Italian families typically love eggplant dishes, and tend to be quite fond of pine nuts as well.
It turns out that combining eggplant with pine nuts is a perfect start for creating an appetizer to enjoy year round, and it can be quite delicious during the winter holidays.
Whether a family celebrates New Year’s Eve or happens to celebrate Christmas time (which runs in Italy between Dec 24th aka Christmas Eve through Jan 5th aka the Epiphany Eve when La Befana visits all the good little girls and little boys) into the Epiphany on Jan 6th aka “Little Christmas” per se, specialty appetizers are a treat to be savored.
“Pine Nuts” image Download from Dreamstime (available courtesy of Free-StockPhotos.com)
Although nut prices are extremely high right now compared to other years, especially for pine nuts (pignoli) at around $14+/pound as I write this, this eggplant caponata recipe only uses a Tbsp of pine nuts, so I felt it was still reasonable to post at holiday time.
Other nut prices I noticed at the store have included pecans at $10+/pound, sliced almonds about half the price of pecans, and walnuts are running a tad more than almonds are. Even peanut prices are way up as crop sizes have been way down. We’ve previously discussed the subject of tree nut pricing in a 22Dec2011 blog post topic as part of our series on Holiday Baking entitled “What’s Up With Nut Prices.”
In this recipe, toasting the pine nuts enables one to get a lot of flavor without using a lot of nuts.
EGGPLANT CAPONATA
Ingredients:
- 1 medium eggplant (~1.5 -2 lb.) or two small eggplants (each < 3/4 – 1 lb.) (eggplants with fewer seeds are more desirable, so sometimes it is nice to use either “baby” eggplants or “Japanese” variety purple and white eggplants as these two options don’t have the bitterness of larger mature dark purple/black skin eggplants)
- 6 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
- 1 garlic clove, large, minced
- 1 onion, large, preferably sweet Mayan or Vidalia, coarsely chopped
- 4 Tbsp.tomato sauce
- 2 Tbsp. tomato juice (only if needed)
- 1/2 cup chopped celery
- 1/2 sweet pepper, diced
- 2 Tbsp. drained capers
- 6 green olives, large, stuffed, sliced
- 6 pitted black olives, large, sliced
- 1 Tbsp. pine nuts (pignoli), toasted, finely chopped
- 2-3 basil leaves, fresh, large, minced fine after cutting chiffonade style
- 2 Tbsp. red wine vinegar
- 1 Tbsp. granulated sugar
- Freshly ground black pepper
Method:
- Peel eggplant and cut into slices 1/2 inch thick; then cut eggplant slices into 1/2 inch cubes.
- In a large chef’s skillet, heat 5 Tbsp. olive oil and saute eggplant until brown. Remove eggplant and set aside.
- Add the remaining tablespoon of oil to the pan and saute garlic and onion. Add tomato sauce, celery, and sweet pepper; cover and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes, adding tomato juice only if needed.
- Return eggplant to skillet; add capers, olives, pine nuts, and basil.
- Heat vinegar and sugar together and pour over all vegetables in skillet. Season with freshly ground pepper; cover and simmer, 15 minutes longer, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking.
- Chill and serve on salad greens or with slices of Italian bread.