Ziti with Roasted Eggplant and Ricotta Cheese

The pasta recipe comes from Lidia’s Italian-American Kitchen. Lidia Bastianich has a show on PBS, and she is well known for her Italian cuisine. It’s very authentic, and the few things we’ve made of hers have all been delicious! It is a rustic and hearty dish and very tasty! I’ve never really cooked much with eggplant, but I really love it. It’s important to get the smaller firmer eggplants as opposed to the extra large Italian American varieties, and there’s a salting process that’s necessary in making the eggplant melt in your mouth tender. Definitely not a weekday meal, as it is very time consuming. We’ll definitely make this recipe again, but probably will half the recipe, because it makes enough to serve a small army! The pan fried eggplant recipe is -s’s
Ziti with Roasted Eggplant and Ricotta Cheese

Ingredients:

• 2 large firm eggplants (each about 3 inches in diameter and 1.25 pounds)
• 2 TBSP coarse salt, plus more for cooking the pasta and seasoning the sauce
• 6 TBSP olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced
• One 35 ounce can peeled Italian plum tomatoes preferably San Marzano), lightly crushed, with their liquid. We used 2 28 ounce cans. You can also skip the sauce making step and just use your favorite sauce.
• 1 tsp. crushed hot red pepper. We omitted to make more kid friendly
• 1 pound ziti
• 1 cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese. We used peccorino Romano
• 1 cup fresh basil leaves, washed, dried, and shredded
• 1/2 pound (1 cup) fresh ricotta cheese or packaged whole-milk ricotta cheese. We used the part skim variety
• 8 ounces Fontina cheese, thinly sliced (if baking the pasta). We used mozzarella.

Assembly:

• Trim the stems from the eggplants. Remove strips of peel about 1 inch wide from the eggplants, leaving about half of the peel intact. Cut the eggplant into 1 inch cubes. Toss in a large bowl with 2 TBSP of salt. Dump into a colander and let drain for 1 hour.
• Rinse the eggplant under cool running water, drain thoroughly and pat dry.
• Preheat oven to 400F. Brush a baking sheet with 3 TBSP of the olive oil. Turn the eggplant cubes onto the baking sheet, toss to coat with oil, and spread them out in an even layer. Bake until the eggplant is very tender and browned, about 25 minutes. Turn and stir the eggplant cubes gently once or twice during baking so they cook evenly.
• Bring 6 quarts of water to a boil in an 8 quart pot over high heat.
• Heat the remaining 3 TBSP olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Scatter the garlic over the oil and cook, shaking the pan, until golden, about 3 minutes. Pour in the crushed tomatoes, add the pepper flakes, and season lightly with salt. Bring to a boil, adjust the heat to simmering, and simmer for 10 minutes. We actually simmer for 30 minutes to get a more thickened rich sauce.
• Stir the ziti into the boiling water. Return to a boil, stirring frequently. Cook the pasta, stirring occasionally, until done, about 10 minutes.
• Drain the pasta and return it to the pot over low heat. Pour in all but about 1/4 cup of the sauce, and toss lightly to coat the pasta with sauce. Remove the pot from the heat, and stir in 3/4 cup of the Parmigiano-Reggiano and the basil. Gently stir in the eggplant. Add the ricotta by heaping teaspoonfuls, stirring it gently into the pasta; you want the ricotta to heat, but you don not want it to blend with the sauce completely. Either serve the pasta as is–right from the pot–sprinkled with the remaining 1/4 cup of the grated cheese, or gently slide it into a 13 x 11 baking dish. Arrange the Fontina slices overlapping to cover the top of the pasta. Spoon the reserved sauce over the Fontina and sprinkle the top of the baking dish with the remaining 1/4 cup grated cheese. Bake until the edges of the baking dish are bubbling and the cheese is lightly browned, about 20- to 30 minutes.

Pan Fried Eggplant

Ingredients:

• Eggplant
• Salt
• Flour
• Egg
• Breadcrumbs
• Seasoning

Assembly:

• Rinse the eggplant and remove stems. Remove strips of peel about 1 inch wide from the eggplants, leaving about half of the peel intact. Slice into 1/2 inch rounds. Salt the eggplant and let drain for 1 hour, and then rinse with cold running water and pat dry.
• Put some flour in one bowl. Put an egg in another bowl. Put Panko bread crumbs in the third bowl. Season the breadcrumbs with salt, pepper, and Italian seasoning (like basil and oregano).
• Heat a skillet with about 1/2 inch of oil. Take your eggplant rounds, dip in the flour, then the egg, then the breadcrumbs. Pan fry until golden brown.

Ziti with Roasted Eggplant and Ricotta Cheese

Pan Fried Eggplant