolleyes: