Recipe - Braised Eggplant

1 Eggplant
1 Or
2 Cloves garlic
3 tablespoon Oil or lard
1 cup Stock
2 tablespoon Soy sauce
One half teaspoon Salt

1. Peel eggplant; cut lengthwise in quarters, then crosswise in 1inch
sections. Crush garlic.

2. Heat oil. Add garlic; stirfry a few times. Add eggplant and stirfry
gently to coat with oil (1 to 2 minutes).

3. Add stock, soy sauce and salt and bring to a boil. Then simmer, covered,
until done (10 to 15 minutes).

NOTE: Overcooking makes eggplant mushy. It's at its best when soft on the
outside, but still firm inside. VARIATIONS:

1. After step 2, add 1 tablespoon shrimp sauce and stirfry 1 minute more.
Then pick up step 3, omit the soy sauce and salt.

2. In step 3, add 2 tablespoons of dried shrimp (which have been simmered
10 minutes in 1 pup of water). Then, during the last 5 minutes of cooking,
add the soy sauce and salt. (The shrimp water may be substituted for the
stock.)

From The Thousand Recipe Chinese Cookbook, ISBN 0517658704. Downloaded
from Glen's MM Recipe Archive, http://www.erols.com/hosey.