For many people, eggplants are a favorite food. They are fried, stewed, pickled, salted, spawn. And each new dish made from eggplants has its own unique taste. Fans of spicy food will appreciate Korean eggplants cooked according to special recipes.
Korean Eggplant - General Principles and Methods of Cooking
Traditional spices for cooking eggplants in Korean are coriander and spicy red pepper, unchanged ingredients are soy sauce or vinegar, as well as garlic. Korean cuisine is notable for short-term cooking, i.e. the heat treatment takes very little time. In order for the vegetables to boil for a short period, they are very thinly sliced.
Korean Eggplant - Food Preparation
In eggplants, especially in overripe fruits, solanine is present, which gives unpleasant bitterness to vegetables. That is why it is recommended to use young vegetables for cooking - bitterness is much less. So that eggplants do not taste bitter, sprinkle them with salt before cooking and leave for some time to let the juice, with which all the bitterness goes. Then they are washed with water, squeezed well and prepared according to the recipe.
Korean Eggplant - Best Recipes
Recipe 1: Korean Eggplant Salad
The recipe for this unpretentious Korean salad is interesting because it can be taken as a basis. And by adding to it various products, for example, roasted peppers or onions, Korean carrots, greens or adjika, this salad can be modified and added to it all new and new taste. Thus, mixing new ingredients, you can achieve the original taste and the new salad will be included in the category of your specialties. This recipe is also good because it does not use vegetable oil when preparing eggplants, which means that this dish is low-calorie. Foods are based on one small salad bowl.
Ingredients: 1-2 medium eggplants (0.5 kg), 3-4 cloves of garlic, soy sauce 3 tables. spoons, a small bunch of green onions, half a lemon, 1 tsp. spoon of sugar, to taste hot ground red pepper, 1 tsp. spoon with a hill of fried sesame seeds.
Method of preparation: Eggplants with the peel to bake in the oven, microwave or bring to readiness in a double boiler, pre-cut lengthwise into two parts. You can boil in water (2 tablespoons / 1l of water). In this case, after cooking, the eggplants need to be put under pressure for some time, so that the glass has excess liquid. The main thing is to make sure that the vegetables do not turn into porridge while cooking. Those. Eggplant should be soft, not raw, but at the same time elastic (it will still need to be cut). When cooking pasta, the stage of such readiness is called “al dente”.
Next, you need to cut the eggplant into fairly large sticks-slices. For example, cut each half lengthwise into 4 parts, and then cut the long strips across into 2-3 slices.
Add finely chopped green onions and garlic in an eggplant salad bowl. Squeeze lemon juice and pour soy sauce. Sprinkle the salad with a pinch of ground red pepper for spice and add sesame seeds (preferably, but, as a last resort, you can do without them). Mix the salad gently, let it brew for a couple of hours and can be served.
Recipe 2: Eggplant Heh
Peking and sea cabbage in Korean, as well as Korean carrot have become a very popular dish and have received permanent registration on the tables of Russians. They are prepared and on weekdays and holidays. Using Korean carrot seasoning, many more different dishes can be prepared. For example, heh eggplant. Of great popularity are, of course, Xe from fish and meat, but eggplant Xe is considered to be no less tasty. To cook this dish for one deep plate (salad bowl), you will need:
On 1 piece of eggplants (the average size), carrots, bulbs and bell pepper, grow half a glass. oil, 2 table. tablespoons of Korean carrot and apple cider vinegar, 3-4 medium cloves of garlic, 1 table. spoon of soy sauce, 2/3 tsp. spoons of sugar with salt.
Method of preparation:
Eggplant, together with the peel, cut lengthwise into slices-plates with a thickness of 0.5-0.7 mm, and then cut across the cross or obliquely into thin strips. Sprinkle the eggplant straw with salt and leave it for about half an hour to get bitterness out of it.
While the eggplants settle, you can grab carrots on a special grater (for Korean carrots). Add onion and thinly chopped Bulgarian noodles into thin slices. Sprinkle the vegetable mixture with sugar and salt, rest a little and leave for half an hour. After 30 minutes, drain the separated juice, add seasoning, mix everything. If you like very hot, in addition to the seasoning, you can add a pinch of hot ground red pepper. Squeeze the liquid from the eggplant straw, then throw in boiling water and boil for two minutes, not to overcook. Throw in a colander. When the liquid is gone, add the eggplants to the vegetable mixture, put the crushed garlic and soy sauce in the same place. Mix.
In a frying pan, heat the oil until the smoke appears, add vegetables to the boiling oil, mix and add vinegar. Stir again, cool and, preferably, let stand for about 3-4 hours.
Instead of seasoning for Korean carrots, you can take other ground spices - 0.5 cu. spoons of coriander and 1/3 tea. spoons of black and red pepper. If you do not find apple cider vinegar, you can replace it with regular table vinegar 6% vinegar.
Recipe 3: Appetizing “In the power of the Dragon”
Ingredients: 1 kilogram of eggplants, half a kilogram of white cabbage, 2-3 medium sized carrots, ground spices: coriander, black and hot red pepper, sugar / salt - to taste, 5 cloves of garlic, 2-3 tbsp. spoon 9% vinegar, Rast. oil for roasting.
Method of preparation
Grate carrot on a special grater with narrow straws, chop cabbage in another dish. Sprinkle the vegetables with salt and sugar and mix with your hands. Let stand a little, if liquid is released, drain it.
Carrots and cabbage put together, pour vinegar, add chopped garlic and spices. Mix the mass thoroughly and let it brew for about two hours.
Cut off the peel of eggplant, cut into cubes - 5-6 cm in length and 1 cm in thickness. Cool sprinkle with salt and let stand for half an hour. During this time they will release a bitter juice. Wash the eggplants, squeeze well and bathe until golden brown in the hot oil.
After the eggplants have cooled down, they need to be added to carrots and cabbage, pour in a little vegetable oil, mix thoroughly and let it brew - the more the better. This appetizer is especially good on the second day. Try it, very tasty!
