Fourth Time’s a Charm – A Sichuan Eggplant Success!

How I dread seeing raw eggplant.  It fills me with fear and sadness because I have never been able to successfully prepare it at home.

Cooked eggplant though I thoroughly enjoy seeing on my plates at restaurants and other's homes. 

I have tried, tried, and tried again to master eggplant at home, but each time resulted in failure or close to it. 

Well, past failures be darned!  When I saw some long eggplant at the grocery store recently I decided to be bold and try this dish again.

I decided to alter my approach, and followed an Omnivore's Cookbook recipe that called for coating the eggplant slivers with cornstarch before pan frying.

Similar to past recipes I've followed, prior to preparing the eggplant slices, soak the cut pieces in salt water to get rid of excess moisture.

Then pan fry the eggplant slivers until they are well-browned.  I almost stopped cooking the pieces when they had a facial browning on some sides, but the eggplant still tasted undercooked and tough.  I decided to keep them on the heat until they broke down more, resulting in a soft interior and crisper edges – approximately 10 minutes of cooking time.

Then using the same skillet, prepare the sauce before adding the eggplant back in.  

I largely followed the Omnivore's Cookbook sauce approach, which resulted in a cornstarch-heavy gloppy sauce and too much sauce for the reduced amount of eggplant I had (13 oz. compared to 16 oz. called for in recipe).  It was also a little sweet for my taste, though we added ground Sichuan peppercorn to the plated eggplant, which made it much better.  I will probably improvise my own sauce approach moving forward for this otherwise great eggplant dish!  Success at last!