Mooli Baingan – White Radish with Eggplant

Cook something different sometime - this dish is definitely not a standard but it tastes great and is easy to prepare!

How to make Mooli Baingan

You start by washing and peeling the radish. Cut it in round slices, not very thin, just so that you can put them nicely into your mouth but still have something to chew on later.

Heat up the oil in a deep pan. When it is hot, add mustard, cumin, garam masala and coriander into the pan and stir the spices but don’t let them burn. Before that happens, you add the radish and top of it the salt. Mix the radish nicely with the spices and add the water. Put a lid on top and let the radish cook.

It will take about ten minutes now until the water is gone. In that time you can wash the eggplants and cut them into medium-size pieces. When you see that all water is gone from the radish, you can add the aubergine pieces into your pan and stir.

In the following two to three minutes which it takes the eggplant to get a little bit softer, you can prepare the tomatoes. Wash them and cut them into pieces. Add them into the pan with the rest of your vegetables.

Now you only have to stir a few times and watch your vegetables. When the tomatoes are mixed among the rest, when they are hot and the eggplants are fully cooked, then you can switch off your stove and server your meal!

Ayurvedic Values

This dish creates heat and increases the pitta in the body, as both vegetables, the radish and the eggplant, increase pitta. They both at the same time however reduce kapha and vata. If you have heard about radish increasing vata, you are right but only in its raw form. When cooked, it does not create gas in the body and actually reduces vata.