My "E" food is the Ensaladang Talong, or the Eggplant Salad. I personally don't like eggplants as part of the dish (like Pinakbet or Dinengdeng), but I eat eggplants if it's fried or prepared as a salad or omelet.
The eggplant salad is always my favorite side dish whenever I eat grilled pork. This serving of ensaladang talong was something I had September last year when my friend Nathalie and I went to the Sidcor Weekend Market after a few hours of staying in the Quezon Memorial Circle. Since there were a lot of cooked foods served at the weekend market, we decided to eat lunch there.
The eggplant salad is quite easy to prepare; all you need are eggplants (the slim, long ones - not the fat ones), white onions, tomatoes, and your choice of salting agent - soy sauce or bagoong (fermented fish paste). Whenever I do this at home, I grill the eggplants over hot coals (making good use of the coals after grilling the meat) until the eggplants are soft, then I peel it (without taking off the crown) and mash the flesh. Then, I'd topped it with chopped fresh tomatoes and onions, sprinkle some calamansi juice (or lemon, if available) and add the soy sauce or bagoong.
During grill days here at home, we grill a lot of eggplants - some we prepare into salad, the rest we save for tomorrow's breakfast, which we then add with scrambled eggs and turn it into an omelet.
I come from a family who loves cooking and eating. I never had any formal training in cooking and that I taught myself how to cook based on the handed down recipes, but I could say that I can cook good food. In 2008, I started documenting my food trips for my