Car-ma

In spite of having thousands of miles under my belt, so to speak, I have cultivated a studious level of ignorance about the inner workings of my car. Such auto ignorance, combined with my penchant for road trips makes me a treasure trove of "And once my car went..." stories.

So I was speeding along I-90, taking in a stunning sunset, when I heard a rattle in the bowels of my prized chariot. Applying my astute intelligence and 95th percentile analytical skills, I thought to myself, "Hmmm, this can only be one of two things". Something is wrong with my car or something is terribly wrong with my car.

First things first. Finding myself acutely stressed, I came upon Golden Arches. It had been a busy weekend, lots of travel plans to be made and executed with precision and here I was stuck at a rest stop with free wi-fi and no laptop.

#@%$!*

Dove into french fries. Nothing like a little grease to get the old neurons firing. To cut a long story short, gentle reader, I dragged away yet another god-fearing AAA guy from his home and hearth. Cleaned the car while waiting for him. Made small talk after he arrived and revived my brave steed. Thanked him profusely. We said our goodbyes, and I sped off in a whirl of dust.

So it all turned out okay :-)

Same goes for an eggplant that came my way! Simply Ming-ed it. Yes, I just made that up :-D

Inspired by Ming Tsai, this recipe is loosely based on the master recipe using red bean sauce.While trying to come up with a vegetarian version, in a flash of inspiration, I used sweet potato. Infatuation with Vitamin A continues.

Anhoo, heres what I did:
1. Diced eggplant into cubes. Sprinkled some salt and let it sit for 15 mins. Zapped a sweet potato in the microwave.
2. To make the marinade: added sambal sauce and red bean paste in equal portions. Added chopped ginger, garlic and green onions.
3. Chucked the cubed vegetables into the marinade and let them hang out in the fridge for a couple hours.
4. Tossed everything into a skillet and cooked till the eggplant was brown round the edges. The sweet potato is already cooked so it just came along for the ride.
5. Garnished with green onions or cilantro.

I quite liked the end-product, eggplant and sweet potato in red bean paste. For one thing, I finally figured out how to use red bean paste. For another thing, this isn't overly sweet or spicy. The background spices are flavorful without being oerwhelming. Especially like how the sweet potato shines through spices. Worked nicely in a wrap or served over barley. Hope to see more ideas at "Eat the Right Stuff". Since theres still some red bean paste in my fridge, I'm already thinking of tofu and broccoli instead of eggplant and sweet potato and all sorts of combinations with the basic master-recipe.

I'm hoping it all turns out okay!