What effect does soaking eggplant have on eggplant Parmesan?

If you're cooking it in some other way — roasting, grilling, steaming — salting has no effect. ... want the eggplant to be creamy and tender — such as with parmigiana — in those cases where you want the eggplant to retain its shape and have a slightly firmer texture — such as ratatouille — you can skip it. read more

Cut the eggplant in whatever shape you want; large sliced, cubed, thin sliced. Place the eggplant in a colander mix with salt - cooking salt is best. Let it drain as long as you can - over a day is best - leave it in the fridge overnight. read more

Sprinkling pieces of cut eggplant with salt, and then wiping or rinsing the salt away would draw some of the bitter juice out of the eggplant. The myth persists, but cultivation techniques and selective- and cross-breeding have made bitter eggplants vanishingly rare. read more

The bowl under the colander that held the salted eggplant had a quarter of an inch of brown water in it, and the slices had turned flimsy. SIGN UP for the free In the Kitchen newsletter >> So salting had pulled moisture from the eggplant. read more