Roasted aubergine dip with tandoori spices.

Roasted aubergine dip with tandoori spices

Apart from when I want to cook a ratatouille, I almost never buy aubergines. David hates them since he had an ex vegetarian girlfriend who, according to him, used to put them in everything she cooked. Today, he can’t even stand the smell of aubergines.

I don’t even try to change his mind, as I’m not patient enough and most of all I think that time is my best friend if I want to succeed.

A couple of weeks ago, I had a lot of aubergines in my kitchen, as I got an extra organic vegetable basket from one of my friends who was on vacation.

I was pleased with the idea of preparing roasted aubergine puree just for Gabrielle and me, Noé having decided to follow his father’s tastes, don’t ask me why.

To change from my recipe which can be found in one of my books, I took Thierry Torens’s idea from his French book “Varations autour des épices” which consists of adding tandoori spices to the aubergines. However, the rest of my version has nothing to do with his recipe.

His idea works very well, this mixture of spices gives a beautiful nearly orange color to the puree and a lot of different aromas.

The term tandoori can have different meanings, as is often the case in different cooking around the world. First and foremost it designates dishes cooked in an clay oven called a “tandoor”. The most famous of these dishes is the tandoori chicken. But it also designates a mixture of spices used in Indian cooking, most often to marinate meat, poultry, or fish before cooking them in the famous tandoor, giving them a beautiful reddish color. This mixture of spices is more fragrant than spicy and its composition varies according to brands.

Roasted aubergines dip with Tandoori spices

Ingredients for a small jar of 15 cl

3 small aubergines (500g)
1 tbsp almond puree
½ garlic glove
1 tbsp olive oil
¼ level tsp tandoori spices
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp lime juice

Preheat your oven to 200°C.
Wash the aubergines and make 2 to 3 cuts in each aubergine.
Lay them on a baking sheet lined with foil paper and roast them for 45 minutes, until soft, turning them twice. This cooking time depends on the size of your aubergines.
Let them cool down, split into two parts and remove the flesh with a large spoon.
Put the flesh in a food processor bowl, add the rest of the ingredients and mix until obtaining a rough puree.
Taste and eventually rectify the seasonings.

Serve with tzatziki and homemade pita bread, it’s heaven, but not for everyone…

Notes on the ingredients

My tandoori spices come from Bahadourian and are sold in a beautiful metallic box. You can find them in gourmet stores, or buy them online on their website. The mixture is made of  Paprika, Salt, hot Chili, Garlic, Cumin, Coriander, Thyme, Celery, Caraway, Rosemary, Cloves, Bay leaf and Cinnamon.

The almond puree can be found in organic shops and you can also make it yourself, by following this recipe.

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Vending machine food? Maybe when I was young and invincible. No way I'd go there now. I can see the "gawking as you drive by an accident" kind of draw it might have.