Sorry for another mustard recipe but we Bangladeshis love mustard so much that we try to cook almost anything with it! I promise that this Mustard Aubergine recipe would be a few ingredients, easy to cook -can be eaten with anything – worth of time kind of recipe!

Beside aubergine, we only need four key ingredients – mustard, black cumin, turmeric and green chili. I have cooked this dish with Bangladeshi mustard oil, but you can use any white vegetable oil.

So, we need to prep veggies first. Since aubergine is very soft and easy to cook kind of vegetable, I cut it in big long chucks so it can be remained in texture after cooking. If you cut the aubergine too small and cook it, it usually gets very mushy.

After cutting in big chucks, I coated aubergine with pinch of turmeric. Turmeric will give a really nice color when we fry it and also help is avoiding oxidation. We don’t need to add salt or keep it marinated for long time, as aubergine tends to release lots of water if kept marinated and thus becomes soggy.

Now its time to shallow fry the aubergines. It will be one pot recipe so I have taken a medium deep pan and heated two table spoon or around 10ml of mustard oil. I put the fleshy side to fry, partly because to keep the texture. If you fry the skin of aubergine, it sometimes breaks and does not hold the texture.

While aubergines were being fried, I have made a paste of mustard and green chili. I have pre-made green chili paste and mustard powder, so what I did was mixed the two with a table spoon of water. The mustard powder – chili paste ratio was: 5:2. However, if you don’t have pre-made mustard powder, you can just make a paste of them together in blending machine. Make sure to make it thicker and smooth.

Aubergine were nicely fried on both side by this time and I set them aside in a plate.

In the same pan, after I took out the aubergines, I added two dry chili and a tea spoon of black cumin. If you want, you can avoid dry chili but these are just for flavor, not heat. So once the black cumin starts to pop, I added the mustard-green chili paste and salt to the pan. I quickly stirred so it does not stick to the bottom. The paste tends to splatter a little, so better to keep the temperature of oven low.

After 10-12 seconds of stirring the spice mixture in the pan, I added little water. As you can see in the picture, I washed the bowl where I made the paste and used that water, in this way there’s no waste!

After adding the water, the spice mix need to simmer little bit, until it gets thicker and raw smells goes away. I stirred once a while so it does not stick to bottom. While the spice mix was still runny I added the fried aubergine to the pan.

I coated aubergine with spice mix very well but carefully, as they are very tender. Now we need to cook them for a while.

I covered the pot with a lid and turned the heat very low. Remember not to stir now because aubergine will loose their texture. Also I won’t add any extra water so I kept them covered to cook them thoroughly.

After 5 minutes of simmering in low heat, I flipped aubergine very gently and let the other side simmer for five more minutes. I am happy that aubergines are still in shape and did not turn into mushes. I covered them again with lid and simmered in low heat.

So, finally my aubergine in mustard is ready! I made the gravy little thicker but if you want you can keep it more runny. Either way, it tastes great with rice or flat bread!

Recipe: 3-4 Servings Prep time: 3 minutes, Cooking time: 20 minutes

Ingredients: 1 big fat Aubergine Spices and condiments: 5 tablespoon Mustard seed paste or puree or powder 2 Green Chili or 1 tbsp green chili paste 1/2 teaspoon Black cumin 1/4 teaspoon of Turmeric powder 10ml Mustard oil/Vegetable oil 1teaspoon Salt 1-2 Dried Chili

Instruction: 1. Wash and cut aubergine in 3cm big long pieces. Coat them with turmeric powder. 2. Take a medium deep pan and heat oil. Add and shallow fry aubergine on flesh side until they are nicely roasted on both side. When done, set them aside. 3. Make a thick smooth paste of mustard seed and green chili. 3. In the same pan, add nigella or black cumin seeds and dry chili. When popping, add mustard-green chili paste and salt and cook for few seconds in low heat. Add a splash of water to the pan and let the spice cook for a minute or until oil starts to get separated. 4. Now add fried aubergine to the pan and coat with spice mix gently. Cover the pan with lid and simmer in low heat for 4-5 minutes. Check salt and add more if needed. After 4-5 minutes flip the other side of aubergine and simmer again for next 4-5 minutes. 5. When gravy gets in your desired consistency, turn off the heat and serve Mustard Aubergine warm with rice or flat bread!