Nyob Zoo All!
My mom and I have been growing lots of herbs this season and thought I would use up our cilantro and green onions in something. So I decided to make eggplant pepper dip because it taste the best during summer when herbs and plants are in season. The flavor is soooo good. Slightly sweet, salty, very herbaceous, spicy and wow…Just amazing over rice or with any protein you like. Hope you can give this one a try because it’s one of my favorites 🙂
Main Ingredients
Eggplant: Use Chinese or Japanese Eggplant. This will create a much sweeter and also tender dip.
Fresh herbs/aromatics: Garlic, shallots, chili peppers, green onions, and cilantro
Seasoning: Salt, mushroom seasoning or msg, and fish sauce.
Bake until everything is fully cooked and charred. Baking the eggplant skin on will help retain the moisture from the inside.
Peel off the eggplant skin
Use a mortar and pestle to finish making the dip
Serve as is over rice or with your favorite type of protein. I like to eat it with fried chicken.
Since this dip is so flavorful and herbaceous, it’s great as is over fresh steamed rice.
Enjoy!
-Cindy Her (C.HerCreations)
Eggplant Pepper Dip
Ingredients
- 2 lb raw Chinese or Japanese Eggplant
- 6-8 whole Thai chili peppers (more or less depends on you)
- 1 cup shallots (chopped)
- 1 whole bulb garlic (~10-12 whole cloves)
- 1/2 cup cilantro (chopped)
- 1-2 whole green onion stalks (chopped)
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 1 Tbsp fish sauce
- 1 tsp mushroom seasoning
Instructions
Roast the eggplants and herbs
- Line baking sheet with foil. Wash the eggplants well and roast the eggplant on bake at 450' F with THE SKIN ON for 15 minutes. Don't forget to poke around 3 holes (with a fork) on each eggplant to ensure proper cooking. After 15 minutes of baking, flip/rotate and cook for another 15 minutes or until fully cooked. Set aside to cool. Then peel off the skin and cut into small pieces. Also roast the whole garlic cloves, rough chopped shallots, and chili peppers along with the eggplants. The chili peppers took about 15 minutes to cook. Take it out and allow the eggplants, garlic, and shallots to continue cooking. They took about 30 minutes total.
Pound away
- In your mortar n pestle, add in the roasted chili peppers, garlic, shallots, salt and mushroom seasoning. Pound until the pepper is nice and pounded. Then add in the roasted eggplant and chopped cilantro, green onions and fish sauce. Pound until everything is well mixed. Taste, adjust, and serve. I like to eat it simply over fresh steamed rice. But you can also serve it with your favorite protein (Fried chicken, bbq pork, beef, etc)
Notes
