Zyada:
Bypassing such delicacies as nopales (cactus leaves), horse chestnuts, dandelion flowertops, and pine bark scrapings? What are you, nuts?
PRINCIPLES OF EGGPLANT COOKERY
a) Eggplant isn’t food. That doesn’t mean it isn’t possible to eat it as if it were food, but neither the natural taste nor the natural texture of the substance called “eggplant” is a valid contributor to the final product if you expect folks to eat it. Left to its own devices (eggplant as eggplant), it tastes a lot like a well-worn goodyear tire. Texturally, it is slimy but otherwise a lot like a well-worn goodyear tire, except not as tender.
b) The Italians, who collectively sold their souls to the devil, obtained in return the secret to cooking eggplant that neither tastes like eggplant nor feels like it when it is in your mouth, and bears, in fact, an astonishing similarity to food. I mean, you could eat this stuff and find yourself saying things like “Could I have a second helping?” – I kid you not! The instructions for doing eggplant parmigiana (yeah, that’s the final product) sound like How to Treat and Varnish The Keel of Your New Sailboat, but if you just do what they say and forget that it is your intention to eat the end product (and perhaps convince others to do likewise), you’ll end up with something edible (palatable, even) nonetheless.
c) When they say “put a book on it”, they aren’t kidding. Think in terms of The Oxford English Dictionary. All eight volumes. Or just empty your entire bookshelf. You might consider sitting on the topmost tome.
d) Buy nice cheese. Really nice cheese. No one ever says the eggplant parmigiana would’ve been nicer with less cheese, or that the cheese selected was too fancy.
e) There will come a time when you are cutting it up into pieces. You will be tempted to make thicker slices, since these strange greyish slabs of seed-infested gooey asphalt that your knife creates out of the odd purple vegetable don’t slice easily unless your knife is sharp and your patience present. You are to avoid this temptation. These slices are the items that will end up under your book collection, and if they are too thick they will end up tasting (and chewing) a lot like eggplant, which is something you want to avoid.
f) I know you are thinking “He’s gonna tell me to discard the eggplant and cook and serve the books, I’ve read this before, I know I have!”. NO, TRUST ME ON THIS, if you do it like the Italians tell you to, you really do eat the eggplant slices (muchly buried in nice sauce and nice cheese). They are not having you on.
g) If they say “hammer”, they ain’t kidding. Think “sledge”. It is permissible to take everything to the back steps and whomp against poured concrete steps if you are worried about your cutting board or counter top.
h) Those hours and minutes are not an exaggeration. Don’t worry. Your house will smell really good, and the longer you cook it the less it tastes like eggplant. Unless you run out of liquid (marinara sauce and the like), you can’t overcook it.
i) If their method recommends blotting with paper towels, buy several rolls. The stuff that gets squeezed out of the eggplant by the books may be useful to industry someday, but not to food preparation. Astonishingly, for something with the taste and consistency of a goodyear tire, eggplant is 131% water, and the water will be tainted with the essence of eggplant.