Aubergine. Stewed!

I've just been back in London staying with my folks for a couple of weeks.  My dear mum had rather a lot on her (proverbial) plate with my dad, two of their three children, my brother-in-law, a visiting aunt and two small grandchildren all roaming around the place and so on arrival I told her I'd be doing most of the cooking whilst I was home.  Lots of brownie points for me of course, but hardly altruistic: one could say that with so much free time, my mother's wonderful Lacanche, a garden bursting with herbs and a brand new Waitrose down the road I was pretty much in heaven.

Whilst I was there, Mr Alan Rosenthal of Stewed! put a rather urgent-sounding call out for a volunteer to try out a recipe from his new book (out in October, published by Ebury, available to pre-order on Amazon and full of divine stews and one-pot dishes to fill even the most vacuous of bellies). Well, who was I not to leap at the chance?   The recipe Alan sent over was for Caponata, a sweet and sour vegetarian stew from Sicily that combines plump chunks of aubergine with a juicy mix of olives, capers, pine nuts and olives. I'm presently unable to get enough of the wonderfully fleshy beast that is the aubergine (see my previous post) and thus I rather thought I was onto a winner.  And I really was.  I wouldn't say it if I didn't mean it: this is one hearty, mouthwatering, flavoursome meal; simple and pleasing to make, and wonderful with a bowl of basmati rice on a warm summer's evening.  Both thumbs up from the whole family.  Here's Alan's recipe:

Ingredients (serves 4):

120ml extra virgin olive oil

750g aubergine, cut into 1.5cm cubes

1 onion, finely chopped

2 celery sticks, fairly finely chopped

3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced

500g fresh chopped tomatoes or 2 tins chopped tomatoes

2 tsp sugar 

100g pitted green olives, rinsed and halved

35g capers, rinsed

2 tbsp currants

3 tbsp pine nuts

5 tbsp red wine vinegar

salt and freshly ground black pepper

Method:

1 Heat three tablespoons of the olive oil in a deep, wide non-stick frying pan. When hot, fry half the aubergines on medium heat for 5–7 minutes until golden brown on all sides. Transfer them to a bowl. Add a further three tablespoons of oil to the pan and repeat with the remaining aubergine.

2 Heat the remaining oil in the pan and add the onion, celery and garlic and cook gently for 10–12 minutes until the onions are soft. Add the tomatoes and sugar and continue to cook for 15 minutes, by which time the tomatoes will have completely broken down.

3 Throw the remaining ingredients into the pan along with some generous pinches of salt and some black pepper as well as the fried aubergines. Cook gently on the hob for a further 10 minutes.

4 Top with basil leaves and serve either hot or cold.

It transpired that Alan wanted to feature the recipe in the Stewed! newsletter and so when it arrived in my virtual mailbox a few days later I got a personal thanks in print (above left).  More fool him - the pleasure was all mine!

DISCLAIMER Alan and I have been friends for several years now: in Spring 2009 I spent many a very long Wednesday chopping and potting for him when he was just getting going with what is now one very successful business. I love his food: he even provided B and I with our favourite Persian chicken stew for our wedding guests in January. So although this post is obviously a bit of a plug for Alan and Stewed!, I asked him if I could blog this recipe because I thought it was utterly delicious and very much in need of sharing... and so it's very much a voluntary plug of love.