Eggplant halp plz.

[Jenne]

UR TURN, ZIP!

i'll make it this weekend, either friday or sunday!

Hee.  This pleases me. 

[Suu]

Ok, and when it comes to the mixture in the pan, you can control the soupiness of the finished product when laying it out over the dairy sauce.  If you have a Middle Eastern market, guys, go and buy their cheese (in a jar, kinda runny) called qurut (koo-root) or kashk.  Mix that up with the sour cream and/or yogurt, lay it out on the pan like Suu did, and place the eggplants with sauce around/ontop.

Suu, you did it perfectly.  And any less oil, and it's just NOT as good.  I know because we've TRIED.  It just doesn't work as well.  More eggplanty and less YUM.

Yeah, it did take A LOT of olive oil. Probably half that bottle I bought so that's about...8oz of oil! But you really don't even taste it. I think I should have drained the tomatoes a bit more though. Next time!

Thanks for the recipe, Jenne. I'll be making this again for a big BBQ later in the month.

[Jenne]

Orsome!  Now, I hope everyone else likes it as much...it's my fave Afghan dish of all time, if I didn't say that enough already.  Most people just like kebabs, but FEH! on kebabs when you can have borani!

Now, the smell in your house...well, 000, just don't say I didn't warn ya. 

[Suu]

As soon as this stuff hit the pan Mr. Suu was like, "DAMN THAT SMELLS GOOD!"

He's a garlic fiend. Lol. ONE CAN NEVER HAVE TOO MUCH GARLIC!

I told a friend of mine who's a DJ at a local radio station and he's on air right now...starving. So I'm bringing him a plate up in a bit.

[Jenne]

YOU ARE PERFECT FOR AFGHAN COOKING SUU!

I see many more recipes in your future. 

[Suu]

I love Middle Eastern food...it's true. It's the Cypriot in me. If I had a deep fryer, I'd totally make falafel. I make a mean falafel. 

[Jenne]

I hear ya...I loooove gyros, Persian food, love it all.  There are some things I don't dig on...as in too much of the lamb, etc., (they have this dried lamb dish that just smells like ASS in Afghanistan, ew), but I'm down with soooo much of it.

I even drink the salty lassies/doghs.

[Triple Zero]

I love Middle Eastern food...it's true. It's the Cypriot in me. If I had a deep fryer, I'd totally make falafel. I make a mean falafel. 

.. right, seems i must dig up my recipe for falafel-like vegetarian burgers (falafel like in the sense that they're based on chick peas), you make them with an oven and frying pan, not a deep fryer.

they're really good, except the consistency leaves a littlebit to wish, possibly the inclusion of an egg would solve that.

[Nast]

This thread is full of tasty dishes.

I made a sort of Asian pork-stuffed eggplant yesterday. Unfortunately the electricity went out (thanks to damn wildfires), and it got a bit cold while we were preparing other things, so we couldn't reheat it.
Needless to say, we ate it and it was delicious. 

[Suu]

I love Middle Eastern food...it's true. It's the Cypriot in me. If I had a deep fryer, I'd totally make falafel. I make a mean falafel. 

.. right, seems i must dig up my recipe for falafel-like vegetarian burgers (falafel like in the sense that they're based on chick peas), you make them with an oven and frying pan, not a deep fryer.

they're really good, except the consistency leaves a littlebit to wish, possibly the inclusion of an egg would solve that.

So it's like a fried falafel burger? That sounds interesting. Do post if you find it!


Update: Borani Banjan - ALSO GOOD CHILLED FROM THE FRIDGE!

[Jenne]

Yup...it's good as a sandwich, too. 

[Triple Zero]

Here's Borani Banjan (the Afghan of Rata's above):

Peel and slice your eggplant, into about 1/2" thick discs.  Set them out on a paper towel and let drain for a WHILE (half an hour plus?).

Put some oil into a LARGE frying pan (lots and lots of oil)--probably 1/4 cup.  Fry some garlic (about 3 cloves, chopped), and add eggplant slices, coating them well with the oil.  As they begin to soften, add some stewed tomatoes, then some more garlic.

Stir, add more oil if it's abosorbed too quickly.  Let stew/simmer on low.

When they start to fall apart, they are ready.  To prepare to serve, take a platter/dish and spread sour cream on it.  You can mix it with plain yogurt to make it even more sour.  If you have access to Persian markets, buy their liquid Qurut and mix it with sour cream/plain yogurt.  Spread the sour cream, etc. over the plate til it's in a thin coating. 

Then Place the eggplants on it, covering with the tomatoes.

This shit is damned fine and delicious.

ok i'm making this now.

just sliced my eggplant, going to put it on the paper towels soon

then off to the supermarket to get some peeled tomatoes and flat bread .. and beer.

so there arent any spices in this? some salt to taste and .. no pepper or, i dunno, cumin?

and the yoghurt/sourcream, is it just plain like that? and qurut, i tried looking it up, it's some kind of salty yoghurt? [this thread is now the 5th hit out of 50 results on google for "qurut", btw ] so maybe add a bit of salt to it?

[Triple Zero]

wow those eggplant slices suck up oil FAST

do they really need to be completely soaked in it? cause then i gotta add moar and moar ..

[Suu]

Yeah, keep adding oil. I used like 8oz. 

[Triple Zero]

i ended up emptying one of my bottles of olive oil (it wasnt full), until there was a littlebit of oil left that didn't get soaked up anymore .. i think that's more than 8oz though

and LOL

now they got soggy and all the oil is coming back out

i wonder if i should drain it a little ... it does have all the garlic flavour in it now..

(although i could save it and have garlic olive oil)

btw did your eggplants turn green as they soaked up the oil? i'm wondering if it's because of the greenish colour of my cheap extra virgin olive oil or something eggplant-ish .. pics will come later.

time to slice up some tomatoes and add them