One of my favorite appetizers is, without a doubt, fried or baked eggplants with cane honey . A traditional Cordoba recipe, although it is eaten throughout Andalusia, Córdoba being one of its best-known dishes, but in Jaén or Granada, I have found it in many bars and restaurants as an appetizer, starter or accompaniment to other dishes.
Today I will not leave any tricks in my hat, and I will make you decide whether fried or baked , in a classic way or with more modern touches, I assure you that any of the ways of cooking them give a delicious result. You’ll have a hard time deciding, you’ll see.
Remember that we have the 2 recipes published on the blog, I wouldn’t know which one to choose, that’s why I let you choose.
Tricks so that eggplants do not suck oil when frying
Although eggplant is an extremely healthy food, we must be careful when cooking it, since we usually consume a large amount of oil to coat or fry them… to avoid this, I am going to teach you some tricks with which the eggplants will be juicy for a long time. inside and crispy on the outside with hardly any signs of oil from frying.
However, we must start as always with the most important thing, which is the raw material . In the case of eggplant, it is advisable to consume it in season because the fewer seeds they have, the less bitter they will be.
How to get eggplants so juicy on the inside, so crispy on the outside.
- Before starting it is advisable to put them in salt to remove the water.
- If you are going to use the frying method , the first thing would be to flour the eggplants a little, if we peel them better, then we must fry them in very hot oil, I recommend sunflower oil, as it gives a more pleasant flavor than that of olive. If you use the frying pan, make them in small quantities so that the temperature does not drop. If, on the other hand, you use the fryer, set it to 190º C, in this case the temperature is very important.
- If you use the oven , you can follow all our advice in the recipe for baked eggplants with cane honey , but I can tell you that you have to coat the eggplant slices in durum wheat semolina on both sides and place them on the tray without are on top of each other. And when the oven reaches 200º C, we put the tray with the eggplants in the oven for 15 minutes. This time can vary depending on the thickness of the eggplants, 10 minutes if they are very thin and up to 20 if they are plump.
But how to prevent them from coming out soaked in oil? There are several methods
- Bathe them in milk . After you have given them the cut you like best, leave them in milk for about 15 to 20 minutes before frying them. Dry them well and dredge them in flour and put them in the pan. Of the three, it is perhaps the least effective. Although it is true that the eggplants turn out better, they are still somewhat oily.
- The other option is to put them in soda, sparkling water or beer , actually the trick is to soak them in a carbonated liquid for about 10-15 minutes.
- This is where the consumer’s taste comes in; soda or sparkling water, being sweeter, generates a very particular contrast with the bitterness of the eggplant. While the bitter touch of hops is better suited to eggplant, enhancing its flavor.
- And of course, baking the eggplants is the best option to avoid them being full of oil.
And here they are, ready to be sprinkled with cane honey and get a delicious Andalusian recipe.
