Eggplant Parmigiana

Eggplant parmigiana is one of my favourite tray bakes. It’s so easy, delicious and uses only a handful of ingredients! Layers of grilled eggplant with rich herbed tomato sauce and a crunchy, crispy, oozy breadcrumb and mozzarella top. Seriously so delicious!

This dish originates from Parma in Italy, and is called ‘melanzane alla parmigiana’ which basically translates to ‘eggplant the Parma way’. Eggplant parmigiana kind of reminds me of a vegetarian lasagne of sorts. But instead of using pasta sheets, you are using finely sliced grilled pieces of eggplant.

The most important part to making the perfect eggplant parmigiana with tender and soft eggplant slices is sprinkling the raw eggplant with lots of salt and leaving the eggplant slices to sit and dehydrate for at least half an hour. This draws some of the water out of the eggplant so that the eggplant parmigiana is not so watery and soggy when you go to cook it. It creates firm, tight slices that hold together nicely. It also makes the flavour so much more intense.

If you have leftovers of your eggplant parmigiana (I highly doubt it!) then store it in the fridge overnight before reheating very well the next day.

Happy cooking guys and if you make it, please do let me know how you go!

Mel x

Eggplant Parmigiana

Serves 6

Ingredients:

2 large eggplants, sliced in rounds about 1/2 cm thick

Salt

¼ cup (60mL) extra virgin olive oil

1 red onion, diced

3 garlic cloves, roughly chopped

2 tbs tomato paste

1 can (400g) crushed tomatoes

½ tsp dried oregano

½ tsp salt

½ tsp cracked black pepper

1 ½ cup (180g) mozzarella, grated

1 cup (60g) breadcrumbs

Method:

To begin, lay out a couple of tea towels on your bench. Place the rounds of eggplant on top and sprinkle very generously with salt. Let them sit for 30-60 minutes. After this time you will see that droplets of water have been drawn out of the eggplant. Firmly dab each eggplant with paper towel to soak up the water. You will also collect a lot of the salt.

While you are waiting for your eggplant, you can make your sauce.

Heat up the olive oil on medium in a pan and saute the onions and garlic for 5 minutes. Then add in the tomato paste, tomatoes, oregano, salt and pepper and reduce the heat to low. Cook this until you’re ready to assemble the tray bake.

While the sauce is cooking on low, heat your oven to 355F (180C) and lay the eggplant out in a single layer onto baking paper lined trays. Bake for 15 minutes until softened.

Then in a rectangle baking dish, layer the eggplant and sauce in alternating layers until you’ve used it all then top with mozzarella and breadcrumbs. Gently push down on top of the breadcrumbs to flatten it out then baking for 40 minutes until golden. You can bake it slightly longer if you love an extra crispy top. Rest for 5 minutes then slice and serve.