Eggplant, tomatoes, and peppers, have a great deal in common. All three are members of the nightshade family and all of them need a warm, rich soil and a long growing season. If they are cooked together they will make ratatouille, a great Mediterranean vegetable stew.
Eggplants are especially tricky to grow. Their seeds must be planted indoors at least eight weeks before you set them outside, and those seedlings require a warm, moist soil and plenty of sunshine. You may want to buy them from a garden nursery or garden center, because starting them on your own can be a very uncertain undertaking. In selecting seedlings, look for those in individual pots for minimal root disturbance when they were transplanted, and check the stems to be sure they are green and pliable, the woody-stemmed plants won’t produce nearly as well.
They require 100 to 120 days for the seeds to mature. The number of days that are given on seed packets can be a little misleading, because the days are mainly counted from the time the seedlings are planted outside. If you the gardener live in an area where summer arrives late, you should plant the early or fast-maturing varieties. The seedlings shouldn’t be transpanted into the garden before daytime temperatures reach 70 degrees F.
What Can Go Wrong
Verticilium wilt, a soil-borne disease, will affect eggplants as well as it does tomatoes and potatoes. The best way of preventing this from happening is crop rotation: don’t plant eggplant where any of the three vegetables have grown in the last three years.
Aphids, flea beetles and Colorado potato beetles have a feast on eggplant. You can control these pests by spraying, or dusting the plants with carbaryl, Diazinon, or methoxychlor. You need to check the pesticide label for the number of days that should elapse between spraying and harvesting.
Nutritional and Medicinal Facts
The good facts are: Eggplants are a very good source of copper, dietary fiber, folate, manganese, magnesium, niacin, potassium, thiamin, vitamin K and vitamin B6. They are also an excellent food for losing weight as they are low in calories, saturated fat and cholesterol. Unfortunately here are the bad facts: Eggplant is very high in sodium and a large portion of the calories come from sugars.
The medicinal benefits are many for those who tolerate eggplant well. Eating it can reduce swelling, reduce bleeding, clear stagnant blood, comfort bleeding hemorrhoids and treat dysentery. The bioflavonoids in eggplant could be quite beneficial in preventing hemorrhages and strokes. It also contains an antioxidant helpful in preventing cancer and heart disease.
If you live in the desert and come across scorpions and sustain a bite, you can apply raw eggplant directly on the affected area. For frostbite, you can prepare a tea of eggplant, bring to room temperature and apply a compress to the area.
