Turkish Eggplant

 I went to the farmers’ market at 46^th  st and Lamar Blvd located at The Triangle in Austin, Texas. It is a member of the Sustainable Food Center of Central Texas. I was able to find this market by searching in Google for farmer’s markets in Austin and was led to the Edible Austin website. I chose to go with my friend, Timothy, so I could choose something that neither one of us had tried, subsequently, to get his opinion of the produce item.

            

            I am from a rural area in East Texas and spent many years on a farm so I knew it would be a challenge to find something unusual for me. After walking around for 30 minutes, we narrowed our choices down to the Black tomatoes and Turkish eggplants.  We chose the eggplants also known as Turkish orange eggplant, hence the color.  Because we’ve had different kinds of tomatoes and they all taste similar, we didn’t want try another. Turkish eggplants don’t really have a smell to them sort of like the purple eggplants. It has more color than smell because it is a deep orange like a pumpkin when ripe. Although these heirloom eggplants, from Turkey, are the color of pumpkins, they are very fruitful in production like tomatoes.

            Since I’ve never eaten this vegetable before, I wanted to find several ways to prepare it. The farmer gave me six of them so that I could prepare a serving size to try. He warned that it was bitter with the skin so I knew I needed to add something for taste. Timothy has attended some culinary classes so he made a suggestion to use a skillet to brown or sauté them instead of boiling. I am not a cook so I welcomed all suggestions. We decided to use onions (green and yellow), salt, pepper, bacon, beef broth, sugar (to combat the bitterness), olive oil and my favorite, garlic. There was no particular recipe, just trying whatever to see what worked.

 After washing them, I sliced four of them into ¼” and ½” slices to cook.  They were firm which made them easy to slice. They looked like tomatoes inside and out but weren’t slimy. The seeds inside were plentiful and small. I left two of the eight slices to the side to try raw which was a bad choice. This veggie is bitter no matter what. I cooked it in a skillet for two minutes without anything and it left a bad after taste that lingered like kale even after eating bread. It had a taste more bitterly tasting than a raw potato. Timothy couldn’t continue eating it.  Next, I tried cooking it in the skillet for two minutes again but with all of the above ingredients especially bacon. Bacon makes everything better! Of course, except for my friend because he doesn’t eat bacon so he tried beef broth. Adding the seasonings, garlic, green onion, yellow onion, and olive oil made this so much better. The taste is more subtle with the longer cooking time. The tough texture improves as the veggie is allowed to cook longer on low heat.

The overall reaction to this vegetable is the same from both of us. We will try this vegetable again but not raw. For us, this veggie needs seasoning and /or bacon. I will probably allow it to cook at least four to five minutes on low heat when I try this again. I would like to batter the eggplant next so I can fry it like green tomatoes or add it to a pizza.