Georgian · Starter

Badrijani Nigvzit

Intermediate
35 min
roughly 2 of 4 for cost
Vegetarian
Vegan

bright · earthy · nutty-toasted · aromatic Leads with acid holding everything up to the light, an earthy, grounding base, opening aromatic and staying there.

Ingredients

3 large aubergines, about 900 g, sliced lengthways 8 mm thick
15 g salt, for drawing the slices
250 ml sunflower oil, for frying
200 g shelled walnuts
4 garlic cloves
3 g ground blue fenugreek (utskho suneli)
3 g ground dried marigold (kviteli kvavili)
2 g ground coriander seed
1 g cayenne or dried red chilli
20 ml red wine vinegar
60 to 90 ml cold water
20 g coriander leaf, chopped
6 g fine salt
seeds of half a pomegranate

The skills inside

Draining fried food: a rack, never paper Steaming: basket, leaf and lid Salting to draw the water out

The words inside

Fenugreek: Seed, Leaf & Blue

Allergen screen

Found: nuts

Screened for: gluten, dairy, egg, nuts, peanuts, fish, shellfish, molluscs, soy, sesame, celery, mustard, lupin, alcohol. Not screened: sulphites.

Screened by keyword from the ingredient list, not reviewed by a person; check every label for what the list cannot show.

Method

Salt the slices on both sides, stand them in a colander for 30 minutes, then press each one between cloths until it feels limp and the surface is dry. 30 min
Fry in 1 cm of oil held at 180C (355F), a few at a time, until deep gold on both faces and slack enough to roll, and drain them on a rack rather than paper so they do not steam soft.
Pound the walnuts with the garlic, salt and dried spices to a coarse damp paste, or pulse them cold in short bursts, then beat in the vinegar and just enough cold water to make it spreadable and glossy.
Fold the chopped coriander through, spread a thick finger of paste down each slice, roll from the narrow end and stand the rolls seam down.
Leave 30 minutes at room temperature for the paste to firm, then scatter with pomegranate seeds. 30 min

How to tell it is going right

This dish has no standard of its own yet. It is judged on the techniques it exercises: checked at the pan, while there is still something to be done about it.

Salting to draw the water out 41 recipes

Salted evenly over every surface rather than tipped on in one place and tossed once.
Laid out so the water has somewhere to go: a colander, a rack, or a sieve over a bowl, never a flat dish where it sits back in what it gave up.
Given real time, and there is visible liquid to show for it: a pool underneath, a drip, or a wrung handful.
That liquid is removed. It is squeezed, blotted or poured away, and the food is dry to the touch before it goes anywhere near heat.
The dish is seasoned knowing salt has already gone on, tasted before any more is added.

Where it goes wrong It went into the dish still wet, and was salted again out of habit. The water it was carrying dilutes and steams whatever it meets, so the result is watery and over-seasoned at once, and those are two faults that cannot be corrected in the same direction.

Draining fried food: a rack, never paper 77 recipes

The rack was in place before the first thing went into the oil, not fetched afterwards while food waited in a spider over the pot.
It lands on a rack with air moving underneath it. Anything set down on paper or a flat plate traps its own steam against its base.
Salted within seconds of landing, while it is still hot enough to take seasoning.
A minute later the underside is still as crisp as the top: no soft flat patch where it has been sitting.
Nothing is stacked or piled while hot, however tempting it is to keep it together. A pile steams itself soft from the inside out.

Where it goes wrong It was drained on paper, or piled up to keep warm. Steam leaving the food has nowhere to go but back into the crust, so the underside softens within a minute: the crispness the frying just bought is gone before the plate reaches the table.

At the Table

The Pour: Grüner Veltliner
Also Right: Vermentino or dry Chenin
From the Taps: Saison
Zero-Proof: Sparkling water with citrus & herbs

The vegetable whisperers: peppery, high-acid whites that flatter greens, roots, and grains without bullying them.

Family notes

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Film school

This dish, cooked on camera Search films of Badrijani Nigvzit The cuisine, deeper Technique films from the Georgian kitchen