John Lantern
TVWBB Member
So on my way home today it was so nice I knew I had to grill, but didn't feel like a burger and ate chicken all weekend, so that was out. I saw that my mom had dropped off a bowl of overflow tomatoes from her garden and thought that maybe I could dice up some of the tomatoes. I remembered a big eggplant I needed to use from the fridge and remembered that on the gasser, I'd done eggplant with fresh tomatoes before, and anything the gasser does the performer does better, right?
I set the chimney up on the performer gas and let it rip, returning inside to cut the eggplant into roughly half inch rounds. I sprayed them with some olive oil and dusted with some ground sea salt. I put them on a hot grill direct and diced up a bunch of cherries and one san marzano that I had. I pulled some basil out of my garden and mixed that with a little bit of diced garlic, olive oil, balsamic, salt and pepper. After flipping them a couple of times, I topped the eggplant once they were tender with the tomatoes, finished with some shaved parmesan romano and recovered to give the tomatoes a little roasted flavor and melt the cheese down a little bit.
Unfortunately, I only had crappy sliced bread to make my sandwich with, but I toasted that and made a layered sandwich, and it was pretty darn good. This is definitely going in the rotation, both because 1) eggplant is cheap but also because 2) the more I have something like eggplant, the less guilt I feel over the pork, ribs, and bacon wrapped treats that usually come off the smoker and grill. Next time, I think I'll build a less hot fire (this one was screaming and had the thermometer nearly pinned before I shut down the lower vent. As a result I got a little bit of char instead of the nice toasty goodness I was going for) and probably start indirect until it starts to soften and then finish direct to get them golden brown, sort of like a reverse sear. And, of course, I'll have some nice Italian bread
One pic, to prove it happened.
http://i996.photobucket.com/albums/af83/jkolantern/eggplant.jpg
I set the chimney up on the performer gas and let it rip, returning inside to cut the eggplant into roughly half inch rounds. I sprayed them with some olive oil and dusted with some ground sea salt. I put them on a hot grill direct and diced up a bunch of cherries and one san marzano that I had. I pulled some basil out of my garden and mixed that with a little bit of diced garlic, olive oil, balsamic, salt and pepper. After flipping them a couple of times, I topped the eggplant once they were tender with the tomatoes, finished with some shaved parmesan romano and recovered to give the tomatoes a little roasted flavor and melt the cheese down a little bit.
Unfortunately, I only had crappy sliced bread to make my sandwich with, but I toasted that and made a layered sandwich, and it was pretty darn good. This is definitely going in the rotation, both because 1) eggplant is cheap but also because 2) the more I have something like eggplant, the less guilt I feel over the pork, ribs, and bacon wrapped treats that usually come off the smoker and grill. Next time, I think I'll build a less hot fire (this one was screaming and had the thermometer nearly pinned before I shut down the lower vent. As a result I got a little bit of char instead of the nice toasty goodness I was going for) and probably start indirect until it starts to soften and then finish direct to get them golden brown, sort of like a reverse sear. And, of course, I'll have some nice Italian bread
One pic, to prove it happened.
http://i996.photobucket.com/albums/af83/jkolantern/eggplant.jpg
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