Late summer recipes are my favorite. See, on the one hand, you've still got all kinds of delicious summer produce available — in fact, September is probably the time of year when produce is at its peak. Yay for veggies! And on the other hand, it's just starting to cool down, especially in the evening. There's less daylight and you can feel the season beginning to wind down. That means I'm ready for heartier, cozier meals.
This eggplant curry is exactly the kind of meal I love during those last few weeks of summer. It uses late summer eggplant, with hearty lentils, juicy tomatoes, and lots of warming spices.
My inspiration for this dish was baingan bharta, which is a favorite Indian restaurant dish. I've tried a bunch of recipes, but never been able to recreate the dish perfectly at home, so I decided to throw recipes out the window and create something of my own. So whereas baingain bharta roasts the eggplant until it falls apart, I opted to sauté my eggplant and then simmer it up with lentils and tomatoes. The result was excellent — a saucy, spicy curry that highlights some summer produce, but has a nice stick-to-your-ribs feel that I'm sure I'll enjoy when the weather really starts to cool down.
When you cook this one you might be tempted to throw the dried lentils right into the curry instead of cooking them separately, but please don't! A while back after having a batch of chili simmer for what seemed like forever I found that the lentils were still hard. I later learned that the acid in tomatoes prevents them from cooking fully, which is why you need to simmer them separately in this recipe. If you can find canned lentils, feel free to use them instead.
Ingredients
- ½ cup dried brown lentils
- 2 cups water
- ¼ cup olive oil
- 1 medium 1 pound eggplant, cut into ½ inch cubes
- 1 onion diced
- 3 garlic cloves minced
- 1 serrano pepper seeded and minced (optional, leave it out for a milder dish)
- 1 teaspoon freshly grated ginger
- 1 to 3 tablespoons garam masala to taste
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1 14 ounce can crushed tomatoes
- 1 14 ounce can diced tomatoes
- Salt and pepper to taste
- ¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro
- Cooked basmati rice for serving
Instructions
- Place the lentils into a small saucepan and cover them with 2 cups of water. Place over high heat and bring the water to a boil. Lower heat and allow to simmer until tender, about 35 minutes. You can add water during cooking if it gets too low. When the lentils are done, drain any excess water.
- While the lentils cook, coat the bottom of a large pot with the olive oil and place it over medium heat. When the oil is hot, add the eggplant. Sauté for about 5 minutes. Add the onion and continue to sauté for about 5 minutes more, until the eggplant begins to brown and the onion is soft and translucent. Add the garlic, serrano pepper, ginger, 1 tablespoon of garam masala, and the cumin. Sauté about 1 minute more, until very fragrant.
- Add the tomatoes and bring the mixture to a simmer. Taste test the sauce and add more garam masala if you'd like. Allow to simmer until the eggplant is tender, about 15 minutes. Stir in the cooked lentils and simmer another minute or two, until heated throughout. Remove from heat and season with salt and pepper to taste.
- Serve with basmati rice and a sprinkling of fresh cilantro.
I made this tonight. It was really good. I was a little short on the eggplant that I had on hand, so I threw in a small zucchini too. I did the cooking in an Instant Pot.
I'm glad you enjoyed it and that it worked out well in the instant pot - I hear such great things about them and hope to get one for myself soon. 🙂
Did you just dump all the ingredients in the instapot or follow the steps prescribed just in the instapot?
How long did you cook it in the instant pot?
You have to give baingan bharta a try! You could roast the large eggplant on the barbecue along with cloves of garlic stuffed into it ( make slits on the eggplant). Then remove the skin amd mash the pulp. And cook it with a base of onion, lots of green onion and garlic and a little tomato paste. Spices - salt, coriander cumin powder, red chilli powder and garam masala.
Thanks for the tips! I haven't tried it on the barbecue grill but that sounds like a great idea. I'll have to give it a try!
I am most excited about finding this recipe, thank you so much, some of the spices I do not have and hope not too hard to find. I do not think my husband will like this but I know I, and possibly my daughter will. Thank you so much 🙂
Very welcome! I hoped you enjoy it!
Today I've got red and green lentils available - which is better to substitute for the brown lentils that this recipe calls for? Thanks!
Either would work, but green would probably give you a result that's closer to the original recipe. Red would make it more like a dal with eggplant chunks (which I'm sure would also be delicious!).
I really enjoyed this dish, and how quick and effortless it is, but mine turned out really spicy. I omitted the serrano pepper altogether, and used 1.25 tablespoon garam masala, and still I had to add more tomatoes to be able to eat this, even though I normally like spicy food. I've bought garam masala at an ethnic store, so it might be stronger than what most places sell, but next time I'll start with with 0.25 tablespoon. Adding a dollop of yogurt would help for sure, but then it's not vegan any more.
Made this for dinner and served with mashed potatoes (vegan) instead of rice- so great! Highly recommend. Almost like an curry vegan shepard's pie.