Eggplant parmigiana - original Italian recipe

Eggplant parmigiana: slices of fried eggplant seasoned with tomato sauce and grated Parmesan cheese baked in the oven. Find this and many more recipes on the Giallozafferano App in English http://itunes.apple.com/app/giallozafferano-recipes/id384387249?mt=8

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Hi all of you GialloZafferano visitors and welcome to our kitchen. I'm Sonia, and today we'll be preparing a dish with a very Mediterranean flavour: Eggplant(Aubergine) Parmesan.
Let's take a look at the ingredients we'll be using:
• 1400ml/6 cups of tomato puree
• Extra virgin olive oil
• One small onion
• Two cloves of garlic
• Table salt
• Fresh basil leaves
• 1.5kg/3lbs eggplant/aubergine
• Coarse or kosher salt
• 300g/11oz of a firm, savoury Italian cheese suitable for melting
• 150g/1 cup grated parmesan cheese
• Some canola or vegetable oil for frying the eggplant
OK. Let's begin preparing our eggplant parmesan!
First slice the eggplant into slices about a centimetre (a little less than a half inch) thick. Now in a sieve resting over a bowl, form layers of the eggplant slices, sprinkling a pinch of coarse salt between each layer. Finish off with another pinch of salt and cover the whole thing with a plate and something to weigh it all down. By doing this, the water that's naturally in the eggplant will drain out into the bowl. The eggplant needs to drain for about an hour and a half. In the meantime, we can prepare the tomato sauce by putting a bit of olive oil into a pot, adding the garlic and diced onion and sautéing them over a medium-low heat until soft but not browned. Then add the tomato puree and after everything is cooked through and well heated, finish off the sauce with a swirl of extra virgin olive oil and the fresh basil leaves.
After the eggplant has drained, rinse the slices well under running water to get rid of the extra salt, and dry them very thoroughly with paper towels. Now, it's time to fry them in the vegetable oil.
Finally, we can assemble our eggplant parmesan. In a casserole dish, add a thin layer of tomato sauce and then add the fried eggplant, forming a complete layer...like this. Now we'll add another layer of sauce over the eggplant. Now comes a sprinkling of the grated parmesan cheese and finally the slices of cheese -- you can add more or less according to how you like it. At this point, we'll start on the second layer. Remember, if you've layered your eggplant horizontally in the first layer, go vertically in the second layer. We'll finish off the dish with a layer of sauce and a good sprinkling of parmesan and now we're ready to bake the dish at 200⁰C/395⁰F for about 40 minutes.
Here's our eggplant parmesan out of the oven. Leave it to cool so that the layers can settle and make serving each portion easier.
From Sonia and GialloZafferano -- Bye, and see you next time!

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[Ossi836]

Recipe ingredients include onion and garlic. Did anyone see where they come in or did I miss it? Thanks in advance!

[yellowsaffron]

@Ossi836 They're in the tomato sauce

[jdubbs530]

in America we bread the eggplant, do you ever do that in Italy?

[yellowsaffron]

@jdubbs530 Yes, somewhere in Italy they do that!

[fannysmack]

I want to try this, but what kind of cheese is used for melting??????

[yellowsaffron]

@fannysmack A type of kneaded-paste cheese, like caciocavallo, or mozzarella

[corrosive33]

Quit using imperial!!! Metric is better.

[nnejdee]

Looks so good, but I would like to see you serve it. Thx!

[lionking1926]

At 1:14 it seems there is Allah in arabi written on the eggplant,in a pot on the right most eggplant

[icxcrex]

There are probably as many versions of melanzane parmigiana as there are "mommas" in Italia. If you want to bread them, go for it (it adds calories and makes it an oily mess). Adding buffalo milk cheese is not an American invention, it is quite Italian. The eggplant is fried in olive oil. I have had luck dredging them in flour, spraying with olive oil, and baking at 400 for 5 minutes. In most of Italian cooking, "less is more."

[themochico90]

Questo piatto è sublime, a casa a momenti non rimane nemmeno la teglia! :)

[vicdibella]

adding melted cheese is an american addition. fine if you like it. just don`t call it original.

[miamiherald75]

@fannysmack you can use mozzarella it works well.