Bagara Baingan Recipe

I am a cookoholic and a food lover. I like to try mixing and matching recipes as long as the outcome of the delicacy can be conceived in the mind. More often than none, things have gone awry also. Whenever my wife asked me (after tasting good food of course) the recipe of the dish I’ve prepared I used to tell her ‘it’s a secret’. Not because I didn’t want to share but it would have so much jumbled up that I would have forgotten what all I had put! :) So this time around, I made it a point to take pictures of my recipe and hope you will like it. But you have to try the dish yourself before. {Actually this is my favorite dish and i started cooking with this dish only. So henceforth if i post anymore dishes here, i would like to dedicate and start with Bagara Baingan. My close friends know this and have tasted this. }

Ingredients:

Small eggplants – 6-8

Onion – 2 big

Garlic – 1

Tomato – 2

Groundnuts – a handful

Usual spices, red chilly powder, salt etc.

Preparation:

1. Cut the eggplants in plus shape till the stem for filling. Roast them on open fire. You can also use wire mesh or grill them. Make sure they do not get burnt too much. Don’t forget to keep the stem intact. Aah! I like the smell of burnt brinjal!

2. Roast groundnuts in a cooking pot or a pan; take off their skin, let them cool down. After cooling, grind them to powder.

3. Cut onions in two shapes. One and half in big pieces and another half chopped in small pieces.

4. Cut tomatoes in big slices.

5. For the filling, prepare a mixture of groundnut powder, oil, chopped onion, masala poweder, chilly powder, little turmeric, little lemon juice and little salt. Make a little more than what is required for the filling. Fill this mixture in the roasted eggplants. Keep aside the left over mixture.

6. Fry big slices of onion and tomatoes, cut garlic and asafoetida. After cooling, grind them to a thick paste.

7. In a pan, heat oil, add mustard, sesame seeds, let them sputter. Add curry leaves and two dry red chilly. I love this part in the cooking the most as smell of curry leaves is intoxicating. Say ahh, wah couple of times to make your cooking more interesting and exciting. Smile brings in the best taste in the food you cook you see.

8. Add the paste to the chaunk (tadka) and let the oil separate from the paste. You can smell the aroma by sprinking a little water in it, it’s awesome.

9. Add the filled eggplants in to the paste and mix well, making sure that the filling doesn’t fall out. Add remaining mixture also in this.

10. Add red chilly powder, more masala powder, salt to taste, and turmeric. Cook for 5-8 minutes.

11. After 5 minutes of cooking, stir once and close the perforated lid. This is the secret of retaining the aroma of the cooked food, in low flame.

12. Did I tell you? Your interest and love for cooking play a major role. I know that the above recipe isn’t new or a rocket science but what is more precious is to pour love on the recipe you are cooking. That makes it more tasty :)

13. Serve hot. Or cold. Or medium. Your wish. Actually it tastes good anyway if you have prepared well! ;) Comment after you tried it my style.

Happy cooking!

(well, if the above is neatly kept in a bowl and garnished with coriander, it would have looked more presentable i know, but it was morning rush hour! so swalpa adjust madi! )