Eggplant Shish Kebab
Patlıcan Kebabı
July 24th, 2006
You saw the beatiful flowers of the eggplants growing in our backyard in my previous post and sure enough there was a recipe to follow them. But lazy me, kept putting off writing this very easy recipe. I want to blame it on the heat wave that is baking the Northern California valley now. Truth: I am lazy, admitted.
Many spellings are acceptable in English for kebabs, kababs, kabobs and ?
Just because we spell them as “kebap” in Turkish, I chose the closest spelling in English: kebab. Before you ask me, yes, we do use the Latin alphabet in Turkish, with a few extra letters. Another piece of info: the word shish (şiş in Turkish) means skewer. Hence the name of this kebab.
I hope you are not mistakenly thinking that Turkish or Middle Eastern food is all about kebabs. Having said that, this is one of many kebab varieties prepared in Turkey. The main kebab mix changes from one person to another. For the parts of the country where they can get quality meat (talking real quality here) they only mix in salt and pepper to the ground beef. I have tried the same here, but the result was nowhere close to what I am used to. So, it was time to add in some more spices, to produce this recipe. Tried it more then once now and convinced that it is spicy and good. Reduce the blackpepper amount if you do not like very spicy food.
I strongly suggest using metal skewers for this type of food, as the metal heats up, it also cooks the meat/vegetable touching it.
- 500gr (1.1 lbs) ground beef, medium fat
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 Tbs ground black pepper (reduce if you do not like spicy)
- 1 tsp pepper paste (can be found in local Turkish, Middle Eastern stores, or online)
- 1/2 onion (when chopped in small pieces, about 1/2 cups)
- about a quarter bunch of fresh parsley (when chopped, about 1/2 cups)
- 3 - 4 long japanese eggplants, cut in 1/2 inch width
- Chop the onion and the parsley fine, mix in all the ingredients. The more you knead the mix, the better it is. Take about a walnut size piece, make a ball around the skewer. Place a piece of eggplant. Alternate.
- While preparing the other skewers, make sure to rest the ones that has meat & eggplants on a tray/baking dish so that the meatballs do not touch — this will help retain their shape. Similarly, try to cook them without having the meat and the eggplant touching the grill
- As the skewers are cooked, you can put them in a big enough pot/baking dish with its lid on to help them get softer as the other skewers are still on the fire, cooking.
Afiyet olsun!
July 24th, 2006 at 9:24 pm
That looks darned yummy! Out of curiosity though, what are the other letters and their sounds?
July 25th, 2006 at 7:59 am
It really strikes me that Turkish cuisine uses so few spices. Being Dutch and because of our uninspiring cuisine I have become a lover of Turkish food and I cook it at least two times a week, but I must admit that I always add more spices than the original recipes call for. Do you think most recipes leave them to the imagination of the cook or is it simply ‘not done’ in Turkey to cover up the pure taste of, for instance, beef or lamb?
July 25th, 2006 at 6:06 pm
Garrett check out http://www.onlineturkish.com/alphabet.asp they cover the alphabet and their sounds pretty good ;)
Robert, I think you are not wrong in your observation; we use mainly the “basic” spices; salt, pepper, cumin, oregano are the ones that come to my mind right now along with herbs such as parsley, mint. Having said that, regional cooking may ask for some special spices, but all in all a recipe would not call for many. Where did you learn Turkish food to be able to cook it yourself?
July 26th, 2006 at 12:07 pm
This looks very delicious. I’ve never heard of or would have never thought about Eggplant shish kebabs!
Paz
July 29th, 2006 at 1:13 am
Hi Fethiye,
To answer your question about where I learned to cook Turkish dishes, well, on the internet really, such as with your site which I found via Binnur’s. And our local library has at least 10 different cook books since there are lots of Turkish people living in the Netherlands.
Nice recipe by the way, this patlican kebabi. I once made a recipe with a similar name in which you had to make slits in the eggplant and fill these up with flat slices of ground beef. Looked great.
And strangely enough another recipe with the same name in which slices of eggplant were laid in an oven dish with a meat-tomato sauce poured over them topped with green peppers and tomatoes. I thought it was more a sort of moussaka. Things are easily called kebab in Turkey, aren’t they?
August 1st, 2006 at 8:16 am
Nice recipe… I love eggplants!
Ciao.
August 1st, 2006 at 9:12 pm
Paz, you should try it out; you may like it.
Robert, I am glad to hear that these sites are giving you an idea of Turkish cooking! Binnur’s site has a lot more recipes! Another good observation from you: “things are easily called kebab in Turkey.” As my husband sometimes teases me saying “there is borek, kebab and kofte for every ingredient!” ;)
Thanks Orchidea!
August 11th, 2006 at 7:14 pm
My son has just returned from a long sojourn in Turkey and all the time he was away we received almost daily emails from him which he sent from an Irish pub in Istanbul :) and very few of those mails do not mention the food of Turkey which he absolutely loves.The breads of Turkey do not compare to any thing he had ever tasted, the butter, the yogurt, the meat everything he tasted was an awkening to the taste of really good food.This is the reason I am scouring the net to find English or French speaking Turkish food bloggers, I am happy to have found yours and will most certainly try your recipes. Thank you so much for your blog.
French Kirin in Montreal Canada
August 14th, 2006 at 8:07 pm
Hi Kirin, I hope you will like Turkish recipes that are blogged here as well! I will certainly keep blogging as time permits. And I am so glad your son returned back with good food experiences.