Black Sea eggplant caviar
6 servings
60 minutes
Eggplant caviar in the Black Sea style is a true gastronomic treasure of Russian cuisine. Its history is rooted in the traditions of southern regions of Russia, where fresh vegetables and aromatic herbs play a key role in cooking. Baked eggplants with a rich smoky aroma combine with sweet-sour tomatoes, spicy onions, and garlic to create an amazingly tender texture and balanced flavor. Lemon juice adds a light refreshing tang to the dish, while vegetable oils make it especially velvety. This caviar pairs perfectly with toasted bread, meat dishes, and even as an independent snack, evoking summer memories of warm evenings by the sea. It is easy to prepare but holds the harmony of traditions and rich flavor in every bite.
1
Preheat the oven to 200 degrees and place the eggplants in for half an hour to forty minutes. You can send them whole, and the signal of full readiness will be the dull explosions of baked eggplants, but this is, let's say, a bit unesthetic, as the oven can get dirty with eggplant flesh, though the spirit of eggplants baked this way is more impressive. You can trim the ends of each fruit or make cuts, then there will be no explosions, but the eggplant will be slightly less flavorful.
- Eggplants: 6 pieces
2
The prepared eggplants should cool slightly, after which all the nutritious fibers should be scooped out with a spoon, discarding the useless skin. Tear the fibers into small pieces by hand and store them in a deep container. Finely chop the onion, garlic, and parsley, and cut the tomatoes into small pieces. Add all this to the eggplants, pour in lemon juice, olive and sunflower oil, add sugar, salt, and pepper (eggplant absorbs a huge amount of salt, so don't worry too much - it's hard to oversalt this dish).
- Eggplants: 6 pieces
- Red onion: 2 heads
- Garlic: 6 cloves
- Parsley: 50 g
- Tomatoes: 2 pieces
- Lemon: 1 piece
- Olive oil: 100 ml
- Sunflower oil: 50 ml
- Sugar: 1 tablespoon
- Salt: to taste
- Ground black pepper: to taste
3
Mix, let it sit for a while, and serve as an appetizer or side dish with grilled meat.