This was quite good. An interesting cominbation of flavors. As suggested by a previous reviewer I used 5 cups chopped spinach. Another change I made was to "sweat" the eggplant before cooking. I find that I do not like the taste of eggplant unless I sweat it first. To do this slice the eggplant into about 1/2 inch slices sprinkle both sides of each slice generously with salt and let sit for at least an hour. The eggplant should release a fair amount of liquid. When ready to cook rinse off the eggplant slices and pat dry.
My thought is to purge the eggplant first and allow the sweetness to come out. Peel and slice it as if you were about to cube or dice it. Lay the slices out on a cutting board or a cookie sheet over a layer of paper towels. Lay out the eggplant slices And lightly salt them. Turn them over and repeat. Cover with another layer of paper towels. Let stand for 15-25 minutes. rinse & pat dry. Dice or cube as needed and continue with recipe. I think it will help.:)
I couldn't disagree more with the prior review that only rated this recipe at one star. I made a few changes...added a bit more garlic added half of a large diced onion and thinly sliced a carrot to add beta carotene. I also used a parmesan-romano mixture instead of only parmesan. We will definitely make this again.
This recipe was fantastic. I hope everybody is realizing that the author probably meant "3/4 pounds of pasta" not 3/4 CUP. I used 3/4 pounds and the ratio of veggies to pasta and cheese was great. This tasted like something I would be delighted to receive in a restaurant. I also doubled the spinach and used probably 2 tbsp lemon juice. I will make this as often as I can find a decent-looking eggplant!
This recipe is great! I halved it and used only 1 tablespoon of olive oil instead of the 2 that halving the recipe would've called for. I also used a little more spinach and a little less lemon juice than what was called for but it had enough lemony flavor for me. I will definitely be making this recipe again in the future!
I only gave this 4 stars simply because my family doesn't care for eggplant. However using zuchinni works very well. I also added onion and used the parmesan/romano mix. I reduced the lemon juice to 1 tbsp (3 was too strong for me). I'm going to try adding chicken or shrimp and see what happens!
My store had spinach and eggplant on sale so I did an ingredient search and this recipe came up! It's a great use of eggplant. I did like another reviewer and "sweated" the eggplant. I used a microwave method I just read about in Cook's Illustrated (mix 1 cubed eggplant with 1 tsp kosher salt line a plate with 2 layers of coffee filters and spray with cooking spray microwave on high for 10 minutes stirring halfway through). I left the skin on the eggplant and I used 6 cups of spinach because it cooks down so much. I used whole wheat rotini and threw in a handful of toasted pine nuts. Very tasty!
The eggplant needs a little more time to cook than 10 minutes...i would say five more minutes would do the trick...also i didnt think 3 cups of spinach was enough so i ended up adding more.
A superb mishmash of flavors! Next time I make this I'm going to use about 5 cups chopped spinach (4 svgs) instead of 3. For those of you who don't like Parmesan cheese stay away from this!
