Eggplant Masala

Description:
Last December 2008, I received a most wonderful book from Helene when I spent my Christmas holidays with her family in Singapore. She combined 2 of my loves in it - glorious food and glorious pictures of food - the Singaporean dishes were presented almost like still-life paintings by masters of art.

I would like to share with you some of the simpler dishes (one reason is that at least with these recipes, I can find the ingredients here in my area).

For this dish, its because eggplant is one of my favorite ingredients. Many a time there was when I could exist mainly on just eggplant torta. Anyway this is not torta but its still eggplant :-)

Masala or Massala is a term used to descibe any of many blends of spices used in Indian cuisine, most often containing cardamom, coriander, mace together with pepper, nutmeg etc.

Copied from "Authentic Recipes from Singapore" Wong and Wibisono.

Ingredients:
3 tbsp oil
1 tsp mustard seeds
1/2 tsp cumin seeds
1 onion, sliced
4 cloves garlic, sliced
2 slender Asian eggplants (500 g/1 lb total), halved and cut into lengths
1 tsp chilli powder
1 tsp ground coriander
1/2 tsp ground turmeric
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp tamarind pulp mashed in 4 tbsp of water, squeezed and strained to obtain juice

Directions:
1. Heat the oil in a wok over medium heat and cook the mustard seeds until they pop, about 1 minute. Add the cumin seeds and gently stir-fry for 1 minute. Add the onion and garlic, and stir-fry until light golden-brown, about 5 minutes.

2. Add the eggplants, chilli powder, turmeric, coriander and salt, and stir-fry for 1 minute. Then add the tamarind juice, reduce the heat and simmer until the eggplants are tender, about 7 minutes. Serve immediately with freshly-cooked rice.

Prep. time: 25 minutes
Cooking time: 20 minutes


Picture from the internet.