This is for those of you who have Eggplant as a Beneficial:

How do you like to prepare it or have it prepared for you?

And/or: what foods do you like to serve/enjoy with it?

once upon a time
eggplant pie
like a quiche, same procedure

Not a benefical for me.

Favorite preperations are as a parmesan (baked, no tomato) or as a stir-fry in garlic sauce (Chinese eggplant is best there.)

as ratatouille, or stuffed halved eggplant......

Bake in oven, or grill over gas stove/charcoal, peel and mesh, add lemon/evoo/garlic sauce.

OK gotta go and wipe off my drools

The only way I've ever had it was Eggplant Parmesan with a tomato sauce.  It was essentially avoid for so long that I haven't thought about it.  
I just realized it is now a diamond on my SWAMI, so I'll be reading the thread with interest.

Slice asian type eggplant into ribbons, brush with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper and grill.

Baba ganoush!!  

I make mine with yoghurt stirred through instead of tahini and loads of garlic and lemon juice, plus fresh parsley, and great quality EVOO.

"...eggplant is first roasted in an oven for approximately 30 to 90 minutes (depending on the size of the eggplant) until the skin appears almost burnt and the eggplant begins to collapse.. The softened flesh is scooped out, squeezed or salted to remove excess water, and is then pureed with the tahini. There are many variants of the recipe, especially the seasoning. Seasonings include garlic, lemon juice, ground cumin, salt, mint, and parsley. When served on a plate or bowl, it is traditional to drizzle the top with olive oil." (wikipedia)

Of course moussaka, it has tomato paste but I don't have it but every couple of years. Layers of sliced and browned eggplant with layers of a ground lamb or deer and red wine sauce and bechemel on top.

thinny grilled slices as Yaman described it
or Lola in a form of ratatouille
or something very lekker....take out the half of the flesh and mix it with mergueze saussages and a lot of herbs and put it into the oven for about 30 minutes... yummy

Eggplant slices , Mozzarella slices, tomato sauce, salt  olive oi, basil, oregano,  in layers in the owen for 35-40 minutes.  Parmigiana of Melanzane in Italia cooking (also with Zucchini). the original recipe called for fried  eggplant slices, but it is too fat  !
Parmesan and a touch o bechamel in  small quantity in the layers is also good.
I did it seldom before BTD

There's a local guy who makes eggplant (melanzane) tapenade, i.e.,  a spread. Very nice.

Another favorite for me is Bengan Bhartha, a punjabi eggplant dish whose recipe varies greatly with the cook. It usually contains a fair amount of tomato (as does much Indian restaurant food) but it needn't. A good Indian cookbook should supply a few varied ideas as to what to do with eggplant, if you like that cuisine.

I generally like Indian food if I can avoid lentils. Hard to find a lot of the spices though. I use yogurt and curry spice to marinate meat a lots and the Green Egg grill gets hot enough to do faux tandoori well.

Quoted from gulfcoastguy

I generally like Indian food if I can avoid lentils. Hard to find a lot of the spices though. I use yogurt and curry spice to marinate meat a lots and the Green Egg grill gets hot enough to do faux tandoori well.

Which spices are hard to find?

Well I don't try that often but last time I looked at an Indian cookbook I didn't even recognize a third of the spices and I definitely can't find curry leaf though that is probably a thai recipe ingredient.

My experience is that the spices are not hard to find.
Fresh curry leaf (aka "neem leaf") is otherwise, generally requiring an Indian grocery, but it is definitely not necessary to have neem leaf in order to cook Indian food.
Go for it. Cooking Indian is very rewarding, if you love that cuisine.

Bay leaf is not a perfect substitute for curry leaf but it will do.

For my part, if a recipe calls for fresh curry leaf and I don't have any, I simply forget about it. That's what I've seen the Indian chefs saying: Treat it as an optional. And in practice it works.

Another thing I learned - the hard way, and early - is never to treat dried herbs and fresh ones as interchangeable.

Eggplant: Some people like to bread and fry slices. You could also bake it that way.

Wow - I look back over this thread and ponder the eggplant again - Aren't we Bs/Nomads (et al) lucky?