Italian cuisine, like Italian fashion - everyone has heard about it, everyone wants it, and no one knows what its difference is. And we will not think!
Let's call pasta pasta, or spaghetti. Grandma's name "blue" ennobled in "eggplant", oregano will be called "oregano". Well, and on the table we will serve not just macaroons under vegetable sauce, but “Pasto-Italian-eggplant”, then this kids will be delighted.
Eggplant in Italian - general principles of cooking
• Styling eggplants under Italian recipes use them unpeeled. Vegetable cut into pieces, medium-sized straws or rings. To remove the bitterness, the crushed “blue” ones are soaked in saline solution or kept under the load, sprinkled with salt, and then washed.
• Eggplants are baked in the oven in the form of baked puddings or stewed with vegetables. Especially popular is pasta with eggplants in Italian.
• Integral components of any Italian dish: tomatoes and cheese. Use fresh, canned in their own juice, tomatoes or tomato paste. If we talk about cheeses, in most cases solid varieties are used, less often “Mozzarella”. Homemade homemade cheese will do.
• Pasta - any kind of pasta. For cooking pasta with eggplants in Italian, you should take products, mixed with flour, from the so-called "hard" wheat varieties. To prevent sticking of pasta they are immersed only in boiling water. Cook with a slight boil until fully cooked or leave slightly undercooked. Ready-made pasta must be washed with hot water.
Italian-style eggplant pasta with canned tomatoes
Ingredients:
• 200 gr. spaghetti;
• one small eggplant;
• ripe red tomato;
• 60 gr. any non-sharp cheese;
• clove garlic, small.
Cooking Method:
1. Cut the eggplant, first along the half-centimeter thickness, and then across, in strips of the same width. 2. Pour two tablespoons of vegetable oil into the pan and lightly fry the chopped vegetable on it. Do not put in badly heated oil, the pulp quickly absorbs it.
3. As soon as the vegetable strips become transparent, add the tomato cut into small cubes and bring the vegetable frying to readiness.
4. In the end, add salt to your taste, add garlic pressed through on a press, mix and set aside from the heat.
5. Boil spaghetti until cooked, and rinse them with hot water. Drain, put in a colander, then arrange in plates, add hot eggplant sauce on top and sprinkle with cheese, chopped on a small grater.
Italian Stewed Eggplants with Almonds
Ingredients:
• two medium eggplants;
• five small tomatoes;
• 50 gr. pitted olives;
• two spoons of capers;
• head of sweet red onions;
• 2 tablespoons of vinegar;
• blend “Provencal herbs” - 1/2 tsp;
• green parsley;
• olive oil - 60 g .;
• garlic;
• teaspoon oregano;
• two tablespoons chopped, roasted almonds.
Cooking Method:
1. Wash the parsley, shake off the water and wipe it dry with a towel. Separate the stems and cut them in small pieces with a knife. Separately chop the greens.
2. Slice the eggplants and tomatoes into large chunks, finely chop the onion with a heavy, sharp knife.
3. Fill capers with cold water, soak in it for about a quarter of an hour and dry well.
4. Heat olive oil over high heat and dip the eggplant pieces into it. Sprinkle them with oregano, lightly salt and fry them for 5 minutes, without ceasing to mix.
5. Add the onion, add the chopped parsley stalks and finely chopped garlic. Put the capers, cut along the olives. Sprinkle with a mixture of "Provence herbs", sprinkle with vinegar. If necessary, add just a little bit of olive oil and continue cooking until the acid evaporates.
6. Reduce the flame level to medium, add tomatoes to the vegetable mass and, having mixed well, simmer for 20 minutes.
7. Then, according to your taste, season the vegetables with ground pepper and remove the salt sample. Add if necessary. Pour chopped parsley, almonds and, carefully mixed, remove from heat. 8. Serve hot to the pasta or on your own.
Italian Baked Eggplants
Ingredients:
• bitter onion head;
• ten pitted green olives;
• three large eggplants;
• 150 gr. Mozzarella cheese;
• 40 gr. cheese, preferably "Parmesan";
• blend “Italian herbs” - to taste;
• 50 ml of olive, or well-purified vegetable oil;
• 30 ml of balsamic vinegar;
• four large cloves of garlic;
• tablespoon of sugar;
• red tomatoes - 5 pcs., Small size;
• 40 gr. capers;
Cooking Method:
1. Cut the eggplants in half lengths and cover with cold water for 20 minutes. Then, wipe the vegetables dry, put on a baking sheet in slices up and slightly moisten with olive oil. In the oven, heated to 180 degrees, set a baking pan with “blue” at an average level and bake for half an hour.
2. In small pieces, chop the onion, chop the olives into thin half rings, chop capers. In the oil, lightly fry the crushed ingredients for at least five minutes and sprinkle with “Provencal herbs”.
3. Add salt to your taste, add sugar, lightly pepper and mix. Pour in balsamic vinegar and roast on the lowest heat for another two minutes.
4. Tomatoes and “Mozzarella” cut into circles no thicker than 0.5 cm.
5. On the baked eggplants, gently place the tomato mugs, spread the onion evenly with olives and capers on top, and place the mozzarella on top of it.
