Eggplant is the most popular vegetable in autumn. When well-cooked, it can taste even better than meats.There are various ways of cooking eggplant in China, but braising and steaming might be the top two popular ones. Sometimes, we marinate summer tender eggplants.

Braised eggplants with garlic sauce is my favorite method of making eggplants in this autumn, using very basic seasonings and producing a well balanced dish with strong garlic aroma. There is another popular Chinese eggplant dish named as “Yu Xiang Eggplants”, which is named “Chinese eggplants in spicy garlic sauce”. That’s a completely different versions.

Though eggplants can be extremely delicious, they are not liked by every house wife cook as they are hard to handle and need lots of oil. I have been trying to search ways to reduce oil absorbed by the eggplants. The final solution is to soak the eggplants in slightly salty water and let them to absorb the water as much as possible. The water contained in the eggplants can help to accelerate the cooking process and make the eggplants much softer.

Coating eggplants with cornstarch might be another effective method, as the cornstarch will form a perfecting outside shell. But the eggplants lose the soft and sticky texture if cornstarch is adopted.

Before we start to make this garlicky eggplants, please note that the oil used for cook the eggplants is not the oil amount you will take in. When the eggplant bites are cooked until soft, they will release the oil and you can save the oil for vegetable stir fries. So you can absolutely speed up the frying process by using more oil to cover the eggplants.  Authentic Chinese table has a different philosophy from western cuisine. We do not emphasize on single dish but the whole table. When this dish is oily, we usually match simple and light soups (tofu soup with Bok Choy) or stir fries to balance the nutrition.

Ingredients

• 2 long tender Asian eggplants
• pinch of salt for salty water
• 3 tbsp. cooking oil + 1/2 tbsp. if needed
• 3-4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 green pepper, cut into small pieces
• 1 tbsp. light soy sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon sugar
• 1 tsp. salt or to taste

Steps: 

Cut the eggplants into one bite size. Throw them in a large pot with water, add pinch of salt and marinate with a weight for 10 minutes. Transfer out and drain slightly (do not over dry, just pick the eggplants up).

At the mean time, heat up wok and 3 tablespoons of oil. Add the eggplants in wok and fry over middle fire. Stir from time to time but do not move the eggplants frequently. When they are softened, transfer the eggplants out and keep some oil for frying the garlic.  Less oil stir-frying may take longer time. If you want to speed up the process, use 1/3 cup of oil and deep-fry those eggplants bites.

If there is no oil left, add around 1/2 tablespoon of oil. Add garlic in, heat over slow fire until aromatic.

Add green peppers and return the eggplants, add light soy sauce and sugar. And sprinkle salt at the last.