Eggplant Parmigianino

Here is another recipe inspired by my CSA allotment.  It was, how you say, delizioso!

The sauce is why it is so tasty.  I had to move the sauce to an orange bowl so I could use my favorite cast iron frying pan to brown the eggplant.  With sauce this awesome even fried cardboard would have tasted good.

Tomato sauce and cheese on top?  Yum!

I've had this dish in restaurants but it never tasted as good as what I made tonight.

Ingredients:  1 large eggplant peeled and cut into 1/2 inch slices, 2 tsp. salt, 1 extra large onion chopped, 1/2 colored bell pepper (mine was purple) diced, 20 crumbled leaves of basil that have been air dried this week, 1 tsp dried oregano, 1 tsp dried thyme, 3 TB olive oil, 2 roma tomatoes and 1 slicing tomato diced, 2 6 oz cans tomato paste, 1 TB honey, 1 1/2 tsp lemon-pepper seasoning, 4 minced garlic cloves, 2 eggs slightly beaten, black pepper,  1 1/2 cups dried bread crumbs, 2 TB butter, 8 cups grated mozzarella cheese

Directions:  Place eggplant slices in a colander; sprinkle with salt.  Let stand 30 minutes.  Meanwhile in a large skilled saute the onions, bell pepper, basil, oregano and thyme in oil until the onions are tender.  Add the diced tomatoes, tomato paste, honey and lemon pepper.  Bring to a boil,  Reduce heat and simmer for 30 minutes.  Add garlic.  Simmer 10 more minutes.  Rinse eggplant slices and dry on a clean towel.  Pat dry.  In a shallow bowl combine eggs with black pepper to taste. Place bread crumbs in another shallow bowl.  Dep eggplant into eggs then coat with crumbs.  Melt butter in a frying pan.  Add half of the eggplant slices and brown each side for about 3 minutes.  Do the same to the other half of the eggplant.  In a 9x13 inch greased baking pan, set the eggplant slices down.  Top each slice with a generous scoop of the delicious sauce and a handful of mozzarella cheese.  When the bottom layer of the pan is full, stack the eggplant slices on a second layer. Continue until all the eggplant, sauce and cheese is in the pan.  Bake at 375 for 35 minutes or until bubbly.

Obviously this recipe takes a lot of time which explains why my dinner was delayed until 7:30 tonight but it was worth the wait.  DELIZIOSO!