The broiled eggplant we had for dinner last night was…well…meh. My taste buds weren’t thrilled by hot mayonnaise, but the mayo and Parmesan did do a pretty good job of dominating the eggplant flavor.
A few people commented in the last post that they love eggplant, and a few recipes were mentioened. If you have a favorite you’d like to share, please do! Remember, I’m expecting to get a lot of eggplant this summer…
In the meantime, here’s last night’s recipe, in case anyone wants to try it.
Broiled Eggplant with Crunchy Parmesan Crust
Ingredients:
—oil for greasing a baking sheet
—mayonnaise
—eggplant, cut into 1/4″ slices
—freshly grated Parmesan cheese (about 1/2 cup)
Directions:
1. Preheat broiler. Lightly oil a baking sheet.
2. Spread mayonnaise sparingly on both sides of each eggplant slice, then dip the slices in the grated Parmesan cheese, thoroughly coating sides.
3. Arrange the slices in a single layer on the baking sheet.
4. Place under the broiler until golden brown—about 3 minutes.
5. Flip the slices and broil until golden grown and crunchy on top—about 3 minutes more. (The eggplant will become soft, with a crunchy outside.)
Last week’s CSA box (which I didn’t photograph or write about before it was eaten) was good. But it pales in comparison to what we got this week.
Enclosed was a recipe for broiled eggplant. I’m not a huge fan of eggplant (something I didn’t admit to myself for years—after all, vegetarians are supposed to like eggplant, right?), but this recipe involves coating sliced eggplant with mayonnaise, covering it with grated fresh Parmesan, and broiling it. I’m intrigued. I think we’ll try that tonight. I hope I like it, because something tells me we’ll be getting a lot of eggplant from our CSA. (I suspect the free recipe is a “get ready for the onslaught of eggplant” warning.)
Jan and I joined a CSA a few years ago but did not have the best experience with it. (We love the idea of the CSA, but this particular implementation had some problems.) Last year, a local creamery started a CSA, and after hearing good things about it from pioneering friends, we decided to sign up for it ourselves this year.
The location just can’t be beat: it’s literally about five minutes from my house. And I did mention that it’s a creamery, right? So yeah, we’ll probably be picking up freshly made ice cream there from time to time, too.
We picked up our first box of produce for the season yesterday. Here it is, laid out on the counter. (The basil wasn’t in the box but was purchased at a farmer’s market.) From left to right: a huge box of strawberries, half a dozen eggs, a head of red-leaf lettuce, a ginormous bag of snow peas, two zucchini, some beautiful pencil asparagus, a ton of scallions, a fresh onion, and about a pound of button mushrooms. We ate most of the strawberries for dessert last night and plan to grill the zucchini this evening. Yum!
