What Kathrine & Jeff have recently been cooking.

Roasted Eggplant Pasta with Parmesan Breadcrumbs

October 31, 2024

We (Kathrine & Jeff) have made this a handful of times, and it's a really tasty (and vegan-friendly) one-pot dinner that makes for great leftovers.

If you're not in the mood to make the tomato sauce from scratch, Rao's Spicy Arrabbiata Sauce is a great hack. (Be warned: it's actually spicy, like, way spicier than you would expect from a nationally distributed sauce, so go with a milder version if you don't want spice. But, really, It's actually a little insulting that it's better straight out of the jar than what is even possible to make without perfect tomatoes.)
We would definitely recommend using pecorino romano here -- you really need the salty, almost feta-like quality of the pecorino to cut through the richness of the dish.
Don't sleep on the garlicy-herby panko bread crumbs. We skipped adding them the first time we made this dish, and we were proved wrong after trying it with the breadcrumbs the next time.
Not really a note, but rather an affirmation -- or exclamation! -- roasting the eggplant in the oven before adding it to the sauce was A GAME-CHANGER. I (Kathrine) have always struggled with making an eggplant pasta with the right texture, etc., but roasting it in the oven will not only save you a bit of a headache, it makes throwing the sauce together (especially if you're using a jar of Rao's) so much easier. Weeknight dinner done!
After making it again last night, we can also confirm that if you're using the really thick eggplants, it might be better to cube it (or remove part of the skin) instead of cutting it in rounds. The skin didn't "disappear" in the same way it has when we've used skinner bois.