Brinjals and Beans

I've not been eating anything very different from what has been posted in this blog already (by me and by others). That and life kept me away from posting here for a while.

On a whim this morning, I sauteed three green brinjals (eggplants/aubergines) till mushy and then added some boiled cow peas to them - as you can see from the photo, I was about to scrape the bottom of the bowl - it was just a handful of peas, soaked for 30 minutes or less, and pressure-cooked. Only recently did I learn that these peas did not have to go through the rigour of a night's soaking before being cooked.


Here's how you make it:

You will need about 3/4 - 1 cup of cooked cowpeas.

Depending on the size of the brinjal/eggplant, halve or cube 250 gm of the vegetable into salted water.

In a pan, heat 4 tsp of sesame/gingelly oil. Temper it with ½ a tsp of mustard seed, ¼ tsp of cumin, 1 tsp of urad dal (split, hulled black gram), a few curry leaves, 2 tsp of red chilli flakes (or 1-3 split, dry red chilli). The urad should turn pleasantly brown.

Add the brinjal and saute for about half a minute.

Add salt, red chilli powder (1/2-1 tsp) and turmeric (1/2 tsp).

Mix well and saute some more.

Turn the heat down to simmer and cook till the brinjals are at the almost-beginning-to-turn into-mush stage. Sprinkle some water and cover, if you like.

As the brinjals are turning to mush, add the cooked cow peas and mix well.

Cook till the water evaporates and the brinjals are almost falling apart.

You can eat this with rice, by itself (as I ate it) or with yoghurt.

Here's another dish with brinjals and beans of a certain kind

Here are more vegan recipes for eggplants