Sunday Kitchen's Incredible Eggplant Dip

If you love Middle Eastern and Arabic dips like baba ghannoush then I have an amazing eggplant dip for you! This eggplant dip recipe comes from our friends at Sunday Kitchen in their new cookbook Sofra and they've allowed me to share this dip with you. I promise this is one of the best ever vegetarian dips you'll ever try and it's one of their unique recipes that you won't find elsewhere.

I first met the mother and daughter duo Sivine Tabbouch and Karima Hazim Chatila of Sunday Kitchen when I did one of their cooking classes in 2021 where they showed us how to make the most wonderful Lebanese food. And since then they've been busy writing their own cookbook called Sofra. This eggplant dip stood out as I tried it at their Sofra book launch and it was so good that I went home with a box of it. Lebanese people are like Chinese people - they over cater and entertain generously and at the end everyone and I mean everyone left with a delicious box of dip, bread, olives, sweets and kibbeh. Sofra means dining table in Arabic and the book is absolutely stunning and this was the first recipe I tried in it. I'm also going to give their super smooth hummus recipe a try next (we also had that at the launch).

Sivine created this dip for her family (hence its name Tabbouch dip after the family name). Karima explains that as children, they didn't like the smoky flavour of baba ghannoush so Sivine created this as an alternative eggplant dip. Tabbouch dip is a real labour of love, one that produces a large amount of dip perfect for entertaining (and I guarantee, people will devour this!). It's made of simple ingredients that you can find easily but it tastes like one of those dips that you'd buy fresh at a restaurant. Except because it is Sivine's creation you can't find it anywhere else. I guess what I'm trying to tell you is that you have to make this despite the time it takes (and half of it is really hands off time).

Tips For Making Tabbouch Eggplant Dip

1 I recommend buying these ingredients like eggplant, Lebanese bread, dried mint, yogurt and za'atar at Middle Eastern and Arabic stores. Not only will they be super fresh but they'll also be a great price and you'll be supporting a small business. I bought these during a shopping adventure in Fairfield and 5 eggplants were around $7 total as opposed to the supermarket where they were $3.20each!

2 Look for eggplants that feel very firm and heavy for their weight. The stem should be bright green and firm with no signs of mould fuzz or greying around the stem. Avoid eggplants with discoloration spots.

3 The first step is to draw out the liquid from the eggplant using salt. I know that it does seem like you're using a lot of salt but most of it drips away in the salting process and you won't need to season this dip at the end.

4 Before frying it, I recommend blotting the eggplant pieces with paper towels to remove the excess water to avoid it spitting. If you don't blot it, it will spit slightly but once I blotted the eggplant, it didn't spit at all.

5 Za'atar is a Middle Eastern spice mix typically made from dried thyme, oregano, sumac and sesame seeds. It is commonly used as a seasoning for bread, meats and vegetables or mixed with olive oil and spread on flatbreads or used as a dip.

Some recipes are meant to be for weekdays and some are designed for weekends and I think this is a wonderful weekend recipe. However don't let this put you off making it on a weekday. It was a Sunday when I made this (I salted the eggplant on Saturday) and I was frantically working trying to get all of my stories up for when we were headed overseas in a week's time so I was still working this weekend. So really, if you work from home this is not impossible as a weeknight recipe.

I actually brought my laptop downstairs and sat on the dining table working while waiting the requisite 10 minutes to cook each batch of eggplant. I thought that I may as well kill two birds with one stone rather than just stand there waiting for the eggplant to book (and since I had 5 batches of eggplant, that was almost an hour of waiting!). As a keen multi tasker I was happy that I wrote out this recipe in the time that it took to cook the eggplant!

So tell me Dear Reader, what is your favourite dip? And do you multi task? Are you still working from home?

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Tabbouch Eggplant Dip and Crisp Bread

Adapted from Sunday Kitchen's "Sofra"

Preparation time: 30 minutes plus overnight draining

Cooking time: 1 hour

This recipe is best started 1 day before

• 5 eggplants around 1.8 kilos or 4lbs
• 1/3 cup or handful of fine salt
• 300ml/10.6flozs oil (neutral like canola)
• 500g/1.1lb Greek yogurt (I used low fat)
• 3 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
• 1.5 tablespoons dried mint
• Fresh mint for serving
• 5 pieces Lebanese bread (I used wholemeal)
• 2 tablespoons za'atar
• Fresh mint to garnish

Step 1 - First remove the tops from the eggplants and then cut in half and then quarters so that you have 4 boats per eggplant. Using a vegetable peeler remove some of the skin (the skin adds texture) leaving a zebra like pattern. Cut into chunks. Repeat with the remaining eggplant. Place a layer of eggplant in a large colander and sprinkle generously with salt and repeat until you have used all of the eggplant and salt. Place the colander in a bowl to catch the water and leave uncovered in the fridge overnight.

Step 2 - Heat the oil in a wok or a heavy based frying pan. Take the Lebanese bread and tear it into pieces and separate the two layers. The rougher side or the inside of the bread is the side to fry face down in the oil (otherwise it will curl up). When the oil is ready (test with a small piece of bread), fry the bread in batches and drain on paper towels. The bread will darken further upon cooling so you don't have to cook them too dark.

Step 3 - Blot the pieces of eggplant on paper towels well (no need to wash salt off). Cook them in batches for 10 minutes per batch. Turn them halfway during that time. The eggplant will be done when it is golden on the outside and soft on the inside. Drain on double layers of paper towels and repeat. This part does take a while - I did it in 5 batches.

Step 4 - Cool the eggplant for 1 hour. In a large bowl mix the yogurt, garlic and dried mint. Pull apart the eggplant with your fingers roughly, it should be melting and soft. Mix the eggplant and yogurt mixture and decorate with fresh mint.

Step 5 - Arrange bread on a plate and sprinkle za'atar on each bread layer, repeating until you've used all of the bread and dusted it all with za'atar. Serve bread and dips together.