recipeworld

Of all of my recipes, I am most often asked for two: lasagna and guacamole. I’m not sharing either of those with you today, but I’m not telling you this to torture you, rather to make a point. In generations past, what was cooked by a person was usually directly related to their family background. Italians knew how to make a mean pasta, but probably couldn’t roast a chicken to save their lives. The French, on the other hand, were all over roast chicken, but wouldn’t be able to make chicken fried rice to save their lives.

Today, a lot of that has changed. In my cooking repertoire, I have recipes from all over the world. However, at the end, the recipes that work best, the recipes that are trustworthy and go-to recipes, are usually those that are connected to my background as an Italian-American.

The odd thing is, none of the Italian recipes I make were passed through generations or anything like that. Maybe I just have an innate feel for the ingredients, for the technique, for the theory of Italian cooking. It is often said that French cooking is all about making something incredible with not-so-great ingredients, while Italian cooking is about bringing out the best in amazing ingredients: simple preparation is best. While I can make a bearnaise sauce with the rest of them, my heart lies in this simplistic theory of Italian food.

So here, I offer my recipe for eggplant rollatini, invented purely by yours truly with only the many, many eggplant rollatini I have tried in the past. It’s simple, but it’s tried and true, and truly incredible.

Eggplant Rollatini

three large eggplants

1 cup flour, for dredging

two eggs, beaten with a tablespoon of milk

1 cup Italian breadcrumbs (if you can’t find Italian breadcrumbs, then combine one part grated Parmegiano-Reggiano cheese to three parts regular breadcrumbs, and add one teaspoon each dried ground oregano, dried parsley, dried basil, and dried garlic powder)

2 cups ricotta cheese

2 cups grated mozzarella cheese

2-3 tablespoons grated Parmegiano-Reggiano cheese

ground black pepper

fresh basil

Slice three eggplants lengthwise into strips about a quarter inch to a half inch thick. Make sure they’re all the same size. Dredge each slice in flour, then beaten egg, then Italian breadcrumbs. Place the dredged slices on a greased baking sheet, and bake for ten minutes on each side at 375 degrees.

In a bowl, combine equal parts ricotta cheese and grated mozzarella. Add a few tablespoons of parmegiano reggiano to taste, and season with black pepper and a chiffonade of fresh basil. Line the eggplant slices up so that one of the narrow sides is facing you. Place about a tablespoon of the cheese mixture at the end of each of the eggplant slices, and roll. Place them, seam side down, in a glass baking dish. When all of the rollatini have been rolled, cover with tomato sauce and bake at 350 until the cheese is melted.