Hot eggplant slices

This week on Without Reck: Cooking Disasters:

It's footBAWL time so it's time for game day recipes. First up, I read eggplants are supposed to soak up flavors. Here's a flavor I want to try: hot sauce!

My eggplant didn't store so well.

It got frost on one side which partially melted which meant there was a wet lump on half and the other half was dry. I think if this eggplant was human doctors would say it has a hematoma.

It looks all right on the inside, so let's proceed with the plan.

First, let's cover it in hot sauce so the slices will soak up the spiciness.

Then, I have some spicy sausage to put on top. I try to be extra careful around raw meat since it's pretty much the most dangerous thing I cook with. So I'm going to brown the sausage first.

Then it can go on top of the eggplant slices.

Next, we add the cheese. Pepperjack, for spiciness.

Now it's ready for broiling. I prefer broiling to baking for dishes where the top has what needs to be melted.

I will add extra pepper to make it spicier.

Done!

Finished, they look pretty tasty.

But the eggplant didn't go so well. It was slimy and wet. I was expecting the flavor-soaking ability of the eggplant to make the eggplant taste like hot sauce or something.

I'm going to try to get the water out overnight.

The next day the eggplant is considerably drier.

I'll microwave it again to melt the cheese.

The dish is still fine except for the eggplant. The sausage and cheese are all spicy and yummy, but the eggplant flavor just doesn't fit. In a last ditch effort I'll try frying.

Oops. Slightly overdone.

It looks nice, but eggplant just doesn't go well with sausage. Or maybe it's just the hematoma eggplant. Either way, I ended up eating the sausage and cheese and not the eggplant.