Eggplants in spicy sauce for the winter
Eggplants in spicy sauce are very popular among us as a snack. I've been rolling them up since the fall. In this recipe, the eggplants are cut into large pieces. They do not boil over and retain their shape.
The yield of the finished product is about 6 liters.
Take a larger pan, 7-8 liters. I have a 5 liter. Therefore, the eggplants have to be laid in two batches.
If you don’t have table vinegar on hand, you can dilute vinegar essence. To do this, take 100 ml of water and add 1 tablespoon of 70% essence. That's it, you have 9% vinegar and almost 120 ml.
Wash and peel the vegetables. Cut out the stems, blackened and wrinkled areas.
Cut the eggplants into long pieces. Small ones - lengthwise into 4 parts. Large ones - crosswise into two or three parts, then each part lengthwise into 6 parts.
Pass the tomatoes, bell peppers and carrots through a meat grinder, or puree in a blender. Blend the hot pepper with them for a hotter sauce, or simply halve it, add it to the pan and remove it before filling the jars.
Also mince the garlic or chop it in a blender and set it aside for now.
Put the oil and pureed vegetables in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil over high heat, then simmer for 15 minutes.
Add salt, sugar, vinegar and let it boil again. At this stage I always taste the sauce. Attention, the sauce must be tasted when it has cooled. When it's hot, it's very easy to make a mistake and add extra sugar or salt. Therefore, we take a small amount of sauce into a spoon, let it cool for a few minutes, and only then try it.
Transfer the eggplants to the boiling sauce and simmer. At first they will float up and try to jump out of the pan. You can press them down with a lid. After a while they will be saturated with liquid and stop running out of the pan.
Boil the eggplants for 10 minutes after boiling. Then add chopped garlic and cook for another 10 minutes. Thus, the eggplants are cooked for only 20 minutes. I don’t recommend cooking them longer, otherwise they will crumble into mush.
Fill clean, sterilized jars to just below the lids. Seal, wrap in a blanket and leave until completely cool.