Eggplant Parmigiana - Attempt #1

Okay.  I was never a big vegetable eater.  As a kid, I normally refuse to acknowledge vegetables as a valid food group along with the heavy hitters like Meat and Desserts.  But as I grew older, I got to appreciate vegetables more... gradually, I was liking it more and more... It started with tomatoes and lettuce (Damn you Wendy's with your salad bar and your 15.55 burgers packed with vegetables!!!) which led to other vegetables..

Fast forward to now... One of the vegetables I still haven't eaten is the "TALONG".  Yup! The mighty Aubergine means nothing to me! Nothing I tell you!  Except for that one night... on that one party... one fella arrived with his pot luck for the night... it was... Eggplant Parmigiana! Or so he told me...  Once I heard the word Eggplant I droned out the rest of the words... but as the night wore on, the dish intrigued me... there it was, sitting at the corner end of the table... just lying there... so I decided to try it with a nudge from my wife (who wouldn't miss an opportunity to make me eat any veggie I haven't tasted yet)... And Lo! Behold! It was damn spicy!!! It was... it was... different from what I was expecting from an eggplant dish... I mean, I tried roasted eggplant before and the squishy, yucky center of the eggplant always grossed me out.  But this dish... wow! It was great!  Mind you It was still squishy and yucky but not too much plus the collage of the flavors and the kick of the chili totally made up for it!

That experience led me to a new appreciation of the violet vegetable...  It made me want to cook my own Eggplant Parmigiana.  Bernie (The guy who brought the Eggplant dish to the party) still haven't given me his recipe yet but that did not deter me from trying.  Ha! At times like these, Google is my best friend! Although there wasn't an exact recipe which mimicked Bernie's dish but hey, I guess I have to wing it on some areas.

So here's my Eggplant Parmigiana Attempt #1:

We were already eating it when my wife remembered I had to take some pictures!

I chickened out on making it too spicy but not a bad dish for a first attempt!  I won't be posting the recipe just yet coz there's a lot of room for improvement... mark my words!  I will post the recipe when I think it's ready!

Till my next mumblings!