One Down, 659 To Go

I had vowed to start cooking more Asian foods, and then I have been too lazy the last couple of weeks.  Maybe I will make up for lost time over the next couple of weeks.  Tonight I made a fish curry from Raghavan Iyer's book, 660 Curries.  The fish (tilapia) was very simple and delicious, seasoned with turmeric, tamarind, garlic, some chili peppers, and cilantro, all in a coconut milk broth.  We had it with rice and an eggplant dish called bhangan bharta, which a long-ago friend from India taught me to make.  And to top it off, I have made some vanilla pudding using the leftover coconut milk to replace half of the milk.  We'll see how that is a little later.

But here is the recipe for the eggplant.

Ingredients:

1 large onion, sliced

1 1/2 c diced tomatoes (canned or fresh)

2 T canola oil

1 t sugar

salt

2 - 3 T finely minced, peeled fresh ginger root, to taste

1/2 cup cilantro leaves and tender stems, chopped

1 good-sized eggplant

1.  Preheat oven to 375.  Roast eggplant until quite soft and wrinkly, about 50 minutes or so.  Set aside to cool.

2.  In the meantime, heat canola oil over medium heat in skillet or saute pan.  Add onion and saute until slightly soft.  Add tomatoes, sugar, and salt to taste, and cook over medium low heat, stirring frequently, until tomotoes and onions are cooked down nicely, to a jam-like consistency.

3.  Cut eggplant in half and scoop inside out.  Add eggplant to the tomato-onion mixture, and stir to combine.  Add ginger and cilantro, stir well, and correct seasonings.

For the fish curry recipe, well, buy the book!