Eggplant Parmesan

Eggplant Parmesan is one of my absolute favourite dishes that Scott prepares.  Actually, I don't think Scott much cares for eggplant, rather he makes it just for me.  To make this delicious low calorie dish, he started with two medium size eggplants.  We are growing eggplants in our garden this year, but they aren't close to ready, so these came from the Farmer's Market. Scott sliced up the eggplants at about 3/4 inch thick. Thicker than in the restaurant, they will take a little longer to bake, but stay firmer and taste better.  He sprinkled them with salt and let them "sweat" for a few minutes while he finely chopped up a melée of herbs from the garden (basil, oregano, thyme, chives).

Scott blended a little olive oil into the herbs as he mixed them together and pressed 1/2 of the herb mixture into both sides of the eggplant. Before setting  work to the eggplant he warmed a small amount of olive oil in a large skillet on the stove.  The assembly line requires 3 cereal bowls. Into bowl 1 goes flour, bowl 2 gets 1 egg, scrambled with a little milk, and into bowl 3 goes Panko bread crumbs, which are lighter and fluffier than regular breadcrumbs, and as a bonus generally healthier since they don't contain any artificial ingredients. Each slice of eggplant starts with a light coating of flour, then gets dipped into the scrambled egg and finally coated with Panko.  Scott seasoned the Panko with the other 1/2 of the herb mixture before he started to process the eggplant.

Once the slices have all been coated, they head into the skillet for a couple of minutes on each side until the coating is crispy and golden brown.  The eggplant will mostly cook in the oven, but this step is important to get a crispy crust and hold in the juices when it bakes. The eggplant slices then get laid into an ovenproof glass baking dish.  Slices should not stack on top of each other so choose a dish large enough to provide each slice ample room.  Scott covered the eggplant slices with two jars of our homemade spaghetti sauce. (Stay tuned for how to can your own spaghetti sauce in a couple of weeks when the tomato harvest rolls in) Any tomato sauce will work, but don't use the kind with meat, as it competes with the flavours of the eggplant.  The tomato sauce should completely cover the eggplant.  Lastly, he grated mozzarella cheese on top and finished the dish with some freshly grated parmesan.  The whole dish goes into a 375 oven for about 30 minutes. While eggplant parmesan is delicious all by itself, we enjoy it on top of pasta, you can use spaghetti, linguini or another long noodle.  Surprisingly, this dinner is fairly low calorie, as mozzarella is a low fat cheese, and the eggplant is cooked mostly in tomato sauce, rather than fried with lots of oil.  Easily one of my top 5 all-time dinner favourites.