Topic: Useful tip for aubergines

[Muttley]

I'd always found aubergines a pain to prepare as they soak up any amount of oil and so are difficult to initially cook.

Trying to use them without an initial cooking (i.e. at a higher temperature than boiling) yielded indifferent results and on one occasion the damn things never cooked through.

Then one day I thought about what you were trying to do with the initial frying (assuming it was not to get them to soak up oil!) and came to the conclusion that it was largely to caramelise the surface and ensure that enough of the intercellular walls of the inside of the fruit have broken that it will cook through even if it is only heated to boiling point in a thick sauce (my failed cooking was in a vegetarian lasagna).

I decided to try grilling the sliced aubergine and have never looked back. The result (in the finished dish) is exactly the same as if they had been fried (although obviously they will add no oil so an adjustment may be necessary).

It's easy to grill them to a beautiful, even, golden colour and now I never put off making dished that I love but avoided because of the pain of trying to fry the aubergines without starting a global oil crisis.

One word of warning, though: If you forget to check aubergines have an unusual property that they can become burned to a frazzle without making any significant smell in the vicinity so make sure you watch them.