The flavor's there: roasted eggplant soup

I bet you agree with me: trying to describe the flavor of eggplant is: difficult. It's much easier to describe its color, even if you call it "aubergine." Everyone thinks of that dark purple immediately, but go ahead: give me three words that describe the flavor of eggplant. NOT eggplant parmagiana, not humus, no, not that. Just eggplant.

Not so easy, huh? Annalena is not sure she could give you those words either. Still, it is one of those foods that "I know when I taste it." And it's also one of those foods that really does taste better when its with something else. Does anyone have a recipe that just uses eggplant? I don't think so. You can eat and enjoy steamed broccoli, or a raw tomato, but plain cooked, or raw eggplant? I don't think so.

Cooking eggplant with other things does transform a dish. The flavors meld into something different, but the eggplant taste, with its unidentifiable "finger print" is there. Such is with this soup. Some background.

Annalena has been wondering about eggplant soups for a long time. It should be a vegetable that makes a good soup, because it's very creamy when it's cooked, but without any dairy. It's thick, which makes for a satisfying soup, and there's so much of "it" in one eggplant, that you can make a lot. But how to get FLAVOR?

In researching "eggplant soups," I found that most of them either had almost no eggplant in them, or used fried eggplant as a garnish , or, as is the case in this recipe, roasted it, with other vegetables.

Now, I will be honest (I'm always honest with you... most of the time). This is NOT really the soup I wanted to make. I wanted something that was eggplant ONLY, but as I thought through it, I figured we would try it, and if it didn't work, well, with the season rapidly closing, I would try it again.

This works. It works well. You must make it. The time it takes (nearly 2 hours), may put some of you off, but there is almost no work here. Ready to start? Let's go.

You need 3 pounds of eggplant. The larger specimens will be easier to work with here, but if you have the smaller ones, that's okay too. Stick with the European globe eggplants though. They will make a thicker soup. You will also want six tomatoes. If you have overripe ones, terrific. I bet you could use green ones, too. Don't use heirlooms. Not necessary here. Also, two onions, and about ten cloves of garlic. Peel the garlic, but don't peel the onion. Cut the onion in half, and cut the eggplants in half lengthwise. Preheat your oven to 400, and brush some olive oil on the cut surface of all your vegetables, and toss the garlic in a little of it. Then lay everything out on baking sheets. You will probably need two of them.

When you lay the stuff on the vegetable sheets, lay the cut sides down. If your oven cooks unevenly, the way mine does, rotate the sheets halfway through the 45 minute period you will be roasting . They will take on a caramel color, the tomatoes will wrinkle up, and the smell of roasting onions will make you feel good all over.

So, it took nearly an hour, but how much work did you do? Hmmm...

Get the stuff out and let it cool. Seriously, don't burn yourself here, because it's easy to do so. Take the peels off the onions, and put them in a big soup pot with everything but the eggplants. Then, get yourself a spoon, and scoop the eggplant pulp into the pot too (you can use your hands, but the spoon makes this easier).

Now, add a quart of liquid: chicken stock, vegetable stock, or water if you really must, although I think the water is going to dilute the flavor. Cook this away for 45 minutes.

Now, let's digress to address a cooking issue which did come up while I was making this soup: if you are working with a liquid and it boils away and you didn't want it to, what do you do? Well, if it's a flavored liquid, like stock, assume that the flavoring agents are there. Just add half the amount of water, and proceed. If you need more, later, as I did, add more.

Ok, so we just spent another 45 minutes cooking, but how much work did you do? You put veggies in a pot, and you let them cook. Not too hard, eh?

When the stuff is cool, add it to a blender in small batches, and puree. You're never going to get a totally smooth puree the way you would with a carrot soup, but so what? The color is best described as mahoggany/rust brown. Taste it. Add salt if you want. And you're done. Maybe.

In some variations, cream is added to this soup. I could see cream being added if the only veggie were eggplant, but not here. No, this is good as it is. You'll get about 6-7 cups of soup. More than enough for a good meal for two, or a starter for four.

Eggplant soup. What'll they think up next?