This melt-in-your-mouth Szechuan eggplant is pan fried, coated in a garlicky sweet-spicy sauce and served with crispy tofu over a bed of rice.
I think I just realized what my theme is for VeganMofo. I didn’t think I was going to have one, and it’s kinda funny because a few weeks ago my boyfriend was helping me brainstorm and suggested the theme of “harvest.” A nice thought, but what would I even do with that? I mean, this is a vegan food blog where the majority of recipes feature some type of fresh fruit or veggie, which was obviously harvested in some way or another. But then as I was getting this post together and looking at the posts I’ve got planned out for the next few weeks, I realized that most of them feature something that came out of my garden, or a friend’s garden, or the farmers market…you get the drift. I’m guessing lots of you have an overabundance of fresh peppers, tomatoes, zucchini, eggplant and the like in your kitchens. Yesterday’s post featured tomato and basil, both harvested from my backyard. Today it’s eggplant and scallions, also harvested from my own crops. I can’t say every post will be like this (spoiler alert, tomorrow’s isn’t), but most will.
Moving on to eggplant! If you’re like me, you planted the ever-popular purple globe eggplants. Traditionally, however, this dish would be made with Chinese eggplants, which are a bit more tender than globes and other more common varieties. You can get away with subbing another type of eggplant here, and in the U.S. at least, globes are the ones that’ll be easiest for you to find. Globe eggplants are what I planted in my garden this year, simply because I can work them into all kinds of recipes. Just stick with a pound of whatever variety you go with and you should be set. Be sure to let me know how it turns out if you try some fun eggplant substitution.
Serves 4
This melt-in-your-mouth Szechuan eggplant is pan fried, coated in a garlicky sweet-spicy sauce and served with crispy tofu over a bed of rice.
10 minPrep Time
20 minCook Time
30 minTotal Time
Save RecipeIngredients
- Cooking spray or a bit of oil
- 1 lb. extra firm tofu, pressed at least 15 minutes and cubed
- 1/4 cup vegetable broth
- 2 tbsp. soy sauce
- 2 tbsp. brown sugar
- 1 tbsp. rice vinegar
- 2 tsp. Asian chili paste (or to taste)
- 2 tsp. cornstarch
- 1 1/2 tbsp. vegetable oil
- 1 tsp. sesame oil
- 3 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 lb. eggplant, sliced into thin strips (no thicker than 1/2 inch)
- 2 scallions, chopped
Instructions
- Coat large skillet with oil or cooking spray and place over medium-high heat.
- Add tofu to skillet in a single layer. Cook until browned on each side - about 3 minutes per side. Remove from skillet, transfer to a plate and set aside.
- Whisk broth, soy sauce, brown sugar, vinegar, chili paste and cornstarch together in small bowl. Set aside.
- Place vegetable and sesame oil in skillet place over medium heat. Add garlic and sauté for 1 minute.
- Add eggplant strips in a single layer. Cook about 5 minutes, until strips are browned on bottoms. Gently flip and cook another 5 minutes, until browned on opposite side and tender. You can add a dash more oil if the skillet begins to dry out.
- Add soy sauce mixture to skillet and cook about 1 more minute, until thickened and eggplant is well coated.
- Add tofu to skillet and toss to distribute.
- Divide among plates or bowls. Serve with rice and top with scallions.
This post originally published on September 2, 2014.
THIS LOOKS PERFECT!!! I’ve pinned it to my list of recipes to make — thanks!
Awesome! Thanks so much for the pin. Enjoy :)
I’ve never been a fan of eggplant, although I *do* like Szechuan sauce! I haven’t had it in forever. I’ll definitely use this recipe the next time I make tofu fried rice. :)
The sauce was really tasty and I was thinking about what other uses I could put it to as well. Tofu fried rice sounds perfect :)
Sounds delicious and I bet it tastes amazing with all those flavoursome ingredients. Definitely will be recreating the recipe for my vegetarian household!
It really is pretty flavor-packed. Thanks, and I hope you and and everyone in your veggie household enjoys this :)
Eggplant + rice + szechuan = sold. This looks really tasty and I just happen to have some eggplant on hand….
Perfect! Gotta love that combo :) I hope you enjoy it!!
This looks super delicious and just might get my husband to eat eggplant:)
Haha nice! I hope it works. ;) Thanks Ginnie!
Hi there. I love szechuan eggplant and just received a lot (!) of eggplants from my farmers’ market. Do you think I could make it up (without the tofu), freeze it in recipe-sized portions, and then later prepare the tofu and add the thawed eggplant dish and fresh scallions? Obviously, this is a very quick dish to make in the moment but I have the eggplants now. Thanks, and I look forward to other recipes using garden produce because I have a lot of it coming in. Martha
Hi Martha! I’ve had a similar problem – in my case it’s an overabundance of eggplant from my garden this year. From what I’ve read, freezing eggplant after cooking generally works just fine. I’ve never tested that and you can never say for sure with any particular recipe, but I think with this one you’d probably be okay to freeze it. If you do, I’d love to hear how it works out :)
I made this recipe and it was sooooo yummy! I posted my “attempt” on my instagram account. If you have an account , I would be more than happy to tag you :)
Yay!!! So glad you liked this! I don’t have an instagram account…I’m so bad with social media! Hoping to finally get on instagram by the end of the year. Thank you for offering though, and thanks so much for commenting to let me know how it worked out – that always makes me smile. :)
Yum! I love eggplant! I don’t think an abundance of it would ever be a problem for me lol. I also like to cube it up and toss with cherry tomatoes, scallions, olive oil, salt and pepper. Roast at 350 for about 15 minutes. Delish! Can’t wait to make this – thanks for sharing!
I’ve done pretty well with using up all my eggplant since this post, and I still have a few more to harvest. Your roasted eggplant sounds awesome, and so easy. I hope you enjoy this dish when you get to try it! :)
I chose this to be my birthday meal and it didn’t let me down!! Excellent!! Thanks for creating and sharing this recipe!!
Yay! Glad you liked it, and Happy Birthday!!