Eggplants and why we salt them

One of the really nice things about late-summer tennis is that the players sometimes bestow armloads of their overflow garden vegetables.

In this way, I came into possession recently of a half dozen extremely fresh, beautiful, unblemished eggplants (thank you, Nora and Allen!). 

I don’t salt my eggplant, or at least I never have. I don’t find them bitter and it never seemed necessary. A quick search on the always reliable and fully accurate internet indicates that modern eggplants have had most of the bitterness bred out of them and thus you don’t need to salt them to improve their flavor. Several articles also say that the salt doesn’t actually draw out bitter juices; it just tricks your tastebuds so they don’t taste any bitterness. 

I just finished reading chef Gabrielle Hamilton’s very excellent autobiography, “Blood, Bones and Butter.” Hamilton is the chef owner of Prune in New York City but her opinions on eggplant come not from her own restaurant experience but from a higher and more infallible food source: her Italian mother-in-law. 

Once a year, while the marriage lasted, Hamilton and husband (and, eventually, children) spent a month in Italy visiting his family. Every time, they would go when eggplant was abundant at the markets. She explains how her mother-in-law makes eggplant, and she adds in her own commentary. 

Both cooks agreed without discussion that the eggplant gets loaded down with salt first, not because of incipient bitterness but because (wait for it) salting draws out the moisture. 

Interesting, I thought to myself. So I sliced up one of Nora and Allen’s eggplants (about a half inch thick) and salted heavily with Diamond kosher salt. Why you’re supposed to use kosher salt is not explained on the internet but I think the idea is to use fine salt and not sea salt. 

So I salted the slices and was very surprised a few hours later to see how much liquid was floating in the bowl under the eggplant. 

I went online to try and find out why eggplants have so much liquid in them but I didn’t find anything useful. I did learn that eggplants are not enormously nutritious but they do have a lot of the phenolic compounds that scrub away cancer-causing free radicals. Medicine being what it is, of course the best cancer-fighting eggplants are also the ones that are the most bitter. Scientists are working on that and trying to find the most perfectly balanced eggplant. 

Normally when I have eggplants, I just cut them in half, turn them upside down on a baking sheet lined with foil and drizzle on some olive oil and sesame oil. Serve with chopped up herbs and a squeeze of lemon. I don’t salt.

With Nora and Allen’s eggplants, I decided to salt the slices, as advised by Gabrielle Hamilton and her Italian mother-in-law, because I was going to make eggplant parmesan. 

The salting does definitely change the texture of the fruit, making it more pliant and less dense and spongy. I will continue to not salt before roasting; but salting is definitely the way to go if you’re planning to bread and fry your slices. 

Also, if you’re making eggplant parm it isn’t as desperately necessary to rinse the salt off your slices because the salt will get absorbed by the blander and wetter other ingredients. 

What are those ingredients? Because it’s the end of the growing season, I have a lot of beautiful Swiss chard and a lot of tomatoes that need to be cooked asap.

I sauteed the chard (with some simple syrup and a dash of vinegar) and layered it on the bottom of the baking dish (you don’t need a ton, just a thin layer). 

Next I sauteed chopped tomatoes and basil and some garlic. They made up a layer about an inch thick over the chard.

This is in my opinion an essential step: Sprinkle red pepper flakes lightly over the top of the tomatoes. I don’t particularly love spicy food but I think this adds important zing.

I dipped the eggplant slices in egg, then flour, and fried them, then added them to the roasting pan. Next up: slices of mozzarella, one layer all the way across the top. 

Then, and don’t get mad at me for this, I poured a jar of tomato sauce over the whole thing. I used Rao’s, but Classico marinara is also good. 

I shaved fresh parmesan cheese all over the top and a couple grinds of fresh pepper. 

I baked it until the cheese was melted and just brown around the edges at 350 degrees. Remember that you are likely to reheat your eggplant parm as leftovers, so don’t let the cheese get too dark and burnt and crusty on this first time in the oven.