EGGPLANT SALAD GREEK STYLE (MELITZANOSALATA)

Every summer our love affair with eggplant is renewed.  Grown in backyard gardens and sold at vegetable stands all over the world, eggplants come in various sizes, shapes and colours.  Bake them, stuff them, fry them, grill them, or even make sweet preserves out of them (yes, very small eggplants can be turned into a spoon sweet, a type of Greek dessert).  One of the most popular ways for Greeks to cook eggplants is to turn them into this luscious salad.  It's served as an accompaniment for drinks or as a starter to a meal. You can spread it on a piece of bread or eat it plain.  Either way, it is a heavenly summer treat.  Its texture is that of a spread or a dip, but Greeks simply refer to it as a salad. 

There are two types of eggplant salad:  One is really smooth and is made with grilled or roasted eggplant which is pureed with just some olive oil, lemon juice or vinegar, and a touch of garlic.  The other type, the one I prefer, is country-style rustic and chunky.  Its ingredients depend on regional interpretations.  For example, southern Greece produces a tremendous amount of tomatoes, therefore tomatoes tend to be added to just about anything, including eggplant salad. In Macedonia, where peppers are really plentiful, roasted peppers are added, and in Thrace, folks like to add walnuts. You could say that just about every Greek cook has his or her own version of this  salad. Being descended from Macedonian and Thracian stock, I add peppers and walnuts. That's how my grandmother made eggplant salad, and I follow suit.
  

The key to making a great tasting eggplant salad is to get fresh off the farm eggplants. Not long ago I bought some from the supermarket; they wound up tasting like cardboard. This time around I drove the two extra miles to a wonderful farm stand and there I found some really cute, and as it turned out great tasting minuature  eggplants. They were turned into a delicious salad. Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:

1/4 cup olive oil

1/2 teaspoon salt

 black pepper to taste

1 teaspoon white balsamic vinegar

2 teaspoons lemon juice

1 shallot or the half of a small onion

1 small clove of garlic 

2 tablespoons chopped parsley

1/2 teaspoon dried oregano

2 Italian frying peppers or 1 large sweet pepper
2 tablespoons walnuts to make walnut butter

1 tablespoon well crumbled feta cheese 

5 or six baby eggplants

Directions:

• Prick the eggplants with a fork, set them on a baking sheet and roast them in a 400°F /200°C oven until the skins are wrinkled and the eggplants have collapsed. This should take about 40 minutes. 
• During the last half hour place the peppers in the oven and let them roast. 
• Remove the eggplants and peppers from the oven and allow them to cool until they are safe to handle. Peel the skin from the peppers and remove the seeds.
• Slice the eggplants down the middle and remove their flesh. Chop it up, chop up the peppers too, and place everything in a large bowl. 
• Chop the onion and garlic and throw that in the bowl as well.  
• Add the parsley, oregano and crumbled feta.
• Place the walnuts in a food processor and grind them until they are smooth and begin to release their oils. That's the walnut butter. Add it to the rest of the ingredients. If you don't want to go to all the trouble of making walnut butter, just chop the walnuts really well and use them that way. I alternate between the two methods, depending on my mood. If I feel that I'll enjoy washing the food processor, I'll make walnut butter.  If I want to stay away from suds, I just chop up the walnuts, and that's that!
• Now add the olive oil, lemon juice, vinegar, and salt and pepper. Mix all the ingredients well.  You may need to play around with the amount of oil you're going to use.  Sometimes eggplants want just a bit more oil, sometimes they don't.
• I hope you love this recipe. The salad will keep covered in the refrigerator for about three or four days. But the longer it hangs around, the more potent the taste of garlic becomes (keep that in mind when you are adding garlic to it). If you're having company, the eggplant salad will be polished off, no worries! 

CREAMY AND CHEESY ARBORIO RICE WITH ASPARAGUS AND ARTICHOKES

How about a cheater's risotto? Here's a recipe for it, boys and girls! If you would rather not stand over the stove to keep adding liquid as the rice cooks, here is an alternative method of making risotto. The rice is left to cook on its own, and then cream, Gruyère and Pecorino are added to make a good, creamy rice. 

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 cup arborio rice 
3 and 3/4 cups no-salt vegetable broth 
1 lb asparagus trimmed and peeled

1 cup frozen artichokes, thawed and sliced into quarters
2 tbsp unsalted butter plus one tablespoon olive oil
2 shallots, chopped 
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1/3 of a cup grated Gruyère cheese

1/4 cup Pecorino Romano cheese 

1/4 cup heavy cream
2 scallions, white and light-green parts only, sliced
some herbs: 

fresh parsley, fresh chives, fresh dill, chopped well

some dried tarragon
pepper to taste

Directions:

• In a medium pot heat the oil, add the rice and stir over medium heat for about three minutes. 
• Pour in a quarter of the broth and cook, stirring until the broth is absorbed. 
• Add the rest of the broth, bring to a boil, and cover the pot. Lower the heat to low and cook for twenty minutes. Turn off the heat set the rice aside, letting it finish cooking on its own. 
• Cut the asparagus into two-inch pieces and reserve the tips. 
• Bring a small saucepan of salted water to a boil. Drop in the asparagus and cook for two minutes. Scoop it out and reserve.
• Throw the asparagus tips in the water. Allow them to cook for two minutes and drain. 
• Over medium heat, melt the butter and add the shallots and artichokes. Cook stirring for about five minutes. Halfway through cooking add the garlic. 
• Stir in the asparagus pieces (not the tips) and remove from the heat.
• Over low heat, stir the cheese into the rice. 
• Add the heavy cream.
• Add the shallot and asparagus mixture.
• Mix in the scallions and herbs. 
• Season with pepper.
• Place into a serving bowl and top with the asparagus tips.