Ode to the Aubergine

I was sitting in my garden, wondering what to write about in my next blog, when I heard the lush produce in my vegetable patch whispering, “Write about us!” Amidst the greens of my Swiss chard, cucumbers and curly lettuce, my eye focused on a perfect, pink baby… aubergine.

I’ve been growing vegetables faithfully for fourteen years. When I went to Jean Talon market in May to buy my plants I was determined to try something new. I settled on pink aubergine, thinking it would contrast pleasantly with green. I was right. When the first fruit matured I was so in love with it that I didn’t want to pick it. Finally, after taking several photos of it, I let my son pick it. He was also fascinated by it, but unlike me, had no qualms about cutting it up and cooking it. I must admit that once my baby eggplant transformed into an aromatic, steaming dish I had no problem eating it, savoring each mouthful of sweet sensation.

The Aubergine in Art

Still Life With a Ginger Jar and Eggplants, Paul Cezanne

Paul Cézanne painted Still Life With a Ginger Jar and Eggplants, between 1890 and 1894. With all due respect to Cezanne, I must say that this composition doesn’t glorify the eggplant. The pears on the other hand look scrumptious.

Interior With Aubergines, Henri Matisse

In Henri Matisse’s Interior With Aubergines, painted between 1911 and 1912, the eggplants rule! Although the three eggplants are small, they are the focal point in this delightful, decorative interior.

This painting inspired me to create a photographic still life with an eggplant. Since we had already eaten my eggplant, I’d have to buy one. When I got to I.G.A., all I found was a pack of two baby eggplants, for 3.99$, which seemed a bit steep because when I say baby I mean baby, as in three inches worth of fruit. Yes, fruit, because this member of the nightshade family is classified botanically as a berry. I didn’t dish out the 3.99$ because although the babies were cute they would never amount to much in a dish.

Aubergine Trivia
How did the eggplant get its name? The word eggplant originally referred to a white-skinned, ovoid-shaped variety. Mark Vogel, in his article, “Eggplant: A Botanical Identity Crisis,” writes that while the word eggplant was popular in the United States, the British, French, and other Europeans referred to this berry (!) as aubergine, which derives from a Sanskrit word meaning “to cure wind-disorder.” Eggplants were thought to cure flatulence. They’ve also been known, at different points in history, to be aphrodisiac, poisonous, and to cause insanity.

Aubergine Anecdote
My cousin, Sylvia, who makes an irresistible babaganoush, swears that if you utter the word babganoush while looking for a parking spot, you will automatically encounter a space to park your car. She successfully demonstrated this piece of folklore in the congested streets of downtown Istanbul. I tried this trick in Montreal’s Plateau distrct, without success, and just when my son chanted “Hummus, hummus, hummus!” from the backseat, an SUV pulled out in front of us, leaving ample room to park our car. Perhaps each city has its own magic word.

The Stray Eggplant Project
Stray Eggplant, is a conceptual art project by artist, author and ordained minister, Laura E. Gentry. The project consists of hundreds of small, ceramic eggplants, each with a random quote on it, sold in Art-O-Mat vending machines throughout the U.S.A., Canada and the U.K. Gentry gleaned the phrases from different sources such as song, TV, news, or an overheard conversation. Some of my favorite eggplant quotes are:

“host chocolate tasting parties”
“don’t pay the ferry man”
“a zeal for troll”
“poof, you’re a puppeteer”

Owners of stray eggplants are invited to stage a photograph of themselves posing with their purple fruit, thereby giving meaning to the quote. Some of these photos can be seen on this slide show.

A New Baby
I am not a stray eggplant owner but I bought two fairly large eggplants at I.G.A. the other day. I tried engraving into one of them with a woodcarving tool but wasn’t satisfied with the jagged lines. So I chopped it up into a pasta sauce. The second eggplant is still in the fridge, its skin becoming more wrinkled and less photogenic with each passing day. I considered abandoning the idea of creating a photographic still life featuring the eggplant slash aubergine.

This morning, two weeks after picking the first eggplant, I inspected my vegetable patch. To my delight, under a jungle of leaves I discovered a brand new nightshade berry, quietly waiting to be photographed, Matisse style, and posted on my blog for its 15 minutes of fame.

Talleen Hacikyan