Nightshades: Eggplants, Tomatoes And More Variety

Graffiti Eggplant:

Graffiti—or Sicilian—eggplant gets its name from its purple and white stripes. Stripes disappear when cooked. This is an all-purpose eggplant.

Long, narrow, and nearly lavender in color, Japanese eggplant are creamy with a thin skin and few seeds. These are fantastic for grilling.

These are tiny, elegant heirloom eggplants that are purple with white stripes. They can be grilled, or even fried whole.

Originally from Turkey and popular in the Mediterranean, this eggplant is small (on average, 2 ounces). These are particularly good fried.

This sweet, tart tomatillo is purple throughout and makes a superlative salsa. It’s rare, so if you see it, don’t think twice.

This small, pretty, zesty tomato is a crowd favorite. This tomato needs nothing more than a quick slice. Serve it with equally appealing dark tomatoes for an eye-catching salad.

A dark, purple-fleshed tomato with deep, rich flavor, this is outstanding on a BLT. Plants yield very little, so you may want to guard these tomatoes with your life.

This is a spicy, full-bodied tomato that’s perfect for sauce. Tomatoes are larger than a fist when ripe, meaning a little goes a long way.

These bite-sized golden tomatoes are bright and clean and lovely sliced in half atop a ball of burrata. But, burrata notwithstanding, these tomatoes are perfectly good eaten right from the vine—or from your farmer’s market box.

This heirloom is sometimes called Rose Fir and is a rare and beautiful rosy-colored fingerling potato. This waxy potato is yellow inside and ideal for a toothsome potato salad, lightly dressed.

Few nightshades are as show-stoppingly beautiful as the All Blue, with its indigo skin and flesh. Bake them or boil them—the color will not retreat.

This arcane potato dates back to 1780s New Jersey; homesteading families have continued to preserve seeds, allowing this potato to survive years of changing agricultural trends. Potatoes are creamy and pale, with a moderate amount of sugar and will hold their structure when baked.

Potatoes have a rose-colored skin and yellow flesh and do not require peeling. Rumor has it that these were smuggled into the United States via horse feedbag in the 1800s, but why complain? Smash them with a fork into French butter, et voila!

These intensely sweet peppers ripen to a rich red-brown and are ideal for sautéing. Think onions and sausages and you’ll have an idea of this pepper’s full potential.

This purple pepper has a mild, slightly sweet taste. Fruits ripen through a showy stage of violet, yellow and orange streaks, eventually turning a rich, very dark red. Catch them mid-ripening for peppers that look like a Long Island sunset.

A mild, sweet pepper widely used in Balkan cooking, which ripens to a deep orange. Slice them and serve them bathed in red wine vinegar along with cucumbers and white onion for a traditional Balkan salad.

These tiny Japanese peppers are best eaten whole. Traditionally, they are flash-fried in oil and served with mayonnaise, but they’re good on the grill, too. Peppers are mild with the occasional hot one (typically, one in 10 peppers is hot).

This Polish heirloom resembles the tomatillo, with a similar husk that needs to be removed before eating. They’re sweet and golden-orange and require nearly nothing: just a dab of whipped cream over a handful will suffice. Or make jam and extend the season as long as you like.