I've been getting into Georgian-style recipes lately. I like the Georgian method of pounding fresh herbs and spices and adding them to a dish without much further cooking. I also like the combinations of herbs used in Georgian cuisine. I haven't spent a lot of time in Georgia but whenever I go there, I try to enjoy traditional food as often as possible. There are also lots of Georgian restaurants in ex-Soviet countries where you can try more or less authentic national dishes and I find that people are usually very patient when I ask questions about, for example, what herbs grow in Georgia, when the different seasons are for different vegetables, how people store and preserve food and what things are particularly expensive to buy or hard to get. These are important questions when you're trying to understand why a particular traditional style of cooking is the way it is.
This recipe is particularly interesting because of the stuffing. It comes out a bit like hummus. It could be quite nicely used to stuff other vegetables and the technique could be adapted to use other nuts and herbs. This recipe requires the aubergines to be salted for an hour before cooking. Lay them cut side up, sprinkle a half teaspoon of salt on each piece and leave them sitting. After an hour scrape the wet salt off with a butter knife and give the pieces a two-second rinse under the tap. Shake them well to dry them - maybe give them a pat with a paper towel. The aubergines won't be salty at all after this. The salt doesn't penetrate the flesh but instead, draws out some of the moisture so that when you fry the pieces they come out with a lovely firm texture. You can keep the cooked and stuffed aubergines in the fridge for days.
Ingredients
2 or 3 largish aubergines
70g of walnuts (about two thirds of a cup)
2 large garlic cloves
1 teaspoon of coriander seeds
A small bunch of green coriander
1 or 2 sprigs of celery leaves or a small stick of celery
3 dessertspoons of vinegar
Olive oil
Salt
Fry the aubergine pieces cut side down in the olive oil with a lid on the pan. After five minutes, turn the pieces over and replace the lid. Fry for another five minutes then leave the aubergines on a piece of paper on a plate to cool while you prepare the stuffing. You will probably have to fry two lots if you use three aubergines unless you have a mighty big frying pan.
To make the stuffing, first pound the coriander seeds then add the walnuts and pound them till they're well smashed up. Add the garlic and carry on pounding until you get a fairly smooth oily paste. Add the chopped herbs and salt and give it all another good going over then mix in the vinegar. Spread the paste on the cool aubergine pieces and leave for at least another half hour or so before serving.