ysilme | Pasta with Eggplant-Tomato-Sauce / Tomato and herb butter variations

It's summer, it's finally beautiful outside (after a horrible heatwave) and the garden grows in abundance, providing us with fresh herbs and salads and holding promises of some vegetables in a couple of weeks. So have a summer recipe with so far not-home-grown veggies. *g*

For Eggplant-Tomato-Sauce, you need

1 medium-sized eggplant
1 small can tomatoes (4oog/~14oz) or 6-8 fresh tomtatos, chopped
1 medium-sized onion
1-2 cloves garlic
fresh or dried herbs (basil, thyme, rosemary, 1 bay leaf, origano)
2-3 table spoons tomato purée (a bit more if you use fresh tomatos)
a dash of wine if you like
olive oil
salt, sugar/sweetener, freshly ground black pepper

Heat 2 table spoons olive oil in a small pot. (If you have some garlic, herb, basil or tomato butter leftovers, this is perfect to use them up.)
Peel and cut the onion in not too small dices and braise in the oil (make sure it's not too hot so the onions don't burn or get dark). Wash and prepare the eggplant and cut into pieces of about 1cm/ 1/3 inch. Peel the garlic clove(s) and cut in thin slices or chop. Add both to the onions and braise as well, stirring frequently so the eggplant does not stick - I'm stingy on the fat, but this amount works well for me even in a regular pot. You can always add more oil if you like.
Deglaze with a generous dash of wine if you have any open and let come to boil, and then (or immediately if you leave out the wine) add a can of chopped tomtatos (or mash them separately if you only have whole ones) and about 3/4 of the can of water and bring to boil. Add the tomato purée, 1 teaspoon of salt, 1/2 teaspoon of sugar or sweetener of your choice, freshly ground black pepper and the herbs. I use 1-2 teaspoons of dried herbs or about a handful of fresh ones, or a mix of both, and 1 bay leave if available, and stir well.
When the sauce starts to boil, reduce heat until it simmers and let cook for about 15min.

Serves four. Keeps well in the fridge for 2 days, can be frozen. Best with penne, tortiglioni, farfalle or other "thick" pasta, and a glass of dry red wine.

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Assorted herb and other butters as bread spread or for barbecue
This tomato butter is as simple as it is delcious as bread-spread (with thin slices of tomato or cucumber or other veggies) or for a barbecue, as it tastes particularly well with grilled vegetables.

I normally use cow milk butter, but the three variants of it I tried so far with vegan butter work equally well. I'm using a kind that nearly tastes like butter and behaves like butter for all intents and purposes (Allsan, available in Germany at least).

You need
250g butter
1/2 tube of tomato purée
1 clove garlic
salt, pepper
fresh or frozen basil

Put the butter in a bowl and let it soften at room temperature until it can be easily stirred with a spoon or fork.
Add the tomato purée, the peeled and pressed garlic, 1/2 teaspoon salt, freshly ground black pepper, and 2-3 table spoons of frozen basil or about a large handful of fresh basil, finely chopped. Stir well until purée and fat are no longer separate, put in the dish you want to serve it in or keep, and put back into fridge.
Take out of the fridge before serving so it is not too hard.
If you want to bring it to a barbecue, you can either make pretty shapes using a cookie press or a plastic bag with a small corner cut off, or, after it has gotten a bit harder in the fridge, roll it into a roll and wrap it in cellophane, and then cut it in slices just after taking it out of the fridge. (I usually don't bother and just bring a pretty jar. *g* )

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I often make garlic or herb butters similar to this, it keeps well in the fridge and can also easily be frozen. I have no experience with freezing non-cow-milk butter yet, though.

Basic recipe:
250g butter
1/2 teaspoon salt
herbs, spices etc. of choice

Let butter soften, season, stir in prepared ingredients and cool again. It's important to use only immaculate herbs completely dry, particularly if you want to keep the butter longer than a day or freeze it.

Garlic butter: 4-6 cloves garlic, depending on your garlic love ;o), some marigold leaves for colour if you have

Basil butter: 1-1,5 handfuls of chopped fresh basil, freshly ground back pepper. Also nice with a teaspoon of pink pepper, freshly ground in mortar

Borage butter: this is terrific if you have borage in the garden. Use 2 table spoons of fresh borage cut into fine pieces and the peel of 1/2 lemon. Add marigold leaves for colour and, if you do not want to keep it more than a day, some of the pretty blue borage flowers

Lemon balm butter: 1 handful lemon balm leaves cut into fine pieces, peel of 1 lemon. You can also add 1 teaspoon of pink pepper, freshly ground. Perfect with white asparagus.

Herb butter: 1-2 handfuls of assorted herbs: parsley, chives, chervil, lemon balm, pimpinella, sorrel, borage, whatever is availabe. Can be rounded off with lemon peel, freshly ground black or pink pepper, marigold leaves for colour, or 1 teaspoon of finely diced red or green chile (or both).

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Edit: I did try out the tomato butter with vegan butter (Allsan) the other day. It works just fine, but the taste is different; it's not as tasty and tart as it should be. I suppose using more tomato puree or a teaspoon of lemon juice might do the trick.

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