Baingan Bharta

My first post for this new year! Wishing you all a very happy and prosperous new year. May all your dreams and wishes come true this year and let your life be as eventful as possible. And hope I get enough time and energy to involve and indulge in things I wish and to blog as much as I wish I could to keep my creative energy flowing!

Coming to the dish, baingan bharta - it's a simple but a classic and exotic dish of North India. In this dish, the whole eggplant is roasted and charred in open flame. After the eggplant is cooked through, its inner flesh is scooped out discarding the charred outer skin. The eggplant is then mashed and cooked with onion, tomato and some basic spices. The speciality of this dish is in the smokey flavour from the roasted eggplant! Be meagre in the addition of spices, so that they don't overpower the smoky eggplant flavor. It is amazing with roti and may go well with biryani and pulao as well.

Ingredients

1 large eggplant

1/2 cup frozen green peas

1 medium sized onion

1 large tomato
2 ts thick curd (optional)

1 ts ginger garlic paste

1/4 ts hing

3 green chillies (slit opened)

1/4 ts turmeric powder, 1/2 ts chilli powder, 1 ts coriander powder, 1/4 ts garam masala

1 ts cumin seed

Few coriander leaves

Preparation

Roasting the eggplant

There are various ways of roasting the eggplant, either on a direct stove top, on an oven or on a barbeque grill. 

I prefer the basic way of doing in on direct stove top. It is not only convenient but its very less time consuming. It hardly takes 10-15 minutes as opposed to an oven which may take more than half an hour. Also roasting them over a open flame gives a good smokey flavour.

Coat the eggplant with oil and roast them in stove-top in medium flame. Rotate the eggplant often so that all sides get cooked through evenly. Roast them until the outer skin is charred well enough and the inside is cooked through well. (If you insert a knife through the eggplant, it should glide off smoothly through the other side.) Keep it aside for it to cool.

Baingan Bharta

- Roast the eggplant and keep it aside to cool.

- Meanwhile heat oil in a kadai. Once they turn hot, add cumin seed and allow them to crackle.

- Add thinly sliced onions and fry them until they turn slight golden.

- Add ginger garlic paste and toss for a few seconds.

- Add hing.

- Immediately add the chopped tomato, yoghurt, turmeric powder, chilli powder and coriander powder. Also add little salt. Cook until the tomato turns mushy.

- During the time the tomato is being cooked, cut the eggplant into half and scoop the flesh from the skin. Discard the skin and mash the eggplant flesh roughly with hand.

- Now add the frozen green peas to the tomato paste and mix them thoroughly.

- After a minute add the mashed eggplant and combine everything well. Also add garam masala at this stage.

- Add about a cup of water and the slit green chillies. Give a good mix.  Cook in simmer for 5 - 10 minutes until it gets the desired consistency that you wish. 

- Garnish with coriander leaves.

Enjoy with hot phulka/ roti!