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August 29
Menu: Vegetarian; Baked Macaroni, Tomato Sauce; Green Corn; Fried Egg Plant; Cantaloupe Salad; Marmalade Pudding; Iced Coffee Fried Egg Plant - Peel good-sized egg plant; cut into slices of 14 inch. Dust with salt and pepper; dip in beaten egg; roll in fine breadcrumbs and saute in hot Crisco. When they are brown on 1 side, turn and brown on the other. If preferred, the egg plant may be dipped in thin batter instead of egg and crumbs, and fried.
A straightforward breaded saute that depends almost entirely on slice thickness and fat temperature. The original assumes a heavy skillet and a solid shortening that tolerates high heat without smoking.
- Slice thicknessThe stated "14 inch" is a printing slip for 1/4 inch. Thinner than that and the slices collapse into the breading; much thicker and the centre is still spongy when the crust is dark.
- Salting firstRather than dusting salt on immediately before breading, lay the peeled slices on a rack, salt both sides, and leave 30 minutes. Blot dry. This draws out water so the slices absorb less fat and hold their shape.
- CriscoCrisco was hydrogenated vegetable shortening; the modern product has been reformulated to cut trans fats and is not the same fat as the one this booklet was selling. Any neutral oil with a high smoke point will serve here; use enough to film the pan generously, about 1/8 inch.
- Fat temperatureAround 350-360F. Below that the crumb coating soaks and turns greasy; above 375F the breadcrumbs colour before the eggplant is tender. Test with a crumb, which should sizzle briskly without browning in seconds.
- Breading orderFor a coating that stays put, dust the dried slices with seasoned flour before the egg, then the crumbs. The recipe skips this step, which is why the crust often slides off in one sheet.
- The batter variantThe alternative thin batter fries faster and puffs slightly, but it seals the slice, so cut those a touch thinner or the interior stays firm.
- Draining and yieldDrain on a rack, not on paper, so the underside does not steam soft. A good-sized eggplant sliced this thin gives a couple of dozen slices or more, enough for four as a side dish.
Crisco appeared in 1911 and the booklets promoting it, this one among them, were built around a year of menus rather than a list of dishes -- the aim being to show the new shortening doing everything butter and lard had done, in every course and every season. Frying was the strongest part of that argument: a solid vegetable fat that held a high temperature without the smoke and the flavour of lard suited a cook who wanted the same pan to turn out eggplant one evening and doughnuts the next. Eggplant itself had long been a late-summer vegetable in American kitchens, and is often said to have been more common in the South and among Mediterranean immigrant households than in plain New England cookery; breaded fried slices are one of its familiar American treatments, though stuffed and boiled preparations appear in American cookery too.