Dish 39: Moroccan Inspired Eggplant Stew

Blurry goodness. Ate it too fast to take the usual amazing composed photos, ha!

After my Green Harissa experiment I was in the mood to try out more Moroccan cuisine. I looked it up in The Flavor Bible (which is due back at the library this week, boo. I'll just buy it soon) and jotted a few spice notes: cinnamon, cumin, paprika, coriander. Saw they listed stews and tomatoes. And then there was eggplant on sale at the grocery store, so it all came together nicely.

The flavors are more Moroccan-lite. Next time I'll be more aggressive with the seasoning, though maybe like a good chili this one will be better the next day. And I actually took some notes, so you (may) have enough to go on if you'd like to recreate.

Ingredients:

- 1 large eggplant

- 2 small/medium zucchini or summer squash (approx as they were leftovers)

- 1 vidalia onion

- 4 cloves of garlic

- 1 pint of canned tomatoes - mine were in pieces (home canned), though I think anything from dice to whole will work- it cooks a while and they'll have time to break down

- 1 bay leaf

- 1 tsp tomato paste

- 3/4 tsp cumin

- 3/4 tsp paprika

- 1/4 tsp coriander

- 1/4 tsp cinnamon

- a few dashes of turmeric and clove

- olive oil, salt and pepper as needed

Chop up your eggplant and squash, toss with olive oil salt and pepper. Roast under the broiler until soft and getting a little brown goodness. You can do that the day before if you want to. I took care of it in the morning before it got too hot to turn on the oven then finished everything for dinner.

Chop up your onion into petals. Chop your garlic reasonably fine but don't stress. Sweat/saute over medium heat until they get soft- try not to brown them too quickly. Add your tomatoes and your spices and tomato paste. Let those mingle a bit then add the squash and additional water (I used 1-2 cups) until everything's almost covered. Bring to a simmer, tasting and adjusting spices as needed (odd measurements and dashes are a result of me finagling around a bit towards the end).

Once everything's nice and thick it's ready to eat. Serve with couscous (in this case the crappy 5 minute kind, next time I'll do better), and all the green harissa you can handle.

I wish delicious things didn't get that sheen on them in pictures.

Notes for Improvement:

- Use more spices- maybe look up a similar recipe to get the balance right? The cinnamon came through a lot in leftovers but the other spices weren't as intense as I worried they would be.

- Get better grain.

- It seems Moroccan cuisine uses fruit in savory dishes, which could be nice. Dried apricots or figs next time. Or preserved lemon- I've never had that and now I want it.