Baba Ghanoush

Trust me friends, it doesn’t get any easier than this!

Your goal here is to char your eggplants on the grill. I like to do mine over charcoal, however you can get away with roasting this under a broiler if you want. I like the grill because you are trying to get some of that smokey flavor from the open flame cooking.

Start by poking into the eggplants several times with a fork. Once your grill is nice and hot, add the eggplants over direct heat. You are going to cook these on the grill for about 30-40 minutes, turning them along the way to ensure that all sides are nice and charred.

The rest is rather easy…

Once they are done, remove the eggplants and completely wrap them in foil, or place them into a large bowl and cover with foil. Your goal here is to let that heat get under that skin and have it easily be pulled away, almost as if you were roasting poblano chilies.

During this time, add the garlic and lemon juice into a mixing bowl.

Pull out a salad spinner if you have one.

After about 10 minutes, uncover the eggplants. Take an eggplant by the stem, and using a fork and your hands, carefully remove the outer skin, reserving all of the flesh. Place this flesh into your salad spinner. Do the same with the second eggplant.

You will not believe how much water is inside of this eggplant. The goal is to remove all of that excess water and the salad spinner is the perfect tool for this task.

Remove the strained eggplant flesh to the bowl with the garlic and lemon juice. Using two forks, start mashing and mixing the ingredients. After about a minute of doing this, add the salt and tahini paste, and continue to mix and mash until everything becomes a smooth mixture, similar to hummus but with some texture. Add the olive oil and give it another mix or two.

Taste and season with any additional salt or lemon juice. Spoon into a serving dish alongside toasted pita chips or vegetables and dig in.