Authentic recipe for baba-ghannouj

1 Servings

Ingredients

Quantity Ingredient
1 large Purple eggplant
4 Garlic cloves
2 Limes or lemons; juice of
¼ cup Tehina; up to 1/3
1½ teaspoon Salt; or to taste
A few drops of liquid smoke extract; (optional)

Directions

For garnish: whole parsley leaves with ¼" of stem left on and sweet paprika (hot paprika or cayenne may be substituted).

Roast eggplant over an open hardwood fire (in that case omit smoke extract) or on BBQ until skin is thoroughly charred and eggplant is totally soft (test with skewer). OR Roast eggplant in 500 degrees oven until totally soft through and through (test with skewer). Place roasted eggplant in a basin of cold water and remove every bit of skin. Put eggplant in colander to drain water away. In mortar, pound garlic with salt until reduced to a smooth paste. Place garlic-salt paste in food processor and add lime or lemon juice (I prefer lime), tehina and smoke extract if used. Process on continuous. If dressing coagulates (citric acid will do that to tehina), add JUST ENOUGH water, in a thin stream, until dressing reliquefies to a thick yet pourable texture (like heavy pancake batter). Place eggplant in shallow serving bowl. With 2 forks, shred the meat thoroughly. Do not process the eggplant in the food processor, as that completely ruins the texture, which should be somewhat stringy (but very very soft!). Blend in the dressing uniformly. Smooth surface of baba-ghannooj and decorate by sticking the parsley stem down in the b-g in a regular pattern. Sprinkle a little paprika between the "florets". You may also drizzle a little bit of extra-virgin olive oil in tiny pools here and there on the surface. Serve with warm Arabic bread, tomato wedges, spring onions, oil- or brine-cured olives (green or black) and cucumber pickles (NOT the sweet kind. Kosher dills work well).

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Posted to recipelu-digest by Badams <adamsfmle@...> on Feb 16, 1998

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