Food like/dislikes AND medieval bread WAS RE: [Sca-cooks]MockApple Pie?

[Phil Troy/ G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach Laura C. Minnick:
>At 06:01 AM 1/29/2004, you wrote:
>
>>May I suggest you slice an eggplant in medium to small thickness, slicing
>
>Nice try, Angharad, but you have as good a chance changing 
>Adamantius' mind about the Yankees  as you would of eggplant...
>
>'Lainie

That may be correct. Actually, you'd have a better shot at convincing 
me of the virtues of eggplant. Eggplant merely suffers from a 
frequent failure of cooks to present it to its best advantage. It is 
not The Evil Empire, like that other thing, that Y-word thing we 
don't talk about.

(And they say the people of the East Kingdom are tactless... eggplant 
wouldn't melt in my mouth, isn't that the expression?)

In actual fact, I'm pretty well-versed in all the lore connected with 
How To Keep Eggplant From Being Slimy And Bitter; I just have a 
pretty sensitive palate and nose, and while the helpful suggestions 
people make _are_ helpful, they only reduce the situation without 
eliminating it. Eggplant is just eggplant, and if you don't like it 
to have a touch of bitterness or mucilage, which it has even when 
sliced this way or that, or salted or not, fried or roasted, etc., 
then the thing to do is enjoy the other vegetables that don't have 
those characteristics. It's like blaming lager beer for being bitter; 
what's the point?

My friend Barbara makes a great eggplant caviar, and I usually like 
caponata. I've also had some success with halved, roasted eggplant 
(the way you normally roast them for any of several presentations, 
shredding them with  two forks like pulled barbecued pork -- easy to 
avoid seeds that way), tossed in a hot pan with sliced garlic, good 
olive oil, Kosher salt, excessive amounts of coarse black pepper, 
cooked pappardelle pasta or fettucine,  shredded flat parsley, and 
shavings of parmigiano. This is my contribution to the "eggplant 
dishes for people that don't like eggplant" chapter...

I don't care much for the stuff, but I can cook it... ;-)

As for keeping the Yankees from being slimy and bitter, I don't have 
much hope, but they say that cyborg clone of Graig Nettles will be 
ready any day now...

Adamantius