Posted on Thursday, March 27, 2014 | By: tasik
Category :
Turkish Food
One of the 99 ways we prepare eggplant in Turkey...
Not
everyone likes aubergine, I know. But if you do, or if you know someone
who does -- or if you're willing to try something new...you might like
this simple but delicious dish we Turks call Domates Soslu Patlican
(Aubergine in Tomato Sauce). I've been making it since I first learned
to cook in my late teens -- and after I introduced it in the States to
my beloved American mother and sister-in-law, it became their 'favorite
vegetable dish', bar none.
Aubergine in Tomato Sauce
(Domates Soslu Patlican)
General Ingredients: (I'll use
Turkish measurement terms below [see items with the * notation], but you
can find plenty of definitions-help on our Turkish Foods page -- for converting to US or British measurements.)
4 medium-sized kemer-style aubergines (with a glossy surface, a curved
and slender shape -- about 20 cm long, dark purple in color, and almost
no seeds)
1 green banana pepper (elongated, light green sweet pepper)
1 red banana pepper (also called salcalik or tarhanalik pepper
in Turkey -- because it's used in the making of tomato paste and
tarhana)
For frying the aubergine: half a water-glass* of Sun Flower Seed Oil
For the sauce:
4 medium sized tomatoes, half a yemek kasigi* of tomato paste
6 cloves of garlic
1 yemek kasigi* of olive oil
2 yemek kasigi* of vinegar
1 cube of sugar
1 çay kasigi* of salt and one of pepper
Preparation:
Don't peel the aubergine, instead stripe-strip it lengthwise -- leaving
strips of unpeeled skin evenly spaced down the length of the
aubergine's surface, from top to bottom. (This 'stripe' gives the
finished dish a more decorative appearance.)
Slice the aubergine lengthwise into two sections. Take each
section in turn and slice them lengthwise too -- into 2 or 3 long strips
each (depending on the thickness of the aubergine). At intervals of 1
cm from top to bottom, cut each of these strips cross-wise into chunks.
Soak the pieces in salty water for 20-30 minutes. (This removes
bitterness from the remaining aubergine skin peel.) Remove the pieces
from the salty water and after rinsing them again in unsalted water --
dry them on paper towels. Clean the green and red banana peppers and
slice them in ring shapes.
Heat up the Sunflower Seed Oil in a deep pan and place the
aubergine and pepper in the heated oil, cooking until they are quite
limp and the aubergine is a medium brown color. Scoop the vegetables out
of the oil with a frying spatula and into a dish lined with paper
towels. Let dry.
To prepare the sauce:
Pour the olive oil
and toss the (coarsely chopped) garlic into a medium-sized sauce pan.
Peel the tomatoes and cube them the size of tavla (backgammon) dice. Mix
together in the sauce pan with the tomato paste. Add the vinegar and
the cube of sugar -- and after sprinkling in the salt and pepper, cook
over a medium hot flame, stirring frequently.
When the sauce begins to boil, cut the heat way back -- and let the ingredients simmer for another 5 minutes.
Pour
the sauce lightly over the aubergine and peppers and serve at room
temperature -- as a meze, a snack, or as a vegetable-dish with a meal.
Whenever
we have new foreign guests, Jim always asks that I make this dish for
them -- as long as I don't call it eggplant. Seems his mother forced him
to eat too many soft-boiled eggs as a child -- and the name association
still bothers him.