Eggplant

[eyegrotom]

I have decided to give Eggplant a try this year. What are some of your favorite ones? Also is there any special things I need to know or look for

[Wildcat82]

I really liked the Ping Tung eggplant I grew last year. Extremely heat tolerant and productive. The skins seemed weren't very tough either.

[worth1]

Don't get greedy and let the fruit grow too big or too long.

[karstopography]

I like the globe/elongated globe/tear drop shaped eggplants better than the long type, but maybe it’s about what you want to do with them.

Aswad, a Persian heirloom eggplant, is really nice for baba ganoush. Very heat tolerant. Somewhat like Black Beauty, but more pear/tear dropped shaped with huge fruit. Aswad plants don’t sprawl quite as much as Black Beauty tends to late in the year

Rosa Bianca is a lavender and white Sicilian Heirloom. It is a beautiful eggplant with mild and creamy flesh. Great sliced on the grill.

[taboule]

Make sure the ground is warm enough before planting, and water generously for plump fruits.

[PlainJane]

IMG_3824.jpeg

Paloma F1 is a beautiful white eggplant, creamy and mild. Also very prolific. From a couple of seasons ago along side some melons.

[TomNJ]

I use most of my eggplant to make and freeze eggplant parm, so I prefer the large Italian tear drop shape fruits. I have settled on Nadia for it's healthy plants and very high production of beautiful black glossy fruit. I find a row cover (95% light transmission) is essential to prevent destruction by flea beetles and, along with a heavy mulch of grass clippings, seems to promote tall strong plants. Once the plants are lush and three feet tall I uncover them to help pollination as they are now healthy enough to survive the inevitable flea beetle onslaught.

[GoDawgs]

To me all eggplants taste pretty much the same. I've never encountered a "strong" eggplant so to me they're all mild. Now some are more seedy than others; fruit shape/color and plant size vary. Production will be more or less per variety and my guess is that it varies according to growing conditions.

For years I've grown Millionaire and in the past three years added Chinese String. In the photo below Millionaire (right) has been very dependable and the plant is maybe 4' tall, a guess as I've never actually measured. Average weight was 8 oz. Chinese String (left) is very prolific, growing its light purple fruit in clusters. Average weight of fruit was about 4.5 oz each.

24.06.10 First Millionaire and Chinese String.JPG

Last year, thanks to seed from one of our members here, I grew Matrosik (a striped Russian variety) and Rosita, a neon beauty. Both were pretty productive.

Matrosik is a large plant with large striped fruit. There are small thorns under the leaves which I've never encountered before! Average weight was 15 oz each.

24.06.20 First Matrosik eggplant.JPG

Rosita is another elongated eggplant whose plant is large but not as big as Matrosik. Average weight was 13 oz each.

24.06.20 First Rosita Eggplant.JPG

For sure, with these four eggplants I had a gracious plenty and was giving some away. This year there will be three as I forgot to order some seed but I do believe there will be enough eggplant to go around.

[worth1]

One year I grew probably 24 eggplants.
Florida market and lavender touch.
The latter I've never seen again it was a hybrid.
Needless to say I had a lot of fruit.
The lavender touch was exceptionally good.

[bboomer]

I've given up on eggplant. Sigh. The minute they are in the garden flea beetles turn the leaves into doilies. It takes a huge amount of organic work to save the plants and then they do not produce much. Insights, suggestions?

[karstopography]

I've given up on eggplant. Sigh. The minute they are in the garden flea beetles turn the leaves into doilies. It takes a huge amount of organic work to save the plants and then they do not produce much. Insights, suggestions?

Have you tried Spinosad?

[pepperhead212]

Eggplant, and many other things out there, I spray weekly with a mix of potassium bicarbonate and Surround, both of which can sit in the sprayer until the next use, without degrading. And that Surround keeps a lot of insects off, and even though it stays on the leaves and fruits fairly well; it takes a fairly heavy rain to wash off enough that I have to spray a coating on the whole plant, and most of the time I'm just spraying the new growth. It's easy to wash/wipe off the fruits, except for small ones, like hot peppers and cherry tomatoes - once those start fruiting, I start something else. As long as you spray the underside of the leaves, the aphids and flea beetles will stay away.

