Eggplant is thought to have originated in India and Sri Lanka, but there are some who think that it came from Southeast Asia in the area of Myanmar and was imported to India during the earliest period of civilization. The Tamil name, brinjal, apparently comes from ancient Sanskrit.

Eggplant went north to China and west through the Middle East and Africa with the trade routes. The Moors brought eggplant to Spain, but it was not widely known to Europeans until the Middle Ages (ca. 1500s). Any ‘well-educated’ European knew that eggplant was one of those nightshades and the fruit would make you crazy; they even called it Mala insana, the “madde apple”.

This field of eggplant is perhaps nine thousand miles and thirty-five hundred years from its horticultural beginnings. Mutations and selections have created numerous varieties from small goose eggs to large oblong and round fruits with colors from white and yellow to pink and deep purple. Usually though, only oblong deep purple varieties are cultivated in the U.S.

 

A note on the production of eggplants: Eggplant is one of the winter crops in Florida. Rows (beds) are prepared 6 feet apart. Fertilizer is added in two rows along the length of the bed, drip irrigation tubing is laid, the bed is fumigated and a sheet of plastic is stretched over the soil as it is shaped to 8 inches high and 36 inches wide. A week later, the eggplants are planted through the plastic every three feet along the bed with a stake between each plant. Stringed together, the stakes support the plants from wind damage.

Row cropping of eggplants or other vegetables is not cheap. It costs the farmer about $7.50 for each bushel of eggplants produced. The field must produce at least 900 bushels per acre for a break-even; 1,400 bushels per acre will bring a profit. Although the plastic-covered bed method reduces fertilizer, water, herbicide and insecticide use, one good windstorm or a cold front can shrink the crop to a loss.

 

(Compiled from: Hortus Third, Staff L.H. Bailey Hortorium, NY State College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, Cornell University, Macmillan Publishing, NY, 1976; “Eggplant Production in Miami-Dade County, Florida”, Y.C. Li, W. Klassen, M. Lamberts and T. Olczyk, Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences, University of Florida, April 2006; “Eggplant”, Wikipedia, 2007)