I've had the 'hunger' for eggplant all season. The strong color, the voluptuous shape, the firm skin, the pillowy flesh, all come together in such an agreeable fashion as to support the tastes of its neighbors while delivering its own mildly musky smoothness. With that tiny voice in my ear whispering 'baba', I set off this summer to really perfect my ganoush. This is my third batch in the last month and I think it's the best. This time, with T. on board, we roasted thick slices of eggplant- slathered with a little olive oil at 450° for about 40 minutes, turning occasionally. Separately in the cuisanart: fresh basil, mint, tahini, fresh garlic, lemon juice were mixed, with olive oil drizzled in while the blade's spinning. When the e.p. came out of the oven, nicely roasted and silky-soft, we scooped the flesh into a large bowl and let it cool. Then we folded in the tahini-herb mixture and seasoned with s-n-p. (In earlier batches I added the eggplant to the cuisinart, which ofcourse yielded a velvety texture, but downplayed the texture of the e.p., which I think is a nice part of this dish.)
We also made our first batches of homemade crackers. Following the easy recipe in the Bittman's How to Cook Everything, we made two kinds- cumin seed and pepper; Chinese 5 spice and sesame. NUMNUMNUM!
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