Calories in Eggplant

What makes eggplant so powerful?

Eggplant, or Solanum melongena, is botanically classified as a berry and belongs to the nightshade family, making it a relative of tomatoes, potatoes, and even tobacco. In fact, eggplant contains the highest level of nicotine of any edible plant, though you would need to eat roughly 20 pounds of it to equal the nicotine in one cigarette. The vegetable's notorious spongy texture comes from a network of air pockets separated by cell walls. When raw eggplant is exposed to heat, the air pockets collapse and the cells act like tiny straws, rapidly absorbing surrounding cooking oil. This is why traditional recipes often call for salting sliced eggplant before cooking. The salt draws out moisture through osmosis, which collapses the air pockets and pre-tightens the cell walls. Once the excess moisture is patted away, the eggplant becomes far less greedy for oil, allowing it to brown and caramelize rather than steaming in its own absorbed fat. The dark purple skin contains nasunin, a potent anthocyanin antioxidant that protects the plant's tissue from oxidative damage and gives the berry its distinctive hue.