Georgian eggplant rolls (badrijani nigvzit)

Fried eggplant rollups filled with a delicious walnut and garlic paste. A popular Georgian appetizer that you can easily recreate at home.

Course Appetizer, Starter

Cuisine Georgian

Keyword badrijani nigvzit, fried eggplant, georgian, vegan, vegetarian, walnut paste

Prep Time 15 minutes

Cook Time 30 minutes

Servings people

Calories 488kcal

Author Eva | Electric Blue Food

Ingredients

2 eggplants medium
200 ml vegetable oil for frying
140 g walnuts
60 ml water
3 garlic cloves
1 tbsp fresh mint minced
1 tbsp fresh cilantro minced
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp coriander seeds crushed
1/4 tsp fenugreek ground
2 tsp apple cider vinegar
1 pomegranate

Metric - US Customary

Instructions

Thinly slice the eggplants lengthways, making them 2-3 mm thick. Salting them is not obligatory if the eggplants you usually use are not particularly bitter (see notes below).
Heat up enough oil to completely cover the whole bottom of a frying pan. When hot add the eggplant slices. Pan fry the eggplants on both sides, turning them a couple of times as they fry. They are done when soft and very easy to pierce through.
Place fried eggplants over paper towels to absorb the excess oil. Eggplants absorb a lot of oil so add more oil to the pan in between batches.
Add the walnuts to a food processor. Peel and press the garlic. Crush the coriander seeds. Mince the fresh mint and cilantro. Add garlic, coriander, fenugreek, salt and the minced fresh herbes to the walnuts.
Start the food processor and after a couple of minutes pour in the water as the blades are rotating. This will turn the paste more homogeneous. Lastly, pour in the vinegar, let incorporate, then stop the machine.
Spread some walnut paste on the larger end of an eggplant slice, covering about 1/3 of the slice. Roll up the slice. Repeat on all eggplant slices, or until the paste is finished.
Place the Georgian eggplant rolls on a serving plate and decorate with more fresh herbs and pomegranate arils.

Notes

Salting the eggplants helps draw some of the water that might spray up during frying. To do that, lay the eggplant slices over a kitchen towel and sprinkle table salt on both sides. Let sit until droplets of water will appear on the surface of the slices. Rinse and pat dry. Please notice that this takes overall an extra half hour which is not budgeted in the total recipe time.

This recipe tastes better the following day, as the flavours have had the time to properly set. Store refrigerated in an airtight container for up to 5 days.

Nutrition