Chinese Vegetarian Recipes

Spicy Eggplant Shreds

Spicy Eggplant

Introduction:

I can not deny that I have introduced many eggplant recipes on this website already, including stir-fried eggplant (e.g. today’s spicy eggplant), deep fried eggplant, etc.

However, eggplant is a vegetable that my girlfriend loves and the Chinese people eat everyday. There are even several kinds of eggplants available in the market.

So I have to keep coming up with new posts with new eggplant recipes. And diversity is the charisma of cooking. So we should diversify even when we are cooking at home for ourselves. Don’t you think?

Ingredients:

Eggplant: 500 g (or 2 medium-sized)

Fresh red chili pepper: 2

Seasonings:

Dried red chili pepper: 10 g (or five)

Garlic: 1 clove

Soy sauce: 2 tablespoons

White sugar: 1 tablespoon

Cooking wine: 1 teaspoon

Scallion: 5 g

Ginger: 1 slice

Vegetable oil: 60 g

Preparation Work:

1. Peel and rinse the eggplants, then cut them into find shreds that are around 4 cm long;

2. Shred the fresh and dried chili peppers finely;

3. Cut the ginger slice into shreds;

4. Mash the garlic clove;

5. Shred the scallion;

Cooking Steps:

1. Pour the vegetable oil into the wok, put the wok on low heat and go to the next step when the oil gets tepid;

2. Drop the dried chili pepper shreds into the oil and take them out when they change in color;

3. Leave the oil in the wok and continue heating it;

4. Drop the scallion shreds, shredded ginger and the fresh chili pepper shreds into the wok, and go to Step 5 when they set off their smell;

5. Pour the shredded eggplant into the wok and stir fry them until they are done;

6. Season it with cooking wine, soy sauce, white sugar, mashed garlic and some water;

7. Turn to high heat and thicken the liquid before serving on a plate.

Cooking Tips:

1. When you really cook this spicy eggplant dish by yourself, you will find that the eggplant shreds will absorb the oil completely when they are dropped into the wok all at the same time even before you stir them.

After some time of heating as you keep stirring, you will find that oil starts to emerge from the eggplant shreds. That is when the shredded eggplant becomes done.

2. If you don’t have the tool to smash the garlic clove, you can just mince it or pat it with the knife with the blade being parallel to the chopping board.