Baba ghanoush

RECIPE

For the dip

• 6-7 lbs (3 kilos) fresh eggplants
• 1-2 lemons
• garlic (I used like 5 cloves but that was a lot)
• cilantro or parsley
• tahini
• olive oil
• salt
• spices, if you want (coriander, cumin, sumac, etc)

For the bread

• 3/4 cup (175mL) water
• 1/4 cup (60mL) plain yogurt (can replace with water)
• 1 teaspoon dry yeast
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup (60g) cornmeal (skip if you want softer bread)
• bread flour (as much as it will take, about 2 cups, 150g)

1. To make the bread dough, combine all the ingredients with as much flour as you can stir in. Cover and let sit for 20 minutes, then knead in as much additional flour as the dough will take. Cover and let rise until doubled, 1-2 hours. Divide the dough into six little balls and let proof for a half hour.
2. Flour the dough balls and roll them out about as thin as you can, docking them with a fork if you want lots of small bubbles instead of one big one. I like to lay each one on a little slip of parchment paper, stack them, and put them in the fridge until I'm ready to grill — they're easier to handle if cold.
3. Ignite a bunch of charcoal, put it in the grill, cover it with a bunch more unlit charcoal, and lay on the grate. If using a gas grill, just get it as hot as you can. Same if you're using your oven — ideally, use the broiler. Pierce the eggplants so they won't explode on you when they get hot, throw them on the heat, cover, and roast until almost completely incinerated — the skins should be burned to crisp and the flesh should be dark, soft and considerably shrunken. It took me about 45 minutes, but that'll vary a lot.
4. While you're waiting, you can mince your garlic.
5. Pull the eggplants off, cut them open, let them steam out until you can handle them, then scoop out the flesh, keeping burned bits of skin to a minimum. Drain as much water out of the flesh as you can — I do this by squeezing it in a tea towel, but some people use a sieve, some people use a salad spinner, etc.
6. Now you just stir in as much garlic, lemon juice, tahini, olive oil, salt, herbs and spice as tastes good to you. When adding in the tahini and olive oil, drizzle it in slowly and stir really aggressively to form an emulsion. You'll want a lot of olive oil — enough to give you mayonnaise consistency at the end.
7. Scrape down the grill grates, slap on the doughs and cook for a minute or so on each side until puffy. If you want soft bread, pull the loafs when they still look a little doughy. I like them crackery, so I let them brown a little more.
8. Rip and dip.