A variety of EP that I've been growing since the 80s, just before I got into seed starting, is the Japanese Ichiban. It is always my earliest producing variety, and it is a shiny black variety, much like the Millionaire above, which I also grew years ago, when this one dropped out of the catalogs, but none of the similar ones were as early or productive (but I still keep trying new ones!). I will say that it is like many tomatoes, in that it stops flowering in the high 90s, so where you are located many of those varieties our Texas friends recommend would probably be good for you. That Matrosik is a larger one I grew last year with great success. Just remember whatever varieties you try, harvest them in their bright and shiny stage, and if they stop growing, pick them! If the black ones lose their shine, and turn a dark purplish color, they are past their prime, and seeds are probably starting to develop, and some can get bitter then, though some are just seedy. And if you see a yellowing fruit, that's way past prime, unless you are saving seeds!

Good luck with your eggplant!

[karstopography]

Flea beetles aren’t a major issue here. They are around at times, but never so bad that they take over. I wonder what is keeping them in check? I use Spinosad from time to time, mostly on the tomatoes and peppers, but I will typically spray it on the eggplant too.

Eggplant are one of my lower maintenance vegetables for summer. Everything around here seems to want a piece of the tomatoes, thd foliage and fruit. Peppers are better in this regard than tomatoes and eggplant are better than peppers. Not every pepper will thrive, but I can’t remember an eggplant types that didn’t do well.

I’ve got Nadia and Beatrice out there this season, plus Aswad and Rosa Bianca, I’m glad to hear good reviews on Nadia. I gave my Matrosik plant to a friend and he has it in a grow bag about a mile away.

Beatrice is a hybrid.

A couple of days ago, I gave my eggplant a little liquid Tomato Food at the label recommended concentration. The plants looked good beforehand, now they look even better.

[Danny]

Can't add much to the suggestions, all good ones. I do grow several varieties at times and lean into some of the japanese regional eggplants. I try to grow a couple shapes and sizes depending on how I want to cook it as to which I look to use, but any can be swapped out.

Eggplant is so versatile in that it seems to take up the flavors of what you marinade or cook it with in the best ways. I love to put chunks into my japanese styled curry, and like it in many soups as well. Even have mixed smaller chunks with canned clams to marinade just before I make chowder - turns smooth and melting in the chowder and tastes a bit clam-ish. And we both love it in lasagna, larger thin slabs between the red sauce and meats. And get your own platter of breaded and fried eggplant, that one's mine !

If your eggplant has prickles on the cap, take your knife at about a 45 degree angle or so and just slide/slice it under the cap, instead of cutting the whole end off.

[Gardadore]

I always had bad luck growing eggplants in the ground. Since I switched to Earthboxes and built a tent around the boxes using mosquito netting I have had wonderful results with few bugs. Over the years I have grown many varieties and have concluded my favorites are Millionaire, Annina, Kamo, Ping Tung Long, a Turkish one from my Turkish neighbors, Galine and Casper. I love Matrosyk when it produces well but last year was a failure. I will try again this year. Rosa Bianca is beautiful but I have had mixed results from that one too. Eggplants are heavy feeders so that is why the Earthboxes work so well for me. I make Eggplant Lasagna, Eggplant Parm, Fried Eggplant and Babaganoush. My husband loves the last one. As a child I hated eggplant but over the years it has become one of my favorite summer vegetables! Good luck @eyegrotom growing them!

[NPKNorthTexas]

I have good luck with Ping Tung and Ichiban. NE Texas. Prefer to grow the long Asian varieties because the skin is tender and I make lots of stir-fry dishes. This year I've also planted some long green Thai eggplant. Last year I grew Millionaire and Fairytale. Both of those were winners too.