What is Khoresh Bademjan?

Khoresh bademjan is one of the great Persian stews: lamb or beef simmered slowly with onion, turmeric and tomato, then finished with whole eggplants that have been peeled, salted, and fried in oil until they are deep brown and completely soft. The eggplants go in near the end and are never stirred hard — the goal is that they arrive at the table intact and glossy, holding their shape right until a spoon touches them, at which point they give way entirely. The sourness comes from ghooreh, unripe sour grapes, tossed in whole so they burst against the meat, or from lemon juice when ghooreh is out of season. It is served over chelo, steamed rice, with the stew spooned along one side of the plate rather than over the top so the rice stays white. A proper khoresh bademjan is orange-red with a film of oil pooling at the edges, and any Iranian will tell you that pooled oil is a feature, not a flaw.

The frying is the entire argument. Eggplants have to be salted and left to weep for at least half an hour, then patted dry and fried in enough oil that they brown rather than steam — and they drink oil like nothing else in the kitchen, which is why a lot of households now roast or air-fry them, and why other households consider that a personal betrayal. There are variants: one with yellow split peas thrown in, one finished with a drizzle of kashk, and a Gilani cousin, mirza ghasemi, that goes the opposite direction and mashes everything into a smoky pulp. Restaurant versions in Los Angeles and Toronto tend to halve the eggplants for portion control. A grandmother will use small ones whole and count them out per person at the stove.