6. Sprinkle the whole Parmesan cheese, chopped on a fine grater, and put in the oven for 10 minutes.
Italian-style eggplant pasta with mushrooms
Ingredients:
• 350 gr. thin pasta;
• one large eggplant;
• garlic;
• 350 gr. unsalted tomato paste;
• 250 gr. fresh mushrooms;
• half a liter of boiled water;
• olive oil;
• a bunch of young greens - choose to taste.
Cooking Method:
1. Rinse the eggplant and mushrooms well, dry. Mushrooms cut into small slices, and “blue” thin straws. If you have a large vegetable, soak its pieces in saline, then rinse and dry. 2. Chop one clove of garlic with a knife and dip it in a well-heated oil. As soon as the garlic flavor goes, add the eggplant and simmer for three minutes.
3. Salt lightly, add chopped mushrooms and stir well, continue to simmer for another three minutes. Put the fried eggplant and mushrooms in a bowl and temporarily set aside.
4. In a deep frying pan, pour the dry pasta with water. Add the tomato and finely chopped garlic, lightly salted, pepper and put on an intense fire. Continuing to mix, bring to a boil, then lower the temperature and continue cooking until the pasta is soft.
5. Put the previously laid mushrooms with eggplants in the prepared paste, stir, sprinkle with chopped greens and serve immediately.
Italian Eggplant Casserole
Ingredients:
• 800 gr. “Blue”;
• one large onion;
• four spoons of wheat flour;
• 800 gr. tomato, canned in tomato juice;
• two eggs;
• 60 gr. cheese, Parmesan or other hard grades;
• extra virgin olive oil;
• to taste - oregano;
• garlic - 3 slices.
Cooking Method:
1. First prepare the blue ones. Cut the vegetables into centimeter thick mugs and put them in a colander, pouring salt over each layer. Place a round plate or shallow plate on top and place the load. Even a half-liter can of water is enough. Be sure to place a deep container of a smaller diameter under the colander so that the bitterness leaving the “blue” bitterness flows into it.
2. After 20 minutes, remove the load, and wash the eggplants, well rinsing the bitterness and salt residues from the pieces, dry them.
3. With canned tomatoes, remove the skin.
4. Cut the onion into small pieces and fry it in olive oil. Do not fry, it is enough to bring the pieces to transparency.
5. Sprinkle the fried onions with two spoons of flour, mix well. Immediately add peeled tomatoes to it, pour the remaining juice in the jar and mix well again. 6. Protue the vegetable sauce on low heat for 10 minutes. Add finely chopped or chopped garlic, oregano, lightly salted, sprinkle a little, remove from heat.
7. In the remaining flour, roll the dried eggplant mugs and fry them in the hot oil, after having dipped it in a beaten egg.
8. In a heat-resistant form, lay a layer of fried "blue", sprinkle them with a large crumb of cheese and cover with half a tomato sauce. Put the eggplants back on top, just sprinkle them with cheese and pour the remaining gravy.
9. Place the form on the grill, set at an average level of the oven, and bake 40 minutes when heated to 180 degrees. Do not forget to preheat the oven.
10. Let the baked pudding stand for ten minutes and then serve.
Italian-style eggplant pasta with fresh tomatoes
Ingredients:
• “blue” - 2 pcs .;
• two small bell peppers;
• top grade pasta - 500 gr .;
• 50 gr. fresh hard cheese, preferably Parmesan;
• five large tomatoes;
• a tablespoon of refined vegetable oil;
• two spoons of pottery salt;
• “Provencal herbs” - to taste;
• five small cloves of garlic.
Cooking Method:
1. Eggplants, without peeling, cut into cups, two or more centimeters thick. In a saucepan, in two liters of cold water, dissolve a couple of tablespoons of salt and soak pieces of “blue” in the prepared solution. Exposure time is two hours. Then rinse well and put in a colander to dry.
2. Spread the dried circles on a baking sheet, moisten with butter and set to bake for a quarter of an hour, at 180 degrees.
3. First cut the tomatoes in half, and then cut each half thinly across. Grind the garlic with a knife, chop the sweet pepper into thin straws.
4. Heat the vegetable oil over a low heat, dip the pepper into it, and pass until it is soft.
5. Add baked eggplant mugs, tomatoes, and continue to quench at minimum heat for about a quarter of an hour. 6. Salt, season the vegetable roast with “Provencal herbs”, add finely chopped garlic. Stir and bring to readiness, slightly lowering the temperature. It takes about five minutes.
7. Simultaneously with cooking the sauce, boil the pasta, rinse it well with hot water and strain the residue into a colander. Arrange in plates, add the eggplant sauce and sprinkle with finely grated cheese on top.
Italian Eggplants - cooking tricks and useful tips
• To keep the eggplant slices from absorbing a lot of oil and, while being quenched with other vegetables, they retain their shape, they are dipped only in well-heated butter and fried for the first three minutes on high heat. With the same purpose, it is not recommended to mix the vegetables often, therefore, in order that the sauce does not burn, it is tormented with minimal heating.
• If the “blue ones” are soaked in saline or sprinkled with salt, be sure to rinse and rinse thoroughly with water. Before further salting, remove the sample.
• When cooking pasta with eggplants in Italian, first prepare the eggplant sauce and only then boil the pasta so that they do not have time to cool. By the way, how to cook pasta?
