Baked Aubergine with Lentil Salad, Creamy Hummus & Roast Tomatoes | Rebel Recipes (2024)

FAQs

Do you need to soak aubergine before roasting? ›

In the past, recipes called for aubergines to be sliced and salted before cooking to reduce their bitterness. As modern varieties are much less bitter, that is no longer necessary, unless you're planning to fry them – aubergines soak up oil like a sponge and salting helps reduce that.

Preheat the oven to 240°C/220°C fan/Gas Mark 9. Place the aubergine slices on a roasting tray, brush with plenty of olive oil on both sides and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Roast for 20-35 minutes, until the slices take on a beautiful light brown colour. Let them cool down.

Older recipes call for salting eggplant to draw out the bitter juices, but today's eggplants are less bitter (unless very large), so salting is largely unnecessary. It will, however, help the spongy flesh absorb less oil and crisp up like a dream.

While the skin of a small young eggplant is edible, the skin becomes bitter on larger or older eggplants and should be peeled. When in doubt, the answer to, "Do you peel eggplant before cooking?" is yes, peel it. Use a vegetable peeler or paring knife to remove the skin.

If the skin is in good shape, it is edible, though some varieties have skin that is too tough to eat. Peel the skin with a vegetable peeler if you think it's wise – younger aubergine skin is fine to eat, but older, more ripened aubergine skin has a bitter taste. Cut off the stem and base, too.

Slice or chop the eggplant. Sprinkle evenly with salt. Transfer to a colander over a plate and set aside for 30 minutes to drain. This draws out the bitter juices.

"The only exception is when you deep fry it. I tend to soak the slices in a bowl of water with a couple of tablespoon of salt for about 30-45 minutes. It doesn't have to do with bitterness, but I find that in doing this, the fried eggplant turns out less greasy," Jenkins says.

To prepare: In the past many recipes recommended salting aubergines to reduce their bitter flavour, this isn't really necessary nowadays, simply wash the skin and trim off the calyx. Slice or cut the flesh into chunks just before cooking as the flesh browns quickly.

Next, soak the eggplant in ice-cold water: The chill shocks the surface of the vegetable and fills tiny air pockets between the cells, preventing the oil from entering them.

Eggplants are known to absorb a lot of fat while cooking. A useful tip to prevent sogginess and greasiness is to salt sliced or diced eggplant and let it sit for an hour. This helps to draw out moisture.