Harmony of the Nightshades

Greetings, eggplantophiles.

Have you ever noticed how many recipes feature eggplants in conjunction with tomatoes? Apart from Asian cuisine, this particular ingredient combination is extremely pervasive around the world. Indian baingan bartha, Italian caponata, Turkish imam bayildi, French eggplant and tomato tart, Aubergenius's very own Mediterranean-inspired "lycopene stew"... the list goes on. This particular harmony of nightshades makes perfect sense: eggplant is a flavor sponge, while tomato (and especially tomato paste) adds richness of flavor. Combine with oil, spices, and other rich flavor components -- garlic, onions, herbs -- and a delicious dish automatically emerges.

Plus, both ingredients have the capacity to be extremely silly.

Crazy eggplants at the Issaquah farmer's market, photo courtesy of my mother.

Even crazier tomatoes somewhere in the world, photo courtesy of someone or other on the interwebs.

All this talk of eggplants and tomatoes brings me to a brief restaurant segment. Some time ago I made a trip to Sayat Nova, an Armenian restaurant in the Chicago Loop. Restaurant pros: a more interesting Loop option than the pervasive steak houses, casual dining chains, and Irish pubs in that area; beautiful decor; tasty food. Restaurant cons: given the Loop location, rather expensive for the food quality; food is tasty but not necessarily upscale, despite slightly upscale prices.

Among the items we ordered was a vegetarian cold combo, which included stuffed eggplant similar to Turkish imam bayildi (the countries do share a border, after all) and the best grape leaves any of us had ever had.

And to continue on the eggplants-tomatoes-vicinity of Turkey rant, I recently made a reincarnation of the dish with Georgian-inspired spices featured here -- but this time, I added tomato paste (and excluded the apricots). It was totally delicious. Turns out that Kmeli Suneli, the spice mix used in Georgian walnut sauce, is enhanced by the addition of tomatoes.

Kmeli Suneli-seasoned eggplant salad with tomato paste, olives,  onions, peppers, and parsley.
Featured with a great deal of hummus.

Totally delicious combo.

In the end, it doesn't really matter where the dish comes from -- virtually any combination of these ingredients yields delicious results. This is why I'm so reluctant to post actual measured recipes on this blog. Eggplant rarely needs recipes... if anything, recipes with too little oil or salt yield eggplant disasters, leading many people to dislike eggplant generally. It's better to work with guidelines for which ingredients combine well, which techniques are necessary for making eggplant delicious, and run with it!

[Anti-recipe soapbox dismount]