Tempeh and Eggplant Curry with Tomato and Toasted Coriander
Browned tempeh and collapsed eggplant simmered in a tomato masala built on coriander seed toasted whole, finished with spinach, yogurt, and lime.
Why You'll Love This Recipe
I built this for the nights when I want a curry that still tastes like a curry after the coconut milk has been left in the cupboard. What carries it instead is tomato cooked down hard, eggplant broken all the way open, and coriander seed toasted whole and ground while it is still warm. That last step takes ninety seconds and changes everything, because coriander bought ground has usually been sitting long enough to taste of nothing much. About an hour, mostly unattended once the pan is going. I make it when I want leftovers, because this is the rare curry that is better on Tuesday than it was on the Sunday night I cooked it.
The order matters more here than the ingredient list does. Tempeh browns first in a hot pan and comes out, because it needs direct contact with metal to develop its nutty side and it will only steam if you crowd it in with the vegetables. Eggplant goes in next and is left alone long enough to color and start giving up its structure. Then the onion, garlic, ginger, and spices cook down with the tomato until the oil separates and beads at the edge of the pan, which is the traditional sign that a masala is ready for liquid. Everything returns and simmers together.
It eats rich without being heavy. The eggplant turns silky and almost creamy, the tempeh keeps a firm chew and holds its shape all the way to the bowl, and the spinach goes in at the end so it is barely wilted and still tastes green. Yogurt spooned on cold against the hot curry, lime squeezed over, and a lot of cilantro is how I finish it. It reheats better than almost anything else in my rotation, so I usually make it on a Sunday. Serve it in bowls rather than on plates, since the sauce stays loose enough to want gathering up, and put the lime halves on the table so people can go again.
Ingredients
- 14 oz tempeh, cut into 3/4-inch cubes
- 1 large eggplant (about 1 lb), cut into 1-inch chunks
- 1 1/4 cups crushed tomatoes
- 4 oz baby spinach
- 1 medium onion, finely chopped
- 5 cloves garlic, crushed to a paste
- A 2-inch piece of ginger, peeled and grated
- 1/2 cup plain nonfat Greek yogurt, at room temperature
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 2 tsp whole coriander seed
- 1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
- 1 tsp ground turmeric
- 1/4 tsp cayenne, or more to taste
- 1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
- 2 tbsp lime juice
- 1/3 cup chopped cilantro, leaves and stems
- 1/2 tsp fine sea salt
Instructions
- Toast and grind the coriander: Put the whole coriander seed in a dry skillet over medium heat and shake it for sixty to ninety seconds, until the seeds darken a shade, start to crackle, and smell citrusy and warm. Tip them out at once and grind them coarsely in a mortar or spice grinder while they are still warm.
- Brown the tempeh: Heat 1 tbsp of the olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high. Add the tempeh cubes in a single layer and leave them undisturbed for three minutes so they take on color, then turn and repeat until three or four sides are golden, about eight minutes total. Move them to a plate.
- Color the eggplant: Add the remaining 1 tbsp oil and the eggplant chunks with the salt. Press them flat and leave them for four minutes so the cut faces brown, then toss and cook another four to five minutes until the pieces are soft at the edges and starting to slump. Push them to one side of the pan.
- Build the masala: Add the onion to the cleared side and cook five minutes until it is soft and golden, then stir in the garlic, ginger, ground toasted coriander, cumin, turmeric, cayenne, and black pepper and cook one minute until fragrant. Pour in the crushed tomatoes and cook eight to ten minutes over medium, stirring occasionally, until the sauce darkens from red to brick and you can see oil beading at the edges.
- Simmer everything together: Return the tempeh to the pan with a splash of water if the sauce has tightened, cover, and simmer gently for ten minutes so the tempeh drinks up the sauce and the eggplant finishes collapsing. Stir once or twice and keep the heat low enough that it burbles rather than spits.
- Finish with spinach, yogurt, and lime: Stir the spinach through in two handfuls and cook one minute, only until it wilts and turns glossy. Take the pan off the heat, stir in the lime juice, then spoon the yogurt over in ribbons and swirl it once so it streaks rather than disappears. Scatter the cilantro and serve straight from the pan.
Variations
- Chickpeas in place of tempeh: Use a cup of drained chickpeas, added with the tomatoes so they have time to soften into the sauce.
- Smoky: Add a teaspoon of smoked paprika with the ground coriander for a deeper, barbecue-scented curry.
- Green chile heat: Slit two green chiles and drop them in with the onion, then fish them out at the end or leave them for whoever wants them.
- Mustard greens: Swap the spinach for chopped mustard greens, added five minutes earlier so they have time to lose their sharpness.
- Tamarind finish: Replace the lime juice with two teaspoons of tamarind paste stirred in at the end for a rounder, more sour-sweet edge.
Storage & Leftovers
This keeps five days in the refrigerator and improves for the first two. The tempeh keeps absorbing sauce overnight and the eggplant loses whatever structure it had left, which makes the second night silkier than the first. Store it without the yogurt and add that fresh to each bowl.
Reheat in a covered pan over medium-low with a spoonful of water, stirring now and then, for five or six minutes. It also microwaves well, which is not true of most things I cook. A fresh squeeze of lime and new cilantro at the end makes a reheated bowl taste like it was just made.
It freezes for three months in flat sealed portions. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator and reheat gently. The eggplant comes out of the freezer softer than it went in, so if you are cooking specifically to freeze, pull the eggplant off the heat a couple of minutes early.
Notes & Tips
- Toast the coriander whole: Ground spice burns in the time whole seed takes to toast. Grinding it warm gives you a fragrance that pre-ground coriander cannot match.
- Brown the tempeh alone: Crowded in with the eggplant it steams and stays pale. Give it its own turn in the pan and its own three minutes of stillness.
- Salt the eggplant in the pan: There is no need to salt and drain it on a board first. Adding the salt as it hits the oil draws water out where it can evaporate.
- Wait for the oil to separate: Beads of oil at the edge of the tomato are the signal that the masala has cooked far enough. Adding liquid before that leaves a raw tomato taste.
- Use the widest pan you have: Eggplant and tempeh both need surface contact. A twelve-inch skillet browns in one round where a saucepan takes three.
- Yogurt goes on off the heat: Take the pan off the burner and give it thirty seconds before the yogurt goes in, and it will stay in smooth white ribbons.
Nutrition & Mindful Eating
- Tempeh, eggplant, and cooked-down tomato are the three things carrying this pan. The tempeh gives it protein and a firm bite, the eggplant turns silky and gives the curry its body, and the tomato concentrated over ten minutes is where the depth comes from.
- Tempeh is whole soybeans fermented into a firm cake, and because the beans stay intact it brings both protein and a good amount of fiber, which is unusual for a food this substantial. The fermentation is also what gives it that nutty, mushroom-like flavor.
- Eggplant is mostly water and spongy pith, which is why it drinks up oil and then collapses into something creamy. The dark skin carries anthocyanins, and leaving it on is what keeps the chunks from disintegrating completely.
- Spinach stirred in at the last minute stays green and slightly firm and brings folate and magnesium, and a minute in the pan is all it needs to go from raw to glossy.
- Coriander toasted whole, cumin, turmeric, and a cold spoonful of yogurt against the hot curry are what make this taste finished. The yogurt adds tang and a little protein, and the lime at the end is what stops a long-cooked tomato sauce from tasting heavy.
- As you eat, notice where the tempeh stays firm against eggplant that has gone completely soft, and let the cold yogurt and the lime tell you when you have had as much as you want.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I use tofu in place of tempeh?
You can, though it changes the dish. Firm tofu absorbs more sauce and gives you a softer, milder bowl, and it needs pressing for twenty minutes and a harder sear to hold together. Tempeh has a firmer bite and a nutty, slightly savory flavor that stands up to this much tomato and spice.
Does the tempeh need steaming first?
It does not, but a ten-minute steam before cubing softens the faintly bitter edge some brands have and helps the sauce get in. I skip it when the tempeh is fresh and do it when the package has been in the refrigerator a while.
My curry tastes flat. What is missing?
Almost always the masala stage was cut short. If you added the tomatoes and moved on within three or four minutes, the sauce never concentrated. Cook it until the color deepens to brick and oil beads at the edge, and if it is still flat at the end, add lime rather than salt.
Will the yogurt split?
Not if it goes in off the heat and at room temperature. Cold yogurt hitting a boiling pan is what curdles, so take the pan off the burner first and let the bubbling stop. If you want it fully stirred in rather than swirled, temper it with a spoonful of hot sauce